Trike with a VELOSOLEX copy engine.

I'm going to sell my electric powered Hercules Tricycle because it doesn't really suit what I need in a vehicle anymore. I really like the old thing, but all it's doing is sitting around and rusting because it's just too tall in the frame for me now with its high seat and 28 inch wheels. The electric drive was useful, - only I want more range now than I can get with the 24 volt/250 watt setup I originally fitted. I have a car, but it's getting too expensive to run and it's a pain to get in and out of with my disability and I hate having to muck around trying to park it when I know I could get around soooooooo much easier and more quickly on a tricycle. Not to mention these past months I've had to spend $$$$$$ on car repairs and new tyres which has been very annoying,

Under the house I've got several Raleigh 20 and Raleigh 20 clone frames as well as plenty of 20 inch wheels and other useful parts, so I was wondering about building up a new tricycle using these parts and frames. I've just gone and purchased a Velosolex copy engine from a supplier I've purchased motorised bicycle parts from on a number of occasions and I've been able to get it at a nice discount. I know about the problem with friction drive rollers in the wet, but this isn't going to be the sort of vehicle I would use in the rain much anyway. I want something simple, lightweight and handy which I can use to buzz up the road to buy groceries or go to the pharmacy & etc, but have the capacity to go further afield than I could with the Hercules without fear of having the batteries go dead on me.

I hauled my old Hercules Tricycle out from the corner of the carport where it's been sitting for the past few months while I haven't been so well. In a word I was shocked, a vine had grown all through the front wheel, it was covered in cobwebs and all the tyres were flat. After a bit of work I managed to pull all the greenery off it and brush away most of the cobwebs and leaf litter. Once I'd done that I put my old trike up on axle stands and did a spot of creative staring.
I know I said I was going to sell it and there is even a a guy who runs a second hand type bric-a-brac shop down in the township who wants to buy it from me to promote his business........ But being a woman I'm allowed to have a free change-my-mind-card, so i decided to play it. After doing the creative staring thing for a while I concluded that all of the problems I'm having with my Hercules can be fixed by doing some adjustments and there is no need to sell it. The other thing I concluded was that it would be a good idea to fit the Hongdu-Solex engine to my Hercules AND keep the electric drive as well. Afterall I'd only just replaced the batteries in my beloved tricycle just before I had my bout of illness and done some repairs to the wiring as well; - which all still worked when i tested it, - woooot!

I will be picking up my engine on Monday as i decided to drive over to the supplier's warehouse instead of doing the courier thing. The name of the company is 'Motrax' and I've had nothing but great service from them ever since I first started messing about with motors on bicycles. They supplied the hub motor wheel and the fitting kit that's on my tricycle and it's been totally trouble free even after the five years of heavy use.I've subjected it to. The only problem will be trying not to do the kid-in-the-lolly-shop thing with all the wonderful bike motorising stuff that will be on display.

Some of you will have seen my tricycle before, but I'll post this picture i took not long after I first put it together as it would be too cruel to take a picture of how it is at the moment.

Thanks Chainmaker Yes I found that thread earlier on today and it pretty much answered all my questions. These engines look to be reliable and rock solid once they've been properly broken in and I'm looking forward to being able to play with one.

I spent today cleaning up my work area and sorting tools. My daughter has been rebuilding the engine in her Rover for the past few months and now that her car is back on the road again it was a good time to put everything back where it was supposed to go and generally sweep out before I set to and make my own mess.
I took a photo of my Hercules trike to give me a reference point of how it looked before I started on the rebuild. As you can see it's in a bit of a sorry state and needs quite a bit of TLC before it looks pristine again.

On the list is fitting new tyres onto the rear wheels as well as lacing a new rim onto the pedal driven rear wheel. I'd like to change the Duo-matic kick back hub for a Sturmey Archer 3 speed hub actually, but I'll have to see what I've got in the spares bin first.
The wicker basket on the back will be staying and I'll be giving it a new coat of exterior grade varnish as well just to help it stay in good shape. It's mounted on a wooden frame at the moment and that is going to be changed for something better made from steel which will give me a chance to play with my new welder.
Most of the rest of the work that needs doing will be refreshing paintwork and cleaning off rust, but I'd also really like to replace all the wiring with vintage waxed cotton cable as I don't like the look of the modern plastic insulated wires.

In case anyone is wondering the headlight is a Bosch and it's powered by a vintage Miller dynamo. I didn't have a suitable Miller headlight at the time which is why I used the Bosch one and now I have spare Miller headlights in the 'stores' I find myself reluctant to change out the Bosch one. It produces a good amount of light too, this old prewar stuff is really good and I always keep an eye out for it. Most dynamo sets from the 1960s onwards were just cheap junk.

I will be picking up the Velosolex engine tomorrow which I'm looking forward to. It's highly likely that I'm going to have to make a new front fork for the Hercules in order to get the engine to fit properly. If I have to do that I'm going to look at building up a new front wheel with a drum brake. I like stirrup brakes, setup properly they are ready good, but something tells me that I won't be able to fit one around the engine,

The sprung truss rods work well too. There's a knack to setting them up, but once setup properly they do make a difference. Sturmey Archer still make the pressed steel type of front brake drum hub that suits these old Hercules bicycles best and once I've saved up my pocket money a bit more I'll order one.


Well hold the bus everybody because the Intrepid Lady has changed her mind again. I'm not going to put the Velosolex engine on the Hercules afterall. When I do the the IC motor trick on the Hercules I will be doing a De Dion Bouton tricycle copy and hang the motor off the rear axle. After thinking about it I realised that the Velosolex engine would put too much weight high up on the Hercules's 28 inch front wheel.
Plan 'B' involves a stash of Raleigh 20 frames and parts, some NOS 20x1.75 wheels and a trike axle left over from the very first tricycle I built up for myself.

I went out this morning and collected the Velosolex motor which saved me $5.00 on courier costs because the 1977 Datsun I drive is such a fuel miser despite the three hour round trip. (Petrol is $NZ2.20 a litre here in Kiwiland) Actually i saved more because John at Motrax knocked $NZ30.00 off the price because I've been such a good customer over the past few years.
Once I got the motor home after some stops on the way to buy tubes and tyres I set to and gathered together all the parts I'm intending to use. After making sure my camera's battery was charged I opened up the box I'd collected from Motrax. I'd read all manner of horror stories about poorly packed and damaged Velosolex clone engines, but I had nothing at all to worry about because the engine was very well packed in offcuts of a firm grade of upholstery foam. No cracks, dents or breakages either and the inside of the petrol tank was as clean as a whistle. John at Motrax has been importing stuff out of China for a long time and he's very fussy about what he buys. He has an agent in China check everything he imports before it gets loaded into the container which is one of the reasons why I've stuck to buying from him.

All I did today was basically mockup the parts I was going to use which was still a useful exercise. The trike axle is fitted with old 'placeholder' original Raleigh 20 20x1 3/8 rims and tyres, but I'm going to be using more modern 20x1.75 rims and tyres for my cycletruck as these will be better to use on a working vehicle, One of the older wheels has a Duomatic two speed hub which I will be re-using as i really like these and they are totally reliable.
The front wheel is actually a NOS rear wheel I picked up cheap and I will be using a band brake on this wheel. I have several of these I picked up at clearance sales so I won't be lacking for spares.
The seat is from an exercise machine and i recovered it in leather. It's looking a little worn around the edges because I used it for a couple of years on the very first trike i built up. Nice comfortable seat though and the price was right because I found it in the scrap steel pile at the council recycling depot.
Speaking of scrap steel, living as I do in dairy farming country we have a few tractor dealerships around town. And these dealerships often have deliveries of large and lumpy pieces of machinery packed in steel framed crates that are bolted together. Most of these crates end up at the council recycling depot and as a result I have a small stash of crate sections in the back of the garage. In one of the photos you will see how nicely one of these crate sections will convert to become the base framework for the tray on my cycletruck.

I though that I would need to repaint the Raleigh 20 frame I'm using, but the original paint is in such good condition all it needs is a darn good clean. I have two frames, the maroon/plum one I'm going to use and a metallic blue frame. There are slight differences between the two frames and the paint on the maroon frame is of much better quality. Both frames came from the council recycling depot, the maroon one was bare with a pair of badly buckled mudguards still attached, but the blue frame was a complete bike; - if you could call it that because somebody had methodically cut everything that could be cut with a pair of heavy duty shears, but fortunately had left the frame itself alone. An unbelievable piece of vandalism on what looked like, - as far as i could tell, - had been a reasonably good bicycle.

While working on the frame this evening it became apparent that there were more chips and rust under the dirt than I thought so I will be repainting it. Suits me better in a way because I like my bikes to be painted British Racing Green so I can now give the frame the full treatment with maybe even a little pinstriping if i can still remember how to do it.

The weather here is hot and humid at the moment which brings on my symptoms with this illness I live with so I waited until the sun had gone down to do some more work on my cycletruck. Wasn't all that well this evening, but I just pottered on for a bit and managed to get some useful stuff done.
The front forks are now properly spread and adjusted to take the new wheel and the band brake I'm going to use. The head races and sleeve bearing for the front fork only need to be cleaned and assembled with new grease which is good. The bottom bracket bearings felt pretty stiff and crunchy so they got pulled apart too. Lots of stiff old plasticy grease and a broken ball bearing explained why things weren't happy there. The cups and shaft look Ok and can be used again, but there will be a new set of ball bearings going in when it's all reassembled.
I have a rod brake Raleigh frame that was in a bad accident and got twisted. I keep it because the paintwork, pinstriping and transfers are almost pristine so it's a good reference when it comes to refinishing an old Raleigh. I decided I would take the 3 heron chainwheel and the heron lamp bracket from it to use on my cycletruck. Raleigh Twentys didn't have such nice fittings, but I figure I can retro it a bit to make my cycletruck look older. I will be getting some Raleigh heron transfers as well as Velosolex decals for the engine so by the time it's all done it should look pretty corker.

I enjoyed myself tonight, it was good to get my old English bicycle tools out and have a bit of a tinker.

When I last spoke to John at Motrax he said that they do intend to keep a small stock of the Velosolex engines on hand so they might be between shipments. Apparently they aren't one of their fastest selling lines as compared with the China Girls, but when I asked about being able to order another one in a couple of months time he said it wouldn't be a problem.
Best to send him an email as he's always quick to reply.

I live in New Zealand and Motrax is a New Zealand company as well so I'm not sure what the situation would be regarding shipping to the US.

My Datsun is completely stock and I got it on staff discount when I worked for the Datsun agents here in NZ many years ago now. Unfortunately they are prone to rust, but my one has been always kept garaged which helps a lot with keeping them in one piece. It's been rust treated too which helps as well. I really like it and I have no plans at all to sell it, Young folk are always approaching me to ask if I want to sell it or even offering to directly swap a much later model Japanese car in the same condition for it, but I always say no. The thing is it's such a beautifully mechanically simple car with no diabolical solid state electronics to go wrong and it's easy to maintain as well.
As you say they handle well on the road and even in stock condition they are quite capable of keeping up with modern traffic. The other thing I like is that my Datsun is physically smaller than most modern cars of its type so I can fit it into parking spaces that other cars can't fit into. For local trips I still prefer to use either a bicycle or tricycle though as the whole messing about maneuvering a car in supermarket parking lots and such things just annoys the heck out of me. On a bike or trike I can be there and back far more quickly than when i take the car.

Trike conversions on Velosolex bikes are not uncommon in France, Here's pictures of one.

fasteddy said:

What a great idea for a trike. The Velosolex makes it possible.

Steve.

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I'm hoping that will be so Steve. The Velosolex engine is no firebreather, but then on the other hand I just want this to be a handy utility trike for local use about town.

max350 said:

I do not know if you've read about my project VéloSoleX 4800 build, but it's a fun engine but lousy quality, but I enjoy every ride with it http://motorbicycling.com/showthread.php?t=45751

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Yes I've just checked out your project thread and found all manner of answers to questions I have about mounting one of these engines. My own project came to a halt when I became ill again, but now I'm starting to think about making a start again.