How can I move, all alone, a disabled motorcycle (heavy, no front wheel).
Any ideas? I'm all alone and don't have a pickup. I can rent a truck but how do I get the heavy bike (rear wheel and engine and frame) onto and off the truck.
Call the local (to you) Mormons. Usually good at helping move house. Look in the phone book under "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints".
Rent an engine hoist (the free standing boom type) from the local auto parts place. Charge is usually minor and sometimes free if you return it the same day or the next.
Oh yeah, and get some nylon tow straps instead of trying to use chains.
Do you have an engine hoist?
You can get a 1/2 ton crane that will go in the back of a truck for $100 at harbor freight. 2 Ton for a couple hundred.
If you're gonna have a bike you might want to pick up a truck or trailer to cart it around when necessary.
Jim
I remember a friend in college commenting that the thing he used his bike most for was going the the shop for parts for it.
A couple possibilities. A cart (hand truck) like the ones used to move refrigerators. You might be able to hook it under the front forks. I'm not sure it would lift high enough to get the frame off the ground though. An equipment dollie might also work. You didn't mention what bike you're moving so no guess on the weight. Bikes can weigh up to 1000 lbs. or so. Maybe it would work better to rent a van. They aren't as high.
Just give me a call:) I will come over and put it in my van:) Then happily drive away:):)
What brand bike is it?
Bikers tend to be a friendly group, look for other local bikers they might help you move it:)
Andy comments:
Put the tailgate down.
Set two 4x4s about3 feet apart and fasten to make a ramp from the ground to the tailgate. I would suggest 10 foot lengths.
Lay the bike on the 4x4s sideways with the rear wheel over one and the engine over the other, at ground level. Try to get it so it's more or less evenly weight distributed....
Walk the bike up the ramp -- one side a foot or so, then the other side a foot or so. If necessary, use a prop, or a rope, to keep the bike from sliding back.....probly not necessary with 10 foot ramp length.
This will take about 10 or 15 minutes, a little at a time, but you will work it up. Then use the 4x4s for a nice garden border in the yard......or something.... With a pile of wood and some rope, you can fashion about any sort of ramp you want. That's how they built the pyramids.... probly....
Andy in Eureka, Texas
Motorcycles are horses for people without room for a stable.
Before buying/renting equipment, first call around to wrecker companies, and other companies that specialize in moving quipment and find out what they would charge. Such a job would probably a simple thing for them, and cost less than you would spend trying to do it yourself. Larry
Agree
If you don't have anybody to help you, you shouldn't be buying a bike. This isn't the last time you're gonna have to haul it somewhere. you can rent a low-profile tilt-bed trailer. It's MUCH safer than trying to load it into a pickup, wheels or not. Again, DO NOT try to do this yourself. Imagine yourself pinned under the thing with a broken leg and nobody around.
Lots of rental trucks have lift gates.
You'd definitely need tie down straps and some way to move the bike around as you're getting it on and off the truck. Maybe strapping it to a dolly would work.
Disassemble it and move the pieces?
U-Haul rents box vans with powered lift gates and a cargo floor that's lower than the typical pickup truck bed and U-Haul also rents very low motorcycle trailers with loading ramps.
Once your don't have a front wheel at all, snag an abandoned supermarket shopping cart and hacksaw the basket part off so you can rest the motorcycle forks on the wheeled bottom half of the cart.
You can probable use the axle clamps on the bottom of the forks to secure the motorcycle to the shopping cart when you have to maneuver the motorcycle around the garage.
Sawed-off shopping carts are good for moving engines around the garage too.
Also, while you're scrounging shopping carts, get a few plastic milk crates to store parts in. Impecunious motorcyclists have been using milk crates for motorcycle workstands since the Beatles were a group...
Perhaps he used his motor cycle to get parts for the car?
Have a car?
Gael wrote in news: snipped-for-privacy@q4g2000yqm.googlegroups.com:
They were good indestructible buggies too.
They were also pretty handy for the market that paid ~ $120/each for them...
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