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• Fixing the tip over.... More failure

  Tony Goacher • 5 days ago • 0 comments

  There's a video on this part of the build here.

  Testing had previously highlighted two issues:

  • The 'track' of the tracks (the distance between the tracks themselves) was not wide enough, resulting in the TrakTrike tipping over. The fix for this was pretty simple: just make it wider.
  • There was insufficient torque to get the vehicle starting reliably..

  To fix the first I started by removing the track mounting plates.

  And then cut and notched a longer square section to fit over the round bar chassis.

  And then welded this longer section back onto the chassis.

  It's noticeably wider with this in place. Fortunately I checked the new width with that of my cars boot/trunk before committing.

  In an attempt to improve starting I swapped out the stock motor controller for more sophisticated VESC 75100 clone. These have a serial PC interface that allows acceleration and power settings to be configured.

  And so with these changes it was time for another test. 

  Stability was massively improved and starting seemed better, but still not quite right. I definitely had fun during the test though.

  I'll just tweak the motor controller settings a little. And that was it. Both controllers failed. Didn't even show up as a serial port in the configuration software. 

  So with 2 weeks to go to EMF camp, I'm getting worried.

• The Electronics..and design flaws

  Tony Goacher • 04/07/2026 at 08:56 • 0 comments

  There's a full video blog of this here.

  The TrakTrike is driven by 2 x 2kW BDLC motors, one for each track. I planned to control speed with a handlebar twist grip. To enable me to trim the speed of each motor I decided to use an Arduino Nano to sample the throttle position , and then split this off to set the value of two digital potentiometers. Using this method I can adjust the speed value to each side individually. For motor controllers I'm using the stock devices supplied with the motor itself.

  I'm also adding a LCD display and a rotary encoder/switch combo to allow me to navigate through various functions.

  I designed a schematic using Design Spark PCB.

  Then I designed a PCB. It's pseudo doble sided. I plan to CNC route it, so I minimise top layer tracks and simply connect them with tinned copper wire. I also have to ensure that any connectors are only routed on the bottom layer as there is no way to solder the top side with the connector in place.

  I then CNC routed the PCB

  And built it up.

  The digital pots I'm using emulate the potential divider of the twist throttle. Frustratingly I discovered  they default to half way when powered up so I replaced them with an equivalent part that stores a power up value in EEPROM. I had to create a small programming circuit to allow me to reset this value to zero.

  To house the electronics and other wiring, I used an off the shelf IP66 project box. Besides the LCD and control, I'm adding two battery status displays and a battery cut off switch. I designed the front panel layout is Fusion360.

  I thought it would be nice to theme the panel with an indented logo. 

  Once cut out, I used squeegeed black acrylic paint into the letters and cleaned excess paint up with a sodium bicarbonate paste after it had dried.

  After wiring everything together it was time for a test.....and a couple of things became apparent.

  1. Starting torque seemed to be a problem.

  2, Stability. In a previous log I mentioned that the track width seemed to be a little narrow. This was confirmed when my son managed to tip the TrakTrike.

  At this stage, it's about 6 weeks to EMF camp 2024 and I need to move fast.

  There's a full video blog on the electronics and initial testing here:

• The Battery

  Tony Goacher • 03/31/2026 at 08:19 • 0 comments

  There's a full video of the battery build here.

  My plan was to mount the battery slung under the frame near the seating area.

  But before I could commit to this I needed to mount the seat. I planned to use a simple go kart bucket seat from Aliexpress. The dimensions for this were well defined so I created a seat mounting plate that would also allow for some adjustment.

  I cut this on the ArcDroid.

  and created some mounting bars that fit to the frame. These had M8 welded studs to match the adjustment slots.

  With the seat mounted I turned to the battery box. The batteries I chose are 60V 35Ah LiPo. One for each motor. These come with integrated battery management so not much to do other than box them up.

  Using some cardboard I created a mock up of the box and taped it in position on the frame. A quick test convinced me this position would be ok.

  The box is made from 1,5mm steel plate with a steel frame made from 10mm angle iron. The top plate is removable for access.

  First I cut the angle iron on the mitre saw. This is a normal saw designed for wood but with a TCT blade fitted and a speed controller. It works pretty well and saves me having to have two different saws.

  I TIG welded the frames together.

  And plasma cut the steel plates.

  I also used the plasma cutter to add the holes for the panel mount RJ60 connectors for the battery terminals. These are to be bolted in place. Rather than mess around getting it to cut the small bolt holes, I'll just drill these later.

  Then the box was tack welded together.

  The box is suspended from the frame by some steel brackets. I created the bends in these on the bending machine at Hackspace Manchester.

  They have a slight angle on them to give some clearance from the box lid so I can easily remove it.

  A quick test fit showed everything was OK. 

  They were then trimmed to size and bolt holes drilled through the brackets and the frame.

  I painted the box black and for show put some yellow diagonals on it with tape. I used wide masking tape to get the spacing right.

  Overall, I'm please with the way this turned out. I silicone sealed the box. The batteries are encased in foam within the box for insulation and I alo added some internal resettable fuses, just to be safe.

  There's a full video of the build :
  

• Steering: The column

  Tony Goacher • 03/28/2026 at 08:16 • 0 comments

  There's a full video of the steeing build here and at the bottom of this article.

  With the forks in place and looking pretty good I needed to create a column and handlebar assembly.

  The first thing I did was trim the excess height of the threaded section of the steerer tube.

  The plan is to use a universal join to extend a rod back to the seating position and connect some pretty long handlebars to this to give me plenty of leverage to thrun the wheel.

  The steerer tube is 20mm so I found a reasonably priced UJ and cut a length of 20mm pipe on the bandsaw.

  I attached to UJ to the steerer tube and the pipe using M8 bolts. I tapped the steerer tube and the pipe to keep everything tight.

  The handlebar clamp diameter was larger than the 20mm of the steering column pipe, so I created an adapter from aluminium scrap piece.

  First thing to do was turn it down to fit the handlebars

  And then bore it to 20mm for the steering column

  I then split the adapter with a slitting saw to allow it to clamp onto the column.

  Then it was fitted onto the column
  

  And the handlebars fitted.

  A quick test showed that this layout worked well. 

  The column needs to be supported. The achieve this I designed  support arm that can be folded flat and height adjusted as required. Steel adjustment plates attached to the frame provide a pivot point and a circular slot allows for angle adjustment and clamping.

  The steering column is attached to these arms with a pillow block bearing mounted on the device at the end of the support arm. This allows for the rotation of the column and the column slides through the bearing as the height is adjusted. The device rotates around the arm axis as the angle changes.

  The adjustment plates were cut un the ArcDroid plasma. It did a great job of the curved slots.

  The arms were formed from 20mm box section bent on the JD2.

  I tack welded the plates to the frame whilst I aligned everything.

  The TrakTrike frame tapers towards the front. To ensure the adjustment plates were aligned and parallel I temporarily connected them with M8 threaded rod. 

  The pillow block mount was plasma cut and welded. A simple hoop and rod allows the angle of the bearing to change as the arms are adjusted. M8 studs were cut from rod to mount the bearing.

  And the bearing mount was welded to each arm.

  This mechanism works really well. The steering works as expected with the large handlebars giving plenty of torque, and the height adjustment allows the steering column to be folded down for transport/storage.

  There's a full video of the steering build here:
  

• Steering: The Forks

  Tony Goacher • 03/19/2026 at 11:05 • 0 comments

  I planned to  create a steering system with DIY forks at a rakish angle giving that Easy Rider look. 

  The TrakTrike is designed to come apart for easy transport so I need the forks and wheel to be detachable. I bought a used 'Fat Tyre' bike front wheel with a quick release from ebay and set about designing forks around it.

  I started on the steerer tube. This is the tube which connects to the frame and the steering column rotates around inside.

  The actual steering column has a diameter of 20mm and rotates on thrust bearings at the top and bottom of the steerer tube. I started by boring the steerer tube on the lathe.

  Then I created some disks hold the thrust bearing housing washers.

  
  Here's the steerer parts ready for assembly.

  I used a piece of 20mm bar to align everything, then welded the bearing housing plates into position.

  After measuring the fat tyre I designed some fork yokes. The fork legs are made from the same 26mm tube as the frame with the fork ends cut from 6mm steel plate welded into the ends of these tubes and a slot cut in to take the wheel axle.

  To make sure everything lined up before I committed to expensive steel I 3d printed the fork and laser cut the yolks from MDF. 

  It's a good job I did because the forks were about 10mm too wide.  I redesigned the yolks and plasma cut them on the ArcDroid.

  The fork ends had the wheel axle slots milled...

  The ends fit into slots cut into the fork leg ends. These were created with a slitting saw.

  And everything welded together..

   I single point threaded the steering column, a locking nut on here will clamp the thrust bearings together.

  Doesn't look too bad for home made....

  Two bent plates welded to the frame serve as a mount for the forks.

   A second set of plates welded to the steerer fasten the forks to the plate with 3 M8 bolts on each side

  Bending these plates proved problematic. At 5mm and quite wide they presented a challenge to my small hydraulic press. In the end I used the plasma cutter to cut the blanks out and also used it to 'score' a line along the bend. 

  This thinned the metal sufficiently to bend it. I simply welded the seam up after the bend. The mounting plates on the frame were done in the same way. I documented this process in morer detail here.

  I ground a bevel on the angle plates to improve contact with the steerer tube. Then the tube and the plates were welded together.

  I then clamped the fork mount plates to the frame plates, adjusting them until I was happy and positioning the frame plates onto the frame for a check before welding to the frame.

  With the frame plates fitted I used a paper template, spray glued to the fork steering plates to align holes to be drilled through both the frame and the steering plates. 

  With the holes drilled on one side I could bolt it up and drill the other.

  With both sides of the forks bolted to the frame I could now sit on it and give it a try! I chose to ignore how it  leaned over. I will regret this later.....

• The TrakTrike frame

  Tony Goacher • 03/16/2026 at 20:22 • 0 comments

  I originally planned to make the frame from 20mm box section steel, but before welding everything together I had the good sense to check the rigidity of a length the same as that of the trike. It was nowhere near strong enough so I changed the design to use 1 1/4" (28.6mm) x 2mm tube. 

  I cadded it up in Fusion360:

  It's a classic tapered frame design with 3 crossbars in 20mm box section to strengthen it. To fit everything together my plan was to notch the box section.
  
  

  I'd bought a JD2 tube notcher for this (it can do round or square material) and the position of the notches is going to be pretty important! But the frame also has a taper:
  
  

  This means I need to get both the position of the notch and it's angle right. To accomplish this I created some guides in the CAD model that I could use to align the hole cutter on the notcher to the correct position:
  

  By clamping these at the end of the box section, I could then move the material to get the notcher's hole cutter in the correct position and at the right angle:

  This worked really well. So I started welding it together.

  The tracks are mounted to the frame on flange bearings, two per track. I created mounting plates to attach to the 20mm box section cross members, with some reinforcement plates to be welded on the back.

  And these were welded into position at the rear of the frame.

  A 20mm steel rod sits between the bearings, and an arm bent at 90 degrees welded to the track unit frame allows it to move up and down. A shock absorber will be fitted later.

  I used the JD2 bender to create these.

  I plasma cut some brackets to mount the shock absorbers and overall, it turned out pretty well. Next: Steering.

  There's a video  blog of the frame being built

• Snowblower tracks: Can I drive them?

  Tony Goacher • 03/16/2026 at 19:14 • 0 comments

  Before I could do anything, I needed to know if I could actually get tracks to move under electric power. So off to Aliexpress and I bought a 2kW brushless motor and controller, and some snowblower tracks.

  I created a CAD model of what I thought would be an acceptable mount for the tracks in Fusion360:
  
  
  

   The tracks require a splined drive shaft and this is a custom build I was going to have to make my own.  With the correct  drive shaft dimensions, I started to consider how I might make the shaft. Without this, the project was dead.
  

  The only way I could cut splines like this was on the mill. I have a Vertex rotary table and this seemed the best route thoughI had no experience of using it. Having some embedded software experience I created the 'Rotary Table Buddy' which allows me to drive the table electronically..I just tell it how many splines I need. This was a project in itself and is documented here.

  Using the RTB, I first created a test piece in Delrin. This fitted the track splines perfectly. I turned a drive shaft on the lathe, then transferred it to my small mill and proceeded to cut the splines. Each spline took about 15 mins to cut with a triangular profile cutter as I had to reduce the depth of cut as the spline became deeper and wider.

  The drive shaft was to be mounted on 20mm pillow block bearings with a sprocket from a 50cc moped attached to the drive shaft and chain driven. I created an adapter plate to connect the sproce to the shaft using a keyway which I cut with a broaching bar.

  The motor mount frame was created from welded 20mm box section steel. I also created a motor mounting plate with mounting slots that allowed the motor to be adjusted in x and y allowing for sprocket alignment and chain tightening.

  I stole the battery from my son's e-scooter for the first test with everthing in place.

  There's a video blog of the track units here

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