{"id":8069,"date":"2017-03-09T12:13:36","date_gmt":"2017-03-09T19:13:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/?p=8069"},"modified":"2017-03-08T10:16:26","modified_gmt":"2017-03-08T17:16:26","slug":"a-harley-three-wheeler-that-leans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/a-harley-three-wheeler-that-leans\/","title":{"rendered":"A Harley Three-Wheeler That Leans"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Tilting<\/a>

This is a photo Bob Mighell sent me to go with my Examiner article<\/em>.<\/strong><\/p><\/div>\n

I’ve ridden motorcycle trikes a number of times, both those with two wheels up front and one in back and those with one wheel up front and two in back. I haven’t liked any of them because they drive too much like a car. The one exception is the Piaggio MP3 scooter<\/a> that has two tilting wheels up front. That one handles like a real motorcycle.<\/p>\n

That’s what’s really key: the ability to lean into a curve. And that brings me to Tilting Motor Works<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Several years ago I did an article about this company for Examiner.com. I’m going to quote a little from that article:<\/p>\n

Motorcycle trikes are getting more and more popular, but at what cost? Sure, you’re on a “bike” and out in the elements, but the dang thing steers like a car. Certainly it is still more fun than a car but is this the best there is?<\/p>\n

In a word: No.<\/p>\n

Enter Tilting Motor Works, and Bob Mighell.<\/p>\n

Bob Mighell is an engineer and a motorcyclist, as well as a sportscar enthuiast. Unlike most of us, when he decided he wanted something better, he was in a position to do something about it.<\/p>\n

“I run around on these backcountry roads and I compare how fast I can take the cars through the corners and the bikes through the corners and I thought that the drawback to motorcycles, the limiting factor, is that one single front tire. So whereas I can drift my Porsche 911 around the corners, you don’t want to be drifting motorcycles because if you lose that traction on that front tire she’s all done. And so I thought well, wouldn’t that be cool if I could add another front wheel to a motorcycle and yet still make it handle like a motorcycle.\u00e2\u20ac\u009d<\/p>\n

And that’s exactly what he did.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

What the company offers is a conversion kit to turn a bike–mostly Harleys–into three-wheelers that–I’ve got to say it–tilt. Or lean. Just like on a regular motorcycle. From the website, here’s which bikes you can get this kit for:<\/p>\n

The current production unit is designed to fit all models in Harley-Davidson\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s Touring line including the Road King, Road Glide, Street Glide and Electra Glide models. We are now also equipped to handle Softails, Dynas, and V-Rods such as the Heritage Softail Classic, the Softail Deluxe, the Fat Boy, and the Super Glide. We can’t yet convert a Tri Glide or a Spyder! :-)<\/p>\n

In addition, TMW can now convert the Honda Gold Wing GL1800 and F6B.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

So anyway, a few years went by and I didn’t think much about them again until late last year I got a couple promotional emails. One was promoting a “Black Friday Flash Sale” offering five converted bikes at a $10,000 discount if you bought all five.<\/p>\n

Then nearer Christmas there was another announcing four dealerships, in Snohomish, WA; Nashua, NH; Springfield, MO; and Greer, SC.<\/p>\n

The first email suggested to me they’re not doing so well in the business but the second suggests the opposite. So I decided then that I wanted to put something up here about them because it seems like a really cool product, if you’ve got the cash. And make no mistake, these things aren’t cheap.<\/p>\n

So if you’re getting on in years and thinking about hanging up the riding gear, this might be the thing to keep you on the road. I’m just passing the word along.<\/p>\n

Biker Quote for Today<\/h3>\n

Life is a road, the soul is a motorcycle.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’ve ridden motorcycle trikes a number of times, both those with two wheels up front and one in back and those with one wheel up front and two in back. I haven’t liked any of them because they drive too much like a car. The one exception is the Piaggio MP3 scooter that has two […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[531],"tags":[837],"class_list":["post-8069","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-custom-motorcycles","tag-tilting-motor-works"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8069","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8069"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8069\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8072,"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8069\/revisions\/8072"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8069"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8069"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/motorcyclecolorado.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8069"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}