MOTORIZED RICKSHAW (Jul, 1960)
MOTORIZED RICKSHAW
RIDING around on a genuine Shanghai-manufactured rickshaw is Buster Mattingly’s Chinese cup of tea. The Louisville, Ky. owner bought it from an Army officer and set about fixing it up. He installed a new convertible leather top, chromed the metal parts, put in a Clinton gasoline engine which is supported by a small steel mount welded to the bicycle frame and painted it a pale green.
“I’ve clocked it at 33 mph,” says Mattingly. “That won’t set any speed records but I get a whale of a kick out of driving it.”
Mattingly runs a moving and storage firm and puts his rickshaw in a vanette when he goes on a trip. “No matter where we’re visiting, it always comes in handy,” he says.
The rig cost about $300 with improvements and gets about 85 mpg.
I wouldn’t mind me one of these things.
Comment by Hirudinea — November 30, 2011 @ 6:40 pm
85mpg (!) certainly makes it cheap to run. You don’t get much protection from accidents, though, nor the weather. The one problem I can see is braking: it wouldn’t have been equipped with brakes capable of stopping it at 33mph, because the designer would never have expected it to go that fast.
Comment by Stephen — December 1, 2011 @ 6:08 am