CARC and sidecar

[Jack Subrosa]

Hmmm, I’m new to GT. Joined up last night as a matter of fact. Came up because I have questions about the exhaust and fueling of a ‘16 Eldorado I’m picking up this next week. I’ve got a buyer for my pristine low-mileage Griso and hate to see it go, but research prior to today said definitively that the Griso is not a good platform for a sidecar, but the 1400s are. I’ve had the Griso for a year and am still fairly ignorant of MGs. But my research ran counter to the rest of this discussion. Hence the pending ‘exchange’ happening this next week. So this post caught my eye. By the way, I coordinated a build with Jay of DMC back in ‘14. I wasn’t impressed, and found I wasn’t the only one with that impression. So I built my own - Ural attached to an R1200GS with Centerline Wheels (machined by David Heinz) and car tires at all three points. I never had it aligned, and it tracked straight and was a hoot to drive. No hours in a parking lot, just thousands of miles with nothing but a common sense learning curve. No fork improvements either. She’d do 75 or 80 as stabil as any car. Perhaps I was just lucky, perhaps it was the car tires. But it was easy and I shouldn’t have sold it. Given a recent near-death experience with Covid and lingering issues, I’ve been looking for it to buy back. No luck. Now that Jay has sold to Kent Silk (Jay is being sued) of Texas Sidecars which is 1.5 hours away, I went to visit. I was Impressed with Kent and his operation. Wow - maybe too much coffee this morning. But sure wish I’d found this forum before I made deals to sell the Griso and buy the Eldorado. I think the Griso would look sharp with a sidecar, and it certainly has the power…and it would slow me down.

 

[scottmastrocinque]

I have seen MANY 1400 rigs with sidecars. Most with modified Earles forks.

I have even seen a few V7 sidecar rigs. Most with modified front ends.

I have only ever seen 1 Griso sidecar rig, crafted by ARMEC sidecar rig from Switzerland and it was $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ as hell.

The front end of the Griso is simply way to undersized and under-sprung to safely accommodate a sidecar hack.

 

[Jack Subrosa]

Those look sharp! Still thinking all this out. It’s all expensive. A DMC Tomahawk, the most appropriate in style IMO, attached to the Eldorado is $15k-ish and that’s w/o fork mods. Attaching The DMC Adventure to my Husky is a thousand or so more. The Chief and various Harleys handle the Tomahawk well without fork mods according to Kent at DMC Texas Sidecar. But I am going to ride this Eldorado for a few months before committing. Still trying to determine how stable I am after my recent hospitalization. If I’m ’good to go’, I may wait on adding the hack. Issue #1 is fueling and exhaust.

And did I see that you have an HP2? I sold mine 2 years ago to a good buddy, who has the gall to ride it in my presence. Loved that bike, but it was too tall for me, pristine, and only 5k miles. I was always afraid I’d drop it. I usually don’t have that fear with others, but my ‘unicorn’ was flawless. I bought a G650 XChallenge to replace it. It’s up for sale now. Also too tall, and I’ve decided my dirt days are over. The 901 does all I need - improved dirt/gravel is all I’ll do in the future.

 

[scottmastrocinque]

$15k isn’t bad. It is my understanding that the Swiss ARMEC rig was over 3.5x the cost of the original motorcycle! I believe it.

My HP2 is NFS. Ever. Period. My estate will sell it when I am dead. It only goes up in value due to it’s incredible rarity and besides, it’s an awesome machine. BMW at it’s finest if you ask me.

I am short, barely 5’9 on a really good day. I rode an 1150GS for almost 100k miles from brand new and GS’s are tall for me but I ride a Stelvio NTX now and it’s fine. With the HP2, I’ve decided to have a 3” heal put onto my riding boots for that motorcycle. That is an inexpensive solution that really works.

I’m 57 years old, and my dirt riding days are history. My buddies my age and a little older, ride in the dirt regularly on their $15K dirt bikes (KTM, Husqvarna, and Husabergs) and they constantly rib me about riding with them, but I am fine with leaving the dirt alone at this stage in my life except for the occasional fire road or dirt road. Definitely no serious desert or woods riding anymore.

Broken bones are a real deal breaker at this stage in the game, and I am not interested in going there at all.

 

[Jack Subrosa]

Yes they can get expensive. Before I attached the Ural to the GS, I visited MOBEC in Germany. We lived in Poland at the time, so I could have imported that rig when we came home at no cost. But the three-wheel drive version was $50k. That was 15 years ago, so I’m sure they’re significantly more now. He was doing a whopping business with Russian oligarchs at the time.

As for the dirt, I’m 63 and have been a GS/GSA guy for a few decades…or was. Nearly totaled a new 2020 GSA on several falls on the CDT red routes. Having ridden a KTM 890 a few months before all that, I knew that BMW had ‘lost the conn’ with adv bikes. But I had the GSA, so that’s what I took. I’d been riding them off-road for 20 years. But the red routes were too much for an aircraft carrier. So after the carnage I ordered and received the first 901 in Texas. And what a diff it’s been. It may not run forever, but neither will I. At nearly have the cost, an experienced GS/GSA rider can make the 890 and 901 dance off-road. At 480 pds, that weight and those tanks down low are the difference. A huge difference. And loaded, it’s arguably as comfortable at 85 on the highway as my GSA. And further, with Rottweiler’s full performance package, I can run with (and outrun if I feel like it) all my buddies on their GSAs, ATs, etc. So much is it the better that at least two of my buddies have traded in their beemers for their own 901s. But, they’re not perfect and certainly won’t be heirloom bikes. It’s a 10 year/100k bike at its best. BMW still owns the ‘quality of build’ facet of the adv bike market. But like I said, I’m near the end of my adv days. The 901 is my last adv bike.

 

[GTM®]

Guys, please note the subject heading. This time of year is easy to divert, I get it.
Jack, good for you on the 901 and Rott. They are just south of my shop, and good guys. Appreciate if, after spending $1700 on it, repeated numerous times now, we can be done with hearing about it and BMWs.
Back to Guzzi please.

 

[John Warner]

View attachment 33690

I've posed this question on the 'Hacks' section on Adv Rider Forum, would be interested to hear opinions from here.

The Outfits/Rigs like the Griso above, I love the Engineering and Fabrication involved in all the different Front-End arrangements, but I have to ask; At what point does an Outfit become an ill-handling 3-Wheel Vehicle, instead of a Bike with a 'Chair' attached?

What I mean is, if you're going to completely redesign the Front End Suspension (and sometimes the rear also), to the point you can no longer unbolt the Chair and ride it as a Bike again, why not just build a Trike (Delta or Tadpole/Reverse).

A well designed Reverse Trike should handle better than most Outfits, or at least have the same manners in both left and right turns.

There are Outfits that are Outfits in shape and Wheel layout only, I'm thinking of the ones, for example, with a car Engine behind the Sidecar Seat, Driving the Sidecar and 'Bike' Wheels.
Why go to all that expense and effort, only to get a 'dodgy' handling vehicle, when you could have something like a Morgan, Triking, T-Rex etc?

 

[scottmastrocinque]

Unfortunately, you will never get the handling on a trike or Morgan, or T-Rex, or any of that trendy stuff like you will get on that ARMEC.

I am intimately familiar with this from back in my days at Brattin Motors BMW in San Diego. Klaus Thiele's K-Sidecar Setup was all the rage and I chased him more than once up and down Mt. Palomar. That sidecar could do triple digits and remain rock solid with not even a twitch. It is specifically designed as a high-speed sidecar rig. The Swiss are perfectionists in this regard. Think, fine Swiss watch!

Klaus drove like a bat out of hell, and that was no joke!

 

[Jack Subrosa]

I’m a little gun shy now about posting, but because it’s courteous, I feel compelled. As I mentioned in my earlier post, I did all the work attaching an Ural sidecar to a GS. I did my best eye-balling the alignment and camber with only a straight edge. The only mod was Centerline brand wheels and car tires. Had you driven mine, you’d have never thought there was a stability issue and it did not pull to either side. It did 85 or greater easily. A buddy of mine with almost no riding experience split the driving duties with me going from Texas to Nashville to Birmingham and back to Texas. With only minimal instruction from me, he hopped on and never had a problem. Moreover, the beauty of my hack was off-road. Of course single-track was a no-go, but it was incredibly capable in the mud. And only one-wheel-drive.

 

[Jack Subrosa]

I've posed this question on the 'Hacks' section on Adv Rider Forum, would be interested to hear opinions from here.

The Outfits/Rigs like the Griso above, I love the Engineering and Fabrication involved in all the different Front-End arrangements, but I have to ask; At what point does an Outfit become an ill-handling 3-Wheel Vehicle, instead of a Bike with a 'Chair' attached?

What I mean is, if you're going to completely redesign the Front End Suspension (and sometimes the rear also), to the point you can no longer unbolt the Chair and ride it as a Bike again, why not just build a Trike (Delta or Tadpole/Reverse).

A well designed Reverse Trike should handle better than most Outfits, or at least have the same manners in both left and right turns.

There are Outfits that are Outfits in shape and Wheel layout only, I'm thinking of the ones, for example, with a car Engine behind the Sidecar Seat, Driving the Sidecar and 'Bike' Wheels.
Why go to all that expense and effort, only to get a 'dodgy' handling vehicle, when you could have something like a Morgan, Triking, T-Rex etc?

Oh, and with or w/o a passenger, depending on your intent and the type of sidecar, I don’t think any of the mentioned vehicles could match the amount of gear that can be carried. And the heavier mine was loaded, the better it performed.

 

[Chris Wilson]

Not mentioned so far is one of the major reasons why an Earles fork is chosen, the reduction of trail.
You need virtually no trail if lean angle is not used.
The leading link has the ability of tailoring the link length that governs trail that should be between 1.75" and 2.5".
A Griso has 4.25" and with no lean that aids steering that figure would cause the vehicle to plow ahead thus stressing telescopic forks.
If you could figure out an easy way the lessen trail with a standard telescopic fork setup they would not be recommended as much.
Leading axle mounts help a bit.
Chris.

 

[moparnut72]

An example of a homemade leading link suspension, this rig showed up at Broken Arrow. It was very big, both he and his wife were large people. It was a large car on a Rocket 3. The owner said it handled very well.
kk