3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle

In his nearly 50 years as an avid motorcyclist, Grady Howard has roared down the tobacco roads of North Carolina and through the mountains of old Kentucky, all with his wife, Barbara, tucked behind him. But with a balky left leg and myriad other maladies, he knew the only way to stay wild was to add a wheel.Mr. Howard is one of a legion of aging bikers suffering from aching joints and slowing reflexes — who have abandoned their traditional two-wheel motorcycles in favor of three-wheelers, the super-steady and seemingly safer machines commonly known as trikes. Equal parts “Easy Rider” and easy chair, the trikes have grown in popularity in recent years, expanding from a do-it-yourself niche to a potentially lucrative market for major manufacturers.Industry experts say the sale of tens of thousands of trikes, whose sticker prices can rival an upscale sedan’s a new three-wheeled Harley starts at $30,999 has helped buoy a slumping industry and kept a generation of born-to-run riders on the roads.“The baby boomers are getting older, man,” said Steve Stirewalt, a lifelong rider and motorcycle dealer known as Fat Daddy by his friends. “People riding all their lives don’t want to stop justbecause of bad knees, or bad eyes, or diabetes or something. They want to keep rocking.”Mr. Stirewalt, who is 63 and helped along by a hearing aid, was polishing his three-wheeler a chrome-on-chrome chopper with a fake alligator skin seat at the National East Coast Trike-In, which drew hundreds of trike owners and enthusiasts to Mount Airy, N.C., over Labor Day weekend.

3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle

3 wheel motorcycle