Any Rail Bike Builders?

Joined
Jul 29, 2020
Messages
2
Hello, all! I'm new to the site and curious if there are any members with experience building a rail bike. I plan to modify/merge AZ plans to come up with a quad that can do both rail and road. Randall
 
Joined
Feb 20, 2013
Messages
869
Location
Axedale, Victoria, Australia
Website
axerail.coffeecup.com
Sorry, no spare, unused, rail lines around here. I live 1km from a closed one but it was converted into a rail trail. However, I did spend three years (1966 to 1969} of a 25 year railway career riding up and down a track on a three-wheel track inspection motor. It had a single cylinder 2-stroke Villiers motor, 3-speed gearbox and chain drive to the rear wheel.



The only image I can find - anywhere - of a Victorian Railways MT Track Inspection Motor. Me, at 21 years of age in 1969 at Kotta, Victoria.
 
Joined
Jul 29, 2020
Messages
2
Kevin - That's an awesome photo! There's a guy in Colorado making polyurethane flanged rail wheels for quads (railriders.net), but it would run $880 for a set of four. I'm hoping to modify one of AZ's plans to make a smaller, lighter quad frame with some sort of drop-down wheeled guide to keep the bike on the tracks...something like a wide skateboard wheel on a swing arm that locks in place. Randall
 
Joined
Feb 20, 2013
Messages
869
Location
Axedale, Victoria, Australia
Website
axerail.coffeecup.com
Should be an interesting build. The trike in my picture had an outrigger with a diagonal brace to the opposite rail. The outrigger wheel was smaller. I seem to recall that the main rear wheel had a small bevel lip on the outside to prevent it slipping off the inside of the rail. Happened to me once, won't explain what I was doing, when I wasn't expecting it. I rode it down a 5m embankment.
 
Joined
Jan 16, 2011
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712
Location
Vilvoorde / Flanders / Belgium
Railriding with your own railrunner in Belgium... If you don't get flattened by a train, you'll get flattened by the fine.
Even unused railroads ( we have a few), are "dangerous".
 
Joined
Feb 20, 2013
Messages
869
Location
Axedale, Victoria, Australia
Website
axerail.coffeecup.com
Not to cast aspersions on your venerableness but that picture looks more 1869 than 1969.
I can assure you that it is 1969 and, if you look real closely at the shed in the centre you will see the rear end of a 1969 Datsun 1000, 4-door. It;s a scan of a Polaroid (remember them?) photograph that apparently proved appetising to some silverfish or similar. I'm sorry to say that it was taken 51 years ago and it lay in a drawer for most of those years.
 
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