Tips for Riding a Trike Motorcycle

Whether you’re new to motorcycling and are thinking of buying a trike or have been riding for decades and want to switch to a three-wheel motorcycle, you need to learn how riding a trike differs from a two-wheel bike. While you’ll still get that feeling of freedom and adventure while you ride your trike, it handles differently from other two-wheeled bikes and should be treated as such.

If you want to learn how to ride a Harley trike, read these tips before heading out on the road or signing up for an instructional class.

Turning

If you’ve ridden a two-wheeled motorcycle before, you know that turning involves your whole body. When you take sharper turns, you need to lean into the turn to help get the bike to go the way you want. But when you ride a trike, it steers more like a car than a motorcycle.

Instead of counter-steering, like on a two-wheeled motorcycle, you will use direct steering while riding a trike. Like with driving a car, you need to brake before going into the turn and then accelerate again halfway through. You don’t need to lean at all to help with the turn. The point of counter-steering is to keep your balance. Because the trike has its third wheel, you don’t need to worry about the bike falling over.

Braking

Another difference between riding 3-wheel motorcycles and 2-wheel motorcycles is that trikes are bigger and heavier. You need to take that extra weight into account — you may need to start braking sooner on the trike than you would on a two-wheeled motorcycle.

With two-wheeled bikes, most of the braking comes down to the front wheel. With trike motorcycles, you have three wheels to brake. For regular braking, you’ll use brakes on the back wheels. For quick or emergency turns, you’ll use all three wheels to slow down and stop.

Adapting

Besides braking and turning, there are lots of other ways that trikes are different from motorcycles with two wheels. If you’ve been riding a two-wheeled bike for a long time, you’ll have to un-learn a lot of habits. There’s some important extra stuff to keep in mind while you’re learning how to ride a trike.

Three-wheeled motor trikes are typically wider and longer than two-wheeled motorcycles. This is important to keep in mind while you’re turning, parking and completing other maneuvers.

Like we mentioned before, the third wheel on a trike allows it to stay balanced on its own. Even when you come to a full stop, the bike will not fall over. Consequently, you should never put your feet down. Doing so can get your feet stuck underneath the bike or get you hurt in other ways.

Another difference is that trikes don’t have a kickstand. Like cars, they have a handbrake that you will switch on to keep the bike from rolling away when you aren’t riding it. Before getting off the trike, be sure to activate the brake.

Visit or call Susquehanna Valley H-D® to schedule a test ride on one of our trikes today!