How to Prevent a Tricycle and ETrike from Tipping? | Keep All 3 Wheels Down on Your Adult Tricycle

Hey everyone. I'm Dustin. I have nearly 20 years of experience in the bike and e-bike industry. Today I'm going to tell you and show you how to prevent a tricycle or electric trike from tipping. Stick around.

All right, so today I'm going to show you and talk to you about how to prevent a tricycle or electric trike from tipping while you're riding it. But before I do, hit that subscribe button below. Stay in touch with us here at sixthreezero. Be the first to know about all the new content we're putting out, giveaways we do, and of course, new product releases. Hit subscribe.

All right. I see a lot of communication and different forms and groups. A lot of people are interested in buying tricycles, and I firmly believe in tricycles and electric trikes. They're great for riders that are concerned about balance or have just lost the ability to ride a two-wheel bike or for whatever reason, muscularly, you're just not capable of riding a two-wheel bike, trikes are great. There are some people out there that make negative comments about, "Oh, trikes can tip over. Trikes can do that. Trikes can do this." One thing I will say about tricycles, if ridden properly and under the right conditions, tipping isn't going to be an issue. The majority of riders I see riding trikes are using it for flat ground riding around town and are riding more conservatively than, let's say a typical two-wheel rider.

Now, two-wheel bike riders, obviously there's a lot of riders that get very crazy on bikes. They go off jumps, they want to ride super fast. And not to say there aren't some tricycle riders that still want to ride at a very fast pace, I'd say the majority of e-trike or tricycle riders are riding at a more casual leisurely pace and, again, usually on flat ground. Now, that doesn't mean, that doesn't eliminate the risk of tipping, but I will say this, there's a risk of falling over on a two-wheel bike.

On a three-wheel bike, when you take turns, if you take them at too high of a speed and you don't do proper weight transfer, there is a risk that you can lift one of the wheels like this and possibly tip over. I've never seen it happen. I've never had a customer write to us and say that they've tipped over their tricycle, and I assume that's because most of the riders we have, again, are riding them in a way that we would expect them to ride them. We're not designing our tricycles to be performing at 25, 30, or 40 miles an hour, and they're just not designed for that type of speed. So I've never had a case where, again, it's ever happened on a sixthreezero bike. But today, I just want to show you a couple of tricks and tools to eliminate the risk of tipping over on an electric trike.

One thing I will say is the biggest risk or what I would stay away from in riding a tricycle is riding horizontally against a hill. So going uphill, going downhill, no problem. Going horizontally, across a hill is where you're going to present the greatest risk of tipping, but the tools I'll teach you today most likely will prevent that. Now, if you're going against the grain or horizontally against a very steep hill, that's going to provide a problem and in most cases, or some cases, you won't be able to prevent the tipping at all because, with a two-wheel bike, your two wheels just rest on the hill if you're going horizontally across it. In this case, you have three wheels. So your bike is going to lean with the hill, whereas a two-wheel bike is still going to sit straight up and down. A three-wheel bike, if the hill's tilted like this, the bike is going to tilt in that direction as well. So as opposed to staying flat like a two-wheel bike, going horizontal, your bike's going to go with it.

So in that case, very simple, there are two ways to approach it. One is to lean this way into the hill, which seems very obvious. I don't like that. I prefer the approach where if I'm needing my body weight to go this way, I shift my weight this way and I lean the opposite way because I move my butt this way and I tilt my body this way, in a way to get my body weight going that direction. But keeping my torso vertical makes me feel a little safer on the tricycle. If I'm leaning this way completely, I just don't like how I've got my entire body heading in this direction.

In this situation, I've got my body weight shifted. So I've shifted my body weight in this direction, but I keep my body upright so I can still steer properly and I feel like I have better control of the tricycle. So again, imagine that we're on a hill and the hill's going down this way. You could lean completely like this, which in extreme cases you can, or try the tactic of, again, shifting your body and your butt to the other side of the seat and you're pushing your hip out and I'm still keeping my body upright, but all my weight is on this side of the trike. Now again, if you're on a very, very extreme hill, then you probably would need to do this approach to keep the bike from tipping. I just don't like it because now you've got your entire body off kilter and it just makes me feel like I don't have control of the handlebars and the steering.

The same thing is true on turning. When you're turning to the left, the risk is that this wheel would come up. So in that case, my strategy also for this is I lean out, but I still like to keep my body shifted this way. I've got my weight on my right butt to keep the wheels down as opposed to some people who would say, you could lean like this. Well, actually if you're leaning into it, sorry, this wheel's going to come up. So it's weird if you're going like this, right? Because then you've got your body all off kilter. So all you need to do is keep your torso upright and it's just a little bit of a weight transfer to your butt cheek. The other thing too is I don't even need to do that if you're going at a moderate pace. If you can see me, there's absolutely no risk of lifting the wheels up. So it's more something to consider when you start to get at higher speeds, you really want to take turns very fast. If you properly slow down into turns, that's the one thing I will say, on a tricycle, you want to slow down into the turn, and that's going to eliminate all of the risks of tipping.

On a regular two-wheel bicycle, in most situations, you don't need to slow down if you are properly coming into the turn or you have control of your two-wheel bike, you don't have to slow down as long as you're prepared to lean and steer the bike correctly. With a trike, you should slow down into the turn a little bit, and make sure you take the turn appropriately. Once you're out of the turn, then you can accelerate. But you can watch me and, if you jerk the handlebars too much in either direction on a tricycle, you will pull the wheels up. So it's just not about jerking, but properly shifting your weight. I like to lean to the inside but keep the weight on my outside butt cheek. And again, that should keep your two wheels down.

You can see I'm going a little bit faster on this turn and there's no issue. I'll come over here as well, and I lean into it. I'm leaning in, but my weight is on my right butt cheek, and no issue of tipping at all. So I just don't like when people talk about the risk of tipping. Now, you can even see here we have a slight downslope, and again, now it's a little more intuitive for me. I'm just kind of leaning this way, shifting in. In this case, I do want to lean in, shift my buttocks in, and you can see in that situation, still with a slight decline, it's going to take a lock to get the wheels off the ground. So as long as you're conservative and if you just ride at a normal pace, you don't even need to shift your weight. Shifting the weight's just going to be an added benefit.

So I just don't like when there are a lot of comments and people around the internet talking about tipping a tricycle. Of course, it's possible. Of course, it's possible to crash on a two-wheel bike. It's really about riding them appropriately, taking the appropriate safety precautions and just ensuring that you're smart and you do things safely. And again, do understand that there is some level of risk of tipping a tricycle, but if you slow down into turns, and properly transfer your weight, you'll have no issues in your time owning and riding a tricycle.

I hope that helps. If you have any other questions at all, please comment below or email us theteam@sixthreezero.com. You can also call us at (310) 982-2877. If you're in the market for a tricycle or electric trike, you can find this one on our website right now, sixthreezero.com. And if you don't know what bike is right for you, take our proprietary body fit quiz. We'll ask you a few questions about your body and your life, and we'll recommend the perfect trike or bike for you, or e-trike or e-bike for you. In addition, we have a 30-day test ride or e-bike or e-trike policy. If you don't love it in the first 30 days, send it back, no questions asked, no money out of your pocket.

In addition to that, join our Facebook Pedalers group and download our app. Great place to connect with existing riders before you purchase and after your purchase. Great place to make friends and track your rides on the app. It's a lot of fun. Thank you for sticking around. And don't forget, it's your journey, your experience. Enjoy the ride.