Playa Trike

Here is the 2-person electric playa trike I built for Burning Man 2016.

I started with a used Torker Tristar adult tricycle that had already been to the Playa a few times. I thought about using a new Schwinn Meridian (the cheapest trike around, at only $270 on Amazon) as my base trike, but I read that the rear axle can easily get bent. My plan was to overload my trike to hold two people, so this worried me. The Torker Tristar sells for almost twice this, new.

The previous owner had upgraded the rear tires to 3-inch wide monsters (Sunlite Cruiser Flame Tires ) that help with navigating the soft playa surface. These tires don't fit inside the front fork.

I converted the trike to electric, using a 48v front wheel hub motor kit from EBikeKit.com that they claim is designed for trikes (heavier than bicycles). Here is the owners manual (PDF) .

EBikeKit sends you a new replacement wheel with the hub motor attached. I painted the motor white to match the bike.

This hub motor kit features a digital dashboard, and a reverse mode. Reverse is limited to low power, so unfortunately it will stall easily in rough terrain.

The motor noticeably pulses and jerks at low speed (less than 3 MPH), but it never seemed to be a problem.

My experience with the EBikeKit company was OK, but not great. One person I talked with on the phone talked confidently about things which later turned out to be incorrect, contradicted by another employee I talked with later. The first wheel they built and sent to me was the wrong diameter. They were somewhat unresponsive to my emails.

I zip-tied the controller under the trike's rear basket, and built an extended "trunk" to hold the battery. I selected the cheaper sealed lead-acid ("SLA") technology battery over the superior lithium battery because they were half the price. The lead acid battery packs are heavy, and wear out faster, but I didn't care for this trike I'd only be using on the Playa.

The part of this project that turned out to be the most work was building a two-person side-by-side bench seat. I saw plenty of two- (or more) person trikes at Burning Man, but the passengers would be seated behind or in front of the driver, sometimes facing backwards. That's no fun!

I wasn't up for doing any welding, so I built my bench seat supports out of 1-inch angle-aluminum I found at the hardware store . Three supports hold the back of the seat, and two more extend out to the front corners of the seat base. My bench seat itself rests on the end of the old trike seatpost holder. My goal was to build a seat that wouldn't bend or sag when someone sits off-center - all the way over on one side.

I used 1-inch scrap foam for padding. The seat base uses firmer foam than the seat backrest. I attached the foam, and the white fur fabric using spray glue and a staple gun.

I installed the largest front tire I could fit - which turned out to be one that is 2.4"-wide, the CST Cyclops Tire . This fat tire does fit inside the trike's front fork, but I needed to add washers as spacers for the front brakes to get them to reach the rim without the brake arms rubbing against the tire.

Stopping using just the front brake worked great. I never found myself needing to use the foot pedal rear brake .

I upgraded to longer handlebars (about 4" longer) - for a more comfortable seating position. I ordered the Sunlite D-Cruiser Handlebar , which is nice, but turned out to be the incorrect diameter for my trike. These handlebars are 7/8" diameter, but the trike wants 1" diameter. Oops! I didn't have time to return these handlebars, so I hacked it up to fit with shims and screws.

Here it is, the almost done. It won't be clean for long....

My last enhancement was adding footrests (not pictured above). I used a pair of shelf L-brackets for this. Theoretically, the driver can still pedal this trike, but it's almost impossibly awkward. With the footrests in place, there's room on the pedals only for heels - the rest of the foot needs to stick out sideways.

I found that on the Playa, my trike's range was about 14 miles with one rider, and 12 miles with two riders. Top speed was 19 MPH with one rider, and about 16 MPH with two.