The PX has broken another clutch cable, so there has been no riding in the last few days. But a strange alignment of the planets produced the search engine term “four wheeled motorbike with roof” and an article about the thing pictured below by the L.A. Times’ Susan Carpenter, on the very same day!
Los Angeles Times photo
“The Quadster is like a centaur,” writes Carpenter, “with the heart of a motorcycle and the suspension of a car.” Unfortunately, you can’t legally register the Quadster in California (or Washington, for that matter) because the legal definition of a motorcycle here specifies no more than three wheels. GG Motorrad Technik, the Swiss company that builds the Quadster, petitioned the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) to allow it as a quadricycle, but the Feds said no dice. If it’s got four wheels, it’s a car, and therefore subject to all applicable car safety standards.
Okay, there’s no roof, and no way to attach one that I can see.
The Quadster’s oily bits come from BMW’s K1200S motorcycle, a large touring bike. I don’t know if you’ve noticed that more and more Honda Gold Wings, which weigh in at almost 1,000 lbs. (Yes! Look it up if you don’t believe me…) are sporting sidecars, or even wheeled attachments that resemble bicycle training wheels. The Quadster’s base price is a cool $65,000, a bit pricey for folks not as wealthy as Michael Jordan (yes, he has one) but if the regulatory hurdle can be dealt with, there would seem to be a large potential market among aging, financially well-off baby boomers who don’t want to give up riding, and don’t want to downsize.
Speaking of downsizing, yes, Seattle’s streets have been invaded by smart ForTwos, just like smart said they would. Maybe you’ve heard the bite-size wheeled fashion accessory did rather well in the Insurance Institute for Highway Safety’s (IIHS) crash tests. IIHS’ testing methods are closer to the more-stringent Euro NCAP standards than the NHTSA standards required of all cars sold in the U.S. Read more about the test here. Or you can watch the video:
It goes to show that smaller doesn’t necessarily mean less protection. But the smart is still a “cage”…
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May 14, 2008 at 5:18 pm
My wife has her order in for a Cabrio Smartcar, but at 40 mpg it doesn’t seem worth dumping the 31 mpg (paid for) Sebring Convertible. Oh and the quadricycle? Its a roofless car! An MP3 which leans is a motorcycle! The bureaucrats are right! Argh!! At $65,000 who cares?