Xtracycle now sells a nice pair of runningboards for $149, which are out-of-my-price-range and out-of-stock. So on a rainy Thursday, inspired by this photo by some folks at Clever Cycles, I started making a running board for my Xtracycle.
I used a wideloader as a frame.
I have a pair of these guys and rarely use them. They are a bit wide for navigating sidewalks and bikeracks, and they get in the way of my small passengers doing running mounts/dismounts. So I removed the spring pins with an old spoke, hacksawed 4" from each end, and drilled new holes for the pins.
While I was under the hood, I removed the broken Kickback plug and replaced it with a wine cork. I found out later that you only want to leave ~2mm of cork sticking out. This is too much:
[Not shown: biking to three hardware stores to find 3/4" P-clamps. WTF? - MN]
I shellacked and old flooring board that I found in my basement, drilled and clamped. Those are cut-up road tubes under the clamps.
Mounted:
I decided to only mount a running board on the drive side for a multitude of reasons: kids climb aboard curb-side, protects derailleur, I push-off with my left foot and it would sometimes get caught under the Wideloader, and one platform seemed like enough.
The Snapdeck and handlebars also received a fresh coat of shellack whilst I had it out. Now I'm ready for more rain!
[I finished this on Friday night, right after receiving an email from Xtracycle stating that their Running Boards will be back in stock next week. FYI. - MN.]
