Motorcycle Ideas

[GTX]

Folsk,

A thread for motocycle whiff ideas.

I'll start:  Once upon a time, armed military motorcycles with side cars were very common:



What would you do with a modern version?  ATGW perhaps?   I can see just this sort of thing on the West German front with a MILAN missile to face the Soviet tanks in a shoot and scoot role.



Over to you for more ideas.

Regards,

Greg

[Weaver]

Your second pic is redXing for me....

I suppose I should be up for that, although in truth, I've never been terribly interested in bike models, possibly because it's one of the few modelling subjects where I can and do have the real thing. I also found, when I was building that Zephyr arlier this year, that being intimately familiar with the real thing made me incredibly intolerent of every scaling compromise the tool-maker had made: I could have spent all year getting every little detail right had the deadline allowed.

One of the difficulties with any converted bike model, common to car models too, is scale: if it's not a military subject, then it's likely to be in 1/12th or 1/6th scale where there are nearly no military kits to nick bits from. I also found when doing the Zephyr that the aftermarket for bike model bits is very underdeveloped, essentially piggybacking off the car model world.

Nevertheless, a few things occur to me:

1. Proper Rat Bike.

One thing I've never seen a model of is a real Rat Bike. I don't mean the "designer" rats you see around sometimes which are just a form of custom bike with a different finish, but real, ridden-into-the-ground, painted-with-a-4"-brush and fixed-with-duct-tape rat. Part of the problem is finding a base kit, since the manufacturers tend to focus on racers or top-of-the-range models rather than "cooking" bikes, but Aoshima is a creditable exception, doing a range of Japanese-market mid-range types (but often close to their export equivalents) in stock and various "street-custom" forms.

One of these is a Honda 400 Hawk, known as a "Superdream" in the UK, and universally reviled as the epitome of grey-porridge commuter biking, thus making it ideal for the customiser on a budget. I've many a real one mercilessly hacked about over the years and every time I look at one of the kits, I can see the back end cut off, a sheepskin seat, K&N air filters, the obligatory beer-can crankcase-breather, army rucksack panniers and the an overall coat of matt black with a heavy dusting of er... dust......


2. Non-Harley custom bike.

Harley's are common as muck over here nowadays, but until the mid 1980s they were rare and difficult to get, and the majority of UK custom bikes were based on either old Brit bikes or UJMs (Universal Japanese Motorcycle - basically any 500-1000cc in-line four, manufacturer irrelevent "'cos they're all the same"), and many still are. Following the recent customising TV craze, Revell produced a series of Harley-engined custom bike models which are now heavily discounted. It wouldn't be beyond the wit of man to take the Harley engine out of one of these and replace it with a Japanese one, although you'd have to know your bikes to understand the different mounting/accessory requirements of the very different engines. You might end up having to make a new engine cradle (alloy tubing?)....


3. Sci-Fi bike.

There are any number of kits of sleek, faired-in bikes on the market: you could remove the wheels and suspension and fit some jet and "anti-grav" units to make something worthy of a sci-fi movie. Actually, I have a Star Wars Return of the Jedi sketchbook with a load of speeder-bike concept drawings in it, which I will scan shortly.....


4. Non-bike kit.

There's been a recent trend for sci-fi trikes or quads based on aircraft fuselages: no reason you couldn't make a bike one...

[Hobbes]

I'll add this:



A Honda Goldwing used to tow vehicles. The bike can arrive at the accident/breakdown site quickly, then fold out the tow rig and remove the stranded vehicle. Meant for congested roads where an ordinary tow truck would have to stand in line and take ages to get there.  


ATGW sounds like a good fit for a sidecar bike. They'd also be a nice platform for sensors (cameras or radar): the sidecar can hold an extendable mast and the electronics.

[Weaver]

Blimey Charlie - I wonder what Honda think of that, given that those things allegedly go into a "dangerous wobble" when the Police put a few pounds more gear in the panniers than the ridiculously low recommended limit? 

[Weaver]

Here we go: Star Wars Speeder Bikes instalment 1 - scooter-style machines:



Got lots more of these, but it will take time to scan and composit them all. As you may have noticed, the book is "variably foxed"....

[beowulf]

Revell produced a series of Harley-engined custom bike models which are now heavily discounted. It wouldn't be beyond the wit of man to take the Harley engine out of one of these and replace it with a Japanese one, although you'd have to know your bikes to understand the different mounting/accessory requirements of the very different engines. You might end up having to make a new engine cradle (alloy tubing?)....

now THAT is a great idea!............ive built quite a few of those revell choppers and they are great fun...go together really easily............ive been thinking how/what to do to another......i was thinking of a pillion/sissy bar or maybe hacking the frame/head stock / forks into a low rider rather than a chopper.................but i can see a rather elderly Katana thou getting broken up for its engine 

thanks for that...........*adds another idea to the 'to be built' list*

[beowulf]

3. Sci-Fi bike.

took me a while to find these............saw them in a thread somewhere...might have been here or somewhere else...cant remember but it was in the last week  ...knew i had saved them 'for inspiration' purposes 

[Weaver]

Revell produced a series of Harley-engined custom bike models which are now heavily discounted. It wouldn't be beyond the wit of man to take the Harley engine out of one of these and replace it with a Japanese one, although you'd have to know your bikes to understand the different mounting/accessory requirements of the very different engines. You might end up having to make a new engine cradle (alloy tubing?)....

now THAT is a great idea!............ive built quite a few of those revell choppers and they are great fun...go together really easily............ive been thinking how/what to do to another......i was thinking of a pillion/sissy bar or maybe hacking the frame/head stock / forks into a low rider rather than a chopper.................but i can see a rather elderly Katana thou getting broken up for its engine 

thanks for that...........*adds another idea to the 'to be built' list*

Nice one!

Alternatively, you could use the Tamiya Virago, because the shaft drive means you don't have the problem of how to lengthen the chain and sprockets (usually one-piece on bike kits).

[Weaver]

More Star Wars speeder bike sketches. The "scooters" were rejected as too weedy, although personally, I think they go well with style of the Imperial armour. The artists then went in the direction of much bigger "sit-in" mahines with feet-forwards riding positions, which are more like mini-spacefighters than "bikes" as such:



These didn't get very far, but you can see the start of the forward "forks" with control fins on them that were a feature of the final designs.

[arkon]

that "easy rider" speeder bike is

[Weaver]

Next instalment of Star Wars bikes. Here you can see the idea evolving from the "sit-ins" to the "flying engine" form of the final movie version:

[kitnut617]

Funny you should start this thread Greg, only a couple of days ago I found some of my old drawings I had done pre-computer days.

This is a pic of a sidecar I designed back in the 80's. It was to use the latest suspension ideas, center hub steering and shaft drive plus use a Yamaha V-Max engine, and the idea was to make it 3-wheel drive.  The 'frame' consisted of a monocoque structure that was mainly the sidecar's floor with all the parts attaching to it and it was also the fuel tank.  I could see a military version of it ----



Here's a top view, sorry about the quality of the photos though



This is a pic of the bike without the bodywork and engine, the framework that goes over the engine and under the seat is just a sub-frame.

[Weaver]

Interesting!  The fact that it's on a sidecar lets you get around one of the principal difficulties of hub-centre steering, namely providing sufficient steering lock without making the swingarm excessively wide.

My idea to achieve the same thing on a bike was to have two-wheeled steering: 22.5 deg of lock at each end equalts 45 deg total. Also, since you'd have to get power to the back wheel somehow, you might as well use whatever method you devise on the front as well, giving two-wheel drive. My favorite for this was hydraulic motors in the wheel hubs, but I'm not blind to the problems (heat for one). Sufficently compact electric motors would be ideal (the technology is about there, but the cost isn't, yet), and would play well into the modern hybrid-drive fashion.

[Weaver]

Last instalment of the Star Wars bikes. Here you can see a diversion into a more skeletal "microlight" version, before they moved on towards final form (and the idea for a classic scene  ). However none of these exactly represent the bikes seen in the film because work now moved to a 3D approach, and the final, approved version was as much a product of the model shop as the artists.



The book doesn't credit individual art to individual artists, but Nilo Rodis-Jamero and Ralph McQuarrie are both mentioned in connection with these drawings, along with Joe Johnston who worked up the final concept models from them.

[Mossie]

My brother had this Action Force (the UK's version of GI Joe) motorbike, ridden by Quarrel



Moto Terminator from Terminator Salvation:



Battlestar Galactica Turbocycles.  Flying bikes, gotta love em'!


Anyone remember Streethawk?  Or largely forget it, like me?