Forks, sporks, springs, dorks

Well, except for me, there's no dorks here. But somewhere I do have a spork or two, and a few spring and forks.

The latest addion to the last category is this, from Freecycle:

It's a Honda 750 front fork, that leaks.

I don't really care about the leak, since I am probably just going to use parts from it, rather than the whole thing, for part of my rear suspension on the cargo trike. If it weren't so heavy (perhaps 25 pounds) I would consider using it *as* the rear suspension and mounting bracket for the wheel.

It does have some nice usable bearings on it, on the steering pivot.

I suspect that whatever leaks are there are caused by seals such as the rings here, or those internal to it.

Many of the non-shock parts above may be useful as well, once I think of something for them.

The handlebar clamps I may already have an idea for, in the USS part of the trike steering. They can unbolt completely from this assembly.

The wheel axle ends may also have a use, though probably not for actually holding a wheel. :)

One of them has the mount points for a disc brake assembly, though it's for a motorcycle style rather than anything small enough to be appropriate for the trike.

They, too, just unbolt from the ends of the fork shocks.


The shocks do compress quite easily at first, and have a dailable soft/hard response (at the top of each shock). I suspect that they would work well enough as the rear shock for the trike, but even by themselves likley weigh about 10 pounds each. It is more likely that I can use individual components from within the shocks, if they use springs inside as the main compression unit. I will have to look up a service manual for them before I attempt any disassembly, because if they are only hydraulic and not spring at all, then I will have to use them as-is.

That's not a huge problem, because eventually I may well need to build a motorcycle-class EV, once I have enough experience with the design and build of frames and EV systems, and this could then be one of the shock systems on it. I'd rather use bicycle-class for a number of reasons, but there may come a time I must go faster or have a bigger motor than allowed by bicycle-class laws.