I first saw an Xtracycle conversion a few years ago at the Santa Monica Farmer’s Market. At the time, I was bent low over a mid-90’s hardtail mountain bike, my wife was pedaling her Dahon foldie with Ruby strapped to her back, and we carried goods home by putting plastic bags on our handlebars. And then that fateful morning we saw it, that glorious longtail, bearing a rider and child, ready for groceries. I knew from that moment it was a world I wanted to inhabit.

Over the last year my wife and I got serious about putting one together, and by late winter we were already planning how it was going to happen. Three images inspired me through the process:

• This video of a mom, her two kids, and 4 bags of groceries steamin’ along in Portland.
• This image of the aptly named Super Monkey, from Clever Cycles, which cemented my decision to use a Karate Monkey as a platform. I mean, what about that doesn’t look like fun?

And then there’s this one, a truly inspiring ride which became my desktop wallpaper at home:

It’s not just the perfect blend of Instigator frame, Xtracycle conversion, albatross bars and Honey-colored brooks saddle. It’s the double kid seat. What could make this better? A beautiful bicycle, made more useful and a blast to ride, it’s perfect right? A perfect excuse to do some woodworking, that is!

The Donkey’s together now, and we’re still working some bugs out and dialing in configurations, but this weekend I finally jumped into building the kid seat. The implementation is about a 55:45 ratio of deliberate planning to improvisation. For a prototype, I think it’s looking pretty good. And it’s been a whole bunch of fun to build so far.

I’m not sure how we’re going to do 5-point harnesses, I’m thinking we may pick up some yard-sale car seats and cannibalize them for pads and seat belts. Upholstery is also a question mark for now, but for seat padding, the raised seat-backs will allow us to fold up a blanket and run it the length of the seat (which also gives us a picnic blanket once we arrive). Its a useful and pragmatic solution, but I still dream of sparkling metallic red ski-boat vinyl cushions.

The wood is a marine-grade 1/2″ maple ply, purchased on eBay. I’m not super happy with it. The guy said it was 5-ply, but it’s basically a 3-ply core with a veneer. I was hoping by getting marine-grade that it would be the heavier 7-ply maple used to build skateboard decks. The next version will be. The arm-rests are made from some scrap mahogany I had laying around.

Oh, also: this thing rocks the party that rocks my body. Lightning fast glue joints, square and strong. I don’t have a dedicated workshop, so my precision is limited to whatever I can set up in my backyard. While dovetails and finger joints are an unattainable dream for now, this makes a lot of things possible that just weren’t. My first stop on the learning curve was to discover that even set for #00 biscuits, it goes all the way through 1/2″ stock. Oops, noted!

Tonight, if I have the opportunity, I’ll sand down the deck edges and get the hooks mounted so we can test it out. And of course, more pics from the proving grounds will be published as testing proceeds.

Update: Got the mounting hooks installed last night and snapped it into place. It looks pretty good. The arms need to be shortened, it needs a lot more sanding, and probably some filling and paint since the wood and the work don’t justify staining. The blanket trick worked okay, but the backs are going to need some padding, and I’ve ordered some nylon webbing and buckles to make seat belts. But, all in all, not too shabby…

First test flight of the Karate Donkey Main Passenger Cabin

I think it needs running boards, quite possibly with lights.

Note: I’ve changed a couple sentences for grammar and punch. That might make me a historical blawg revisionist. Or, it might mean that I haven’t changed anything at all, and I’m gaslighting you. Who can know what the truth is?

Tags: bicycling, Karate Donkey, snapdeck mods, woodworking, xtracycle

This entry was posted on Tuesday, May 6th, 2008 at 1:01 pm and is filed under Cycling. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.