Manky Monkey Motors

Here's the diagram my brother, Steve emailed me of a remote linkage for the Reliant gearshift. Looks like it'd work but would need a second stick on the other side to select reverse. I'm going to have a look at my frame but don't think I've got the room to do this. Would be pretty smart though & also would eliminate a lot of the free play & excess travel in the normal long gearstick set-up.

After looking at the sketch i think i might have a go at that in my spare time lol  ;D ;D ;D

I'd be interested if it could be fitted at a later date, without modifying the trike frame. Not sure which gearbox it'd work best with -the one that has reverse on the left or on the right. If you used one that went to the right you could fit a second short lever on the right of that linkage to pull it over & back into reverse in a similar way to Mark's system shown in the Motors, 3 wheels, tech bit of the main site.
Ahem, I've been berated by Brock. He'd like to point out that his sketch was a work in progress & he's already come up with improvements. Sometimes I wish he'd got the good looks & I'd got the clever gene.  ;D
 

hey Scott,
   very much a quick sketch just to establish a concept rather than a working drawing, looking at it again I think I would delete the front guide tube and fit one at the back, this would make the whole thing not much longer than the gearbox top cover and more ridgid to boot. The two "towers" on the new shifter should , I think , be mounted on a sleeve slid over the new rod with a grub screw fitted , it would be possible to assemble the unit and also to play with various lengths and angles in the stick and cross drill and roll pin it when right.
   more thoughts ?

Hi brock i was thinking of making a raised cage to sit over the entire top plate and also making support bracket with a third guide at the back this would make it much more rigid i will try and draw it up.

Huh? ???

   yeah, I think I can visulise that, the more ridgid the better , at what point does it become better to fabricate a whole new top plate and do the job properly ? If we discount the original shifter lever and it's pivot ball there might be some advantage to be had. The reverse side of it has been a bit of a puzzle, I started looking at pulling the "bridge piece" up a ramp or cam to force the shifter stub to lift but this is realy just crude and there is a better method waiting to be found. It's been a while since I was last inside one of these boxes, but I think that the reverse restriction is just a roll pin across the gate into the reverse fork and if that was removed there would be no reason to lift the stick, it might be easier to form some sort of external lock out rather than trying to work with the original, again, more input, anyone ? 

Huh?

Close your mouth, Manky!

 ;)

Mmmf?

Cheers Brock i can see this has got you thinking i was at ska mans the other night and only just peeked inside the top of a spare box,manky said i could take it away and have a good look,im sur i can come up with something i kinda like the idea of a suicide shift position on my trike if i can make it work what d'you think?

Don't forget there's 2 versions of the box -one has the reverse position to the left & the other to the right. There's a small bulge at the back of the box, down by the mounting points. The gearstick will move the opposite way to that bulge, ie, if it's on the left of the box, the stick will move to the right for reverse. Gives you 2 options for gearstick patterns.

Mine came down the side of the trike
with universal joints making the connections, i had  forward an reverse on one stick
although no H gate, it only took a mile or so to get used to 'knowing 'where the gears where

   I quite liked the idea of something more elegant than a bent stick, but if that works why change it. I will have a look later for anything on the linkages used by the Formula V racers where they are running it from the cockpit to the back of a reversed VW box but I'm not sure if they use a reverse gear. Seeing Yoda's  ( Hi Mate ) reminded me of some kit car ones, where just a deep sided clevis is used with a bottom mounted ( oo er misses ) stick. 

Thats a nice stick that, same size with the same bends as mine. Mr saddlebags could make me a shiny one like that  :)

Bet he's starting to regret revealing his trade here now!
Yodie's Reliant's here by the way. Unusually, it features a mid mounted Reliant motor.

http://www.bikerlifestyle.co.uk/Trike/Yodaold/Yodastrike.htm

   pay attention at the back, that's not just a bent stick, there are three articulations going on there, but I don't doubt that the Birthday boy could knock out something similar with little effort or even a blinding hangover

Ha ha! Stoopid Flap. :P

Looks like a bent stick to me, a shiny bent stick  ;D

I think you need poking with a pointy stick.

You want to poke me with your pointy stick  :o :o :o

Thanks for the offer, but no thanks.

This might help.

Swedish reversed engine gear lever set up, they do also have the reverse gear.

(http://img120.imageshack.us/img120/4313/gearlever001gl7.jpg) (http://imageshack.us)
(http://img254.imageshack.us/img254/659/gearlever002pn4.jpg) (http://imageshack.us)

   yeah , I was in two minds about adding a knutlank but it obviously works