 From this… |  to this. (Photos: David Mahan/Fixed Gear Gallery) |
A few weeks ago, a reader emailed a link to one of the most amazing bike conversion projects I have ever come across. David Mahan from Ojai, California converted an old folding bike to a front loading cargo bike with extra-special grocery-getter functionality.
Mahan uploaded 44 detailed photographs of the project as part of a contest on Fixed Gear Gallery.
Portland is home to many, very talented and creative bike building artisans. But this project is right up there with the best I’ve seen. Let it serve as inspiration to bike conversionists everywhere.
Check out all the photos of Mahan’s grocery getter conversion project on Fixed Gear Gallery.
A few other stunning submissions: Carl w/ epic fenders and Brad’s backyard of bikes. A true fixed gear grocery bike should be loaded with cartons of camel lights, pbr, and hummus though…
I couldn’t get past the fact that the pic shows the bike in a grocery store.
I guess the ADA act means nothing to some people.
Might as well just roll your Segway on in there with it…
I don’t get what the advantage is to bringing the bike in the store versus leaving it outside; you don’t have to use a cart?
Beautiful build, what an awesome shop he has. Thanks for sharing Jonathan.
Dabby: actually he locked the “bike” part in front of the store, and the Cargo part is intended to be used as a shopping cart.
Skidmark,
I totally get that. It took a few moments at first looking at the photo to figure out how he rode it, then I saw a third of it was missing. Thanks though.
I just also noticed that a large percentage of the bike is inside.
I have just never agreed with taking things like bikes, segways, scooters, etc, when you are not reliant upon them.
I mean, you might as well just park the rest of the bike in a handicapped spot.
And it isn’t that hard to transfer your food from the carts already provided.
I do, however think it is a clever conversion, now that my trauma has subsided from the photo shock.
I agree that this is cool. So cool I also posted about it when it came out. http://www.bikejuju.com/2009/awesome-grocery-getter-homebuilt-cargo-bike/
Ruben has a good point, though.
clever as hell. I always love seeing these home-brew bakfietsen
So you forego the shopping cart when you go to the store? I guess if all you’re picking up is a 12-pack of PBR that works fine…
Simply an awesome bike! Great work!!
An easier way is to just build a trailer around a removable blue bin, and then transfer that bin to a shopping cart, and then finally carry it into your house.
http://www.duckfloater.com/gallery/view_album.php?set_albumName=kbutt
The best thing about it is that you can switch it back to being just a folding bike.
Neat-o.
Dabby,
I’m not getting your point re: “I guess the ADA act means nothing to some people.”
Care to enlighten us (not a challenge, I really do want to understand) on why this bike configuration seems to be a bad thing when used for this purpose?
So it looks great. In California.. no lid for groceries, way to far to lean over and pick up tub or the groceries in it. But its a great concept. Loved it!
@John Campbell – I agree that it can be rude for folks to bring sizable chunks of personal property inside while shopping (how hard is it to lock your bike outside, for example). But in this case, it doesn’t appear that the detachable cargo section is larger than a normal shopping cart. So I don’t see the problem, really.
Very creative!
Yet ‘nuther folder impressive enough to repost.
That is so cool! It’s amazing what some people can do with their hands. Beautiful.