Vintage Thing No. 14 - the Tryagain Trycycle

Don't worry it's nothing weird, just a Fiesta that's been got at by Ed Holloway

After all the shock horror stories in the publishing world this week (see my Anarchadia book blog on the right if you're interested) let's have another Vintage Thing.

This is another device from that affable automotive anarchist Ed Holloway. I was already familiar with his work having seen the Weeny Leaper in action - see VT 11 - when the Tryagain Trycycle hove into view while I was spectating on the Land's End Trial a few years ago. (I'm sorry - I can't find relevant programme in the Boogie Wundaland archives. Er, that's where I live. Maybe someone out there can advise me?)

Of course, it had to be Ed. The Tryagain Trycycle cleared the section but provoked a round of tut-tutting and disapproving remarks from the marshals and spectators. It seems that this such sort of thing shouldn't be allowed and could bring the sport of trialling into disrepute although nobody could say why. Me? I think I laughed out loud.

The Tryagain Trycycle follows the general principle of the Allegro-based Weeny Leaper. Ed kept the go-faster bits of a 1300 Fiesta and got rid of the rest of it. This made it much lighter even though he did add another wheel at the back to stop it dragging its tail - a tail that had once been its midriff. From the windscreen back, Ed was responsible for all of it.

From the rear it reminds me a bit of a dalek. Can it climb stairs though?

Originally constructed as an open top doorless car, the Tryagain Trycycle had a roof by the time I made its acquaintance. As Ed told me "If you can chop it off you can weld it back on." The addition of doors was not so simple. Ed made them out of 18swg aluminium and they slide back to open. It made for a very cosy little cockpit.

Ed used half of the discarded rear beam axle to make a motorcycle type rear swing arm for the third wheel. Like the Weeny Leaper, the fuel tank was a simple jerry can at the back.

1300cc is the maximum engine size for the three wheel class so Ed warmed his up with a special camshaft. He used a pair of motorcycle batteries mounted in front of the front axle line and supplemented this additional ballast with some 1 cwt weights that usually are gainfully employed keeping the sheeting over scaffolding down in high winds.

Ed kept it for a couple of years before selling it on as another project burst out of his fertile imagination. It certainly amazed a lot of people but I think that after the extraordinary Weeny Leaper they were almost prepared for the Tryagain Trycycle. Running as a Class E (symmetrical tricycle as opposed to a motorcycle and sidecar) Ed ran with the motorcycles whenever the route split for cars and bikes. As they arrived at a section on the Edinburgh Trial, a marshal said to Ed, "If you clean this, we'll have to re-write the rules." Ed obliged with a rare failure.

Although the Tryagain Trycycle is a bit square rigged, I like the way that, from the front, it does odd things to perspex. The vanishing point is all wrong. It tapers away a bit too suddenly in a way that makes you look again, as if there is a sudden hiatus in the time/space continuum.

Challenging perceptions can make a lot of people nervous. I reckon that's why they poo poo such amusing mechanical contrivances.