My twin girls are 4.5 years old and a few years ago, I saw a tandem trail-a-bike on craigslist for $40. It was being sold ‘as-is’, and when i got there, i knew why it was only $40. But since I was willing to put the work into it, and a new one costs over $300, I was quite excited. Immediately after I got it, I tossed the rusted-solid chains and removed the wheel, scrubbing all the rust of it, repacking the bearings and making it all nice and smooth and shiny. Then the thing sat there.
Over the summer, I went to the Larz Anderson Bike Swap Meet and got a bunch of little things that i thought would work great with the trail-a-bike to pimp it out, including some old english three speed bars and some pink pedals and most importantly, for me a brooks b-17 for $50. I ended up being wrong on some of the measurements, but a trip to the LBS, and I got new seatposts, new shiny silver chains, and pink grips! About a month ago, I decided to pull down the frame, finish taking everything off, clean and repack the bottom brackets and put it back together. I destroyed my crank puller (the cranks are equally hard steel and the threads were stripped), but again the LBS helped out. Finally, after procuring a replacement seat-post-connector, we were ready to ride. The girls were unsure at first and I had to lower everything down to the lowest setting, but here you go: a little test ride around the neighborhood.
I have given them a Dahon 20″ rear rack and a cute Dutch saddle bag I got off ebay for them to store their backpacks on the way home from school. Also on the rack is a blinky light. More pix soon.
Right before I had built this up, i also decided to try putting the stoker bar onto my xtracycle, and the girls seem to love that too, but the current configuration (and my confidence in them) only allows one kid. I might have to fix that as it’s easier than the trail-a-bike.
This was just a pose -- we didn't actually ride with both yet
Zipping along!
See, both girls got a chance. This was me going to pick up the gear for the trail-a-bike
Love the set ups. Back when I was going to do two kids on the X I thought of having my husband build a handle bar that came out of the snap deck. Like a wooden T bolted down to it halfway in for the last person to hold on to.
I have some ideas for a wrap-around handlebar thing, but i haven’t the time or expertise (much less the need yet). But i like that idea too!
geoff–
came here through the fb link. This set up is way, way too cool! The girls are going to be the coolest biker chicks in town.
sujata, i actually got the idea to facebook the posts from seeing your post. so thanks! :)
and yes. yes they will be!
Tandem trail a bike. That is sweet! Very nice.
Oh yeah, I also finally got your RSS into my Google reader. I had put it in before, but not correctly.
Cheers!