Inventor builds custom Trike made using Unistrut
The MK2 Unistrut Trike
In the late Summer of 2016 Les McMahon (former engineer and part-time inventor) built a custom trike for a young man called Lewis Flint, Les’ friend, and neighbour.
Lewis suffers from a rare genetic condition and wanted to experience the joys of cycling but needed something that would carry him in his wheelchair. Using his past experience as an engineer, Les decided to build a custom trike for Lewis using various components such as spare channel and trays that would support Lewis’ wheelchair.
Following this, Les’ daughter uploaded a short clip of Lewis on the finished trike onto Facebook and within 17 hours the video hit one million views! Les was then contacted by many media outlets including the BBC who posted about the first trike on BBC North West's Twitter profile which you can watch here.
In 2019 Les began working with Hero Cycles & Insync Bikes to gather ideas on how to edit the trike’s current design to make it cheaper and easy for anyone to assemble.
This is where Unistrut come in! Back in February 2020, Unistrut contacted Les on Twitter about his fantastic work and suggested ways that we could help him with the 2nd Trike design. By using the Unistrut weldless Metal Framing system, the trike could easily be assembled and adjusted as required. Les stated that the team agreed the best option for the MK2 Trike would be to use official Galvanised Unistrut products due to its simplicity, unique flat pack ability and outside durability.
Currently the MK2 Unistrut Trike is still being tested but you can see the results so far below. As you can see, this time Les opted for slotted Unistrut channel (P1000T) to offer more flexibility when adjusting.
Products used for the MK2 Unistrut Trike:
• A mixture of 41 x 21 x 2.5mm and 41 x 41 x 2.5 mm for the chassis.
• 225mm cable tray for the wheelchair loading platform (perfect width for the wheelchair wheels & leaves a gap in between for ramp storage)
• 225mm cable tray for the ramps (these can be stored on the main platform as noted above)
Information & Image credit - Les McMahon