It's official. I fixed five motorcycles over the past two weekends from my new mobile motorcycle shop. If I were going to have a name it would be House of Steel Motorcycle and the website would be http://www.houseofsteelmotorcycle.weebly.com but since I'm unofficial and part time I guess I won't. Please don't fact check me on the "it's made of aluminum, dude" issue. I know. House of Aluminum just doesn't have the same ring.
Anyway, thought I'd share since I'm pretty excited about the whole project. Still have some details to work out. I need a tall, small drawer cabinet to go next to the toolbox to hold various mall parts. Found one at the Container Store but it is out of stock til sometime in May. I also think I'm going to add an electric winch to haul motorcycles up the ramp and onto the lift. So far I've used the engine to run them onto the lift by feathering the clutch while I walk along side but it makes me nervous that my hand might slip and I'm not sure that strategy will work for a bike with especially tall handlebars. An electric winch with a dead man switch wireless remote so that if I do start to overbalance or lose control, letting go of the remote stops the pulling.
A friend suggested a canopy on the side of the trailer. Would allow me to do front end work under cover as right now I have to do that outside. There just isn't room in the trailer to put a bike on a jack and I don't think I want the expense of a lift with a removable frontpiece. A canopy would come in handy when I convert it to a camper anyway.
The whole thing, by the way, looks like this when I'm chugging down the road.
2 comments:
Looks nice! A canopy would extend your foot print, nice touch. Wonder if you could convert a small log-splitter as a ram to push a bike up a ramp? I store my little 5-ton under the garage bench. Just a thought that occurred to me as it has a dead-man switch kinda thing.
I have a vision of the ram hitting the back of the motorcycle and flinging me and it forward. Not sure how effective that would be but interesting idea. I have found some winches that look like they will work well but am waiting for the local shop to track down suppliers.
I may have to do the canopy install myself but need to talk to an RV shop. The trailer guy thought that the canopy install would need custom bracing which would entail removal of some of the interior plywood so that concerns me a bit. I think I see a workaround but I have to figure out how the canopies are supposed to mount. A project for summer perhaps.
Post a Comment