cargo bike

Last week we took delivery of Larry vs. Harry Bullitt cargo bikes. We have been anxiously awaiting these newly engineered cargo bikes. Homeland Security decided to put them in the slow lane of our customs office and about the time we were thinking they'd never arrive, a truck pulls up with the goods.

I had Bike Club at the local elementary school  that afternoon and thus raced to get one put together in time to ride with the kids (thanks for the ride Mary. I still can't believe I fit it into our undersized minivan). I hadn't ridden 25 feet and a boy yelled out of a crowd "cool bike!"). What a great start to this new relationship!

Now I've had a chance to shop for groceries, make a few runs to the warehouse, commute to work as well as just riding the Bullitt out and about with the family. My expectations were high (really high). The Bullitt has performed all tasks in an amazing fashion. It's fast as all get out, it's completely FUN to fly around on and then comes the cargo part of the deal. This bike can take your load with hardly a notice of it. My typical loads have been 20 -50 pounds and I'm telling you, it's effect on the handling is a non-issue. The bike has exceeded my expectations by a lot.

Yesterday I was at a stoplight downtown and someone yelled out "Hey guy, what is that?". I responded :"the future" as the light turned green and I took off with a smile. Believe me when I tell you that the Bullitt is special and it will push the Cargo-Commuter category of bikes well beyond its current position.

Basement projects at Perennial Cycle cover a pretty wide array of bike related interests. Marlin is a mechanic at the shop that recently learned how to use the torch and was looking for a fun, practical project. This cargo bike project is Marlin's take on a practical load carrying bike that you can ride around all day without feeling as though your driving a bus, or a tank.

There were a lot of little sketches like this around when the project was going strong. This is the most detailed drawing I ever saw of the Cargo Bike. I'd say that Marlin had a little extra energy after having a sandwich from Caffrey's (I recognize the bag). The sandwich bag sketch gives the main idea behind the design..

The frame is a  steel 90's Fischer mountain bike frame that had a oversized (1-1/4") headset. To convert the front end to fit a 20" front wheel he got a 1-1/8" headtube that happened to fit nicely inside the original headtube and used the new headtube to extend the headtube down. This allowed him to put a large, heavy duty (yet lightweight) rack on the front of the bike.

The rack is brazed onto the frame of the bike and thus when you turn the bike, it does not move with the fork and handlebars like you'd expect a front basket to. The fact that the rack is quite low (this is the reason for the 20" front wheel) means that the weight on the rack does not throw off the handling of the bike much at all. When there is not a load on the rack you don't even notice that the bike is cargo-minded.

You can see a lot more of Marlin's work and see more current projects at his website http://utilitariantransports.com/

Nice work Marlin!