The post ICE Trikes video overview appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.

ICE Full Fat trikes start around the $8500 range. This one came in a bit north of that.

The post ICE Full Fat trike photos appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.

The pictures they released were certainly lovely, but nothing communicates poetry in motion quite like some YouTube video. Enjoy!

The post ICE Full Fat 26fs fat tire trike in motion appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.

The post I guess they really are ICE Trikes! appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.

What’s at stake? First prize gets $300 worth of ICE accessories (handy if you have an ICE) and two runners up will get an ICE Radical Side Pod for, yep, ICE mesh seats.

See why it makes sense to submit photos of ICE trikes?

To take part in the contest, hit up ICE’s Facebook page where you can also read the full official rules of the contest. And do read them – you might be surprised to learn that residents of Arizona, New Jersey, and Vermont are ineligible.

The post ICE wants your trike photos appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.

Well now the trikes are in the wild, so all bets are off mister! What was the first thing we did? Well, rode the trike. But you can be sure the second thing we did was … take photos. But when all of that was done, we shot video of the folding mechanism.

I now present to you that which was until recently hidden from the world. No, I’m not talking about my LEGO Stormtrooper t-shirt.

The post How to fold an ICE trike appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.

The post From comfy seat to no seat at all appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.

In their press release was this line: “As many of you are aware, we’ve got some exciting innovations on the way for 2010.”

You’re welcome. 

The videos can be found at ICE’s YouTube Channel.

The post ICE teases with new media appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.

After visiting Pat Franz yesterday, we moved to KMX who had nothing new to show this year, though they did give me the shortest and most enthusiastic sound bite on video. One of their reps got into the fact that customers in Europe are looking more and more to do electric assist on KMX’s (which I find bizarre even though a friend of mine has done that very thing – I find his modification bizarre, too), but that getting BionX and similar systems in the UK is painfully difficult.

We stopped at Triton a bit to check out their new seat backs which use a 6 pack of foam rolls as a support. While there, we also checked out their new folder and talked a bit about their successful marketing strategy. $1 million in revenue and 5K units sold for the Triton in the past year.

ATOC/Draftmaster was the scene of some activity. We came around the corner only to find Jerome Hediger and Ian Sims involved in conversation. While Rob caught up with them, I went on to take a look at the new split tray design for Draftmaster. They’ve made the tray narrower while maintaining strength and dropping weight. It is now split in two so that the tray can be adjusted for custom length. This is much preferable to my method of adjusting the length – a sawzall. They were also showing the tadpole trike mount and their wheel mount system.

Arkel had a wide assortment of bags, but the ones we were most excited to see were the Catrike bags! So we bought the display bags. We’re supposed to pick them up tomorrow. We got to hear a bit about how many revisions the bags have gone through to make them perfect. The number of revisions has contributed to their delay.

Reverse Gear were on hand with their recumbent specific clothing. Nothing really new in the product line, but they are looking to do co-branding with recumbent manufacturers and dealers. Their first such collaboration was on a Greenspeed jersey which, unfortunately, was held up at UPS and didn’t make it to the show.

Not too far from Reverse Gear was KangaTek, who sell a bike bandolier with zippered pockets in a sling configuration. Both Rob and I bought one to try them out on recumbents as we thought them a novel way to carry the small necessities without resorting to trunk bags or panniers.

Not specifically recumbent, but we took a look at the Proton Magnetic Pedal Locks. They are a set of magnetized pedal platforms that then mate with an SPD compatible metal plate. Two questions were immediate: how much pull could they take and how would we keep our feet from slipping down and off the pedals? 80 pounds of direct pull is the answer to the first part. The answer to the second lies in a small tab/shelf to one side of the magnet that normally keeps feet from sliding forward on upright bikes but could be reversed (by reversing the pedals) on a bent to keep feet from sliding down. We bought two pair to play with once we get back home. The pedals are $165 for the full size and $145 for the minis. And they are heavy.

Speaking of pedals, we visited Speedplay where I noticed something I had never seen before. Sure enough, a new pedal: the Speedplay SYZR. Terrible name, but it had adjustable float and looked like one half of a Crank Bros. egg beater decided to leave the relationship.

Sauntering into the J&B Importers booth, we encountered Freddy Markham who spoke about working on a carbon X-Stream and a carbon Volae. Then he threw in something about the Markham Malibu. Mostly, I was off to the side photographing Sun’s new handtrike. We had no idea that one was coming!

Being a bit of a helmet fetishist, I was pulling Rob into nearly every helmet display at Interbike looking for bent friendly lids. Didn’t really find any of those, but we did find the Ming helmet by Knucklehead. The helmet is fully covered with a reflective finish and comes with snap-on skins to change the look. Under camera flash, it lights up like TRON during a power surge, and should retail for $25. Yes, it’s CPSC certified.

HP Velotechnik had only small changes to their products, but they were nice refinements. Their press release goes into detail on each one, but the seat bag that contains a rain cover and can also be used as a fanny pack was pretty great. The changes to the BodyLink seat were also welcome – the front lip has less of a curve to it while providing more of a seat pocket to reduce forward slides. The bolt holes in it are recessed now, and the entire seat uses less material and is slightly lighter. Getting the new BodyLink seat does require getting the new seat pad to go with it.

Day 6 was showing off a rowbike conversion for their seat-backed bikes, touting it as great for folks with disabilities even though it made it harder to step through the frame. It’s still in the early stages of design and Day 6 are looking to develop a less expensive implementation.

BionX was showing off a half-height battery for their low end unit. And Rob got a lesson on how to tell which controllers go with which batteries (they keep changing them) for those units that we’ve cannibalized for custom builds.

By the time we got to RANS, I was burnt out, so I’m sorry to say I was barely paying attention at that point. They deserve a return visit tomorrow when I’m more awake.

And before calling it a day, I did two things. First, I got a photo of Hoo Ha Ride Glide for Rob Mackenzie over at the Recumbent Blog. Rob – they read your post and want you to know that ladies in spin class really like that stuff. Second, I headed back to ICE to get photos of the front suspension and get a lesson on how it all works. The photos I have are of prototype equipment, so please keep that in mind. What they’ve described as the final configuration makes more sense than what you’ll see in the pics.

Did I mention we witnessed a bicycle fashion show? Yeah, that was terrible.

Okay, now here come the photos. These are not in the same order of the text and include images of some things I did not discuss. Go to it!

The post Day 3.5 through 4 at Interbike appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.

We did, however, make it to the ICE booth where we learned all kinds of stuff. The 2010 models do not have a solid release date yet, only “some time in 2010″. Don’t look for these in the first quarter. But here is what’s known. There are three models: the Adventure, the Sprint, and the Vortex. All three trikes feature the new ICE Trice folding mechanism which is a thing of beauty. We were asked not to shoot video of it, and we complied, but believe me when I say that the ease and speed of folding will have you wondering if its time to sell your current trike.

ICE has simplicity as a goal next year. They are reducing the product line from the mix of Q, QNT, T, TNT, and the varieties of stock colors to three trikes with one color each. This allows for a much clearer marketing message and a reduced headache for dealers who like to stock all the available models.

The Adventure, in blue, is the basic model. The Sprint is the mid-range model with suspension. The Vortex is the speed machine with a 700c rear wheel. Its black and red detailing is certainly striking.

Joining us was Pat Franz of TerraCycle. He pulled us off to the side and dug into his bag of TC goodies to show us a few items. I took a photo, but no notes, so you’re going to have to guess what it is you’re seeing. The mystery is part of the fun, right?

I’ve got more to post, but it’s 2AM. I need sleep. But here’s what’s coming in the followup, which will end up being the Day 4 report – Draftmaster, Triton, and Hase.

There are more Day 3 photos available at our Facebook page.

The post Interbike Day 3 appeared first on RBR Recumbent Bike Riders Inc.