ChrisM

Has anyone here tried to attach a tagalong to a tagalong? I currently have my Burley Piccolo attached to my Santana tandem, with a trailer attached to the Piccolo, but my kids have outgrown the trailer. Is attaching a second tagalong to the Piccolo asking for trouble?

DieselDan

Adams has a tandem tagalong:

robertc3

I think you might run into some geometric issues. The seat post on the tagalong is going to be much lower than the seat post on your adult bike. The second tagalong might be riding with a downward tilt in the front. It might be something that you could deal with through adjustments, but I would try it before you buy it. The tandem tagalong looks like a pretty good solution if it works for the budget.

masiman

I have seen it done a few times. I don't recall if it was with Piccolo or seat post mounts. The second TAB may be a little lower but someone on here tried it out and did not find a problem.

ChrisM

Thanks for the input everyone. I think I'll borrow a second TAB before I buy one. The Adams tandem looks great, but my kids are already at the weight limit. The other option I was considering was putting a banana seat on the piccolo. My goal is to be able to bring 3 of the kids to school on a busy street.

arej00dazed

I've seen a tagalong attached to a tandem with a trailer attached to the tagalong........it was interesting watching them turn around in the road.

ChrisM

That's how we've been doing it; Tandem, tagalong and trailer. However, I had a brainstorm yesterday about using the back half of my unused Raleigh Twenty to make a tandem out of the piccolo. Actually, it's more of an xtracycle since the person on the back can't pedal.

masiman

That really is quite cool!

You are just a few steps away from making it into a true tandem TAB.

I assume the Raleigh 20 is a steel frame since it looks like you made the triangle that you welded to the seat tube and BB. The plate on the adapter triangle rests on the stays or is there sort of bolt/clamp? Any sort of chain/foot protection for the rear passenger? It looks like you just have them rest their feet on the extended bolt.

ChrisM

This is definitely still a work in progress. I'm planning on putting some BMX style foot pegs on the threaded rod and also a chainguard for the passenger.

The Raleigh is steel, but the cool thing is that I didn't need to weld to put this together. The plate is just resting on the stay at the moment. It seems pretty stable, but I think that I should clamp it down somehow.

I'm also debating adding a sliding bottom bracket shell to add a set of cranks for the stoker. The only problem is that I would need to mount it rather high on the seat tube to allow clearance for the seat stays on the piccolo.

ChrisM

Also, I did buy a cheap banana seat for the piccolo. It didn't work very well. It was really too small for two kids to be comfortable for very long. It might work on the back of this if the stokers don't need to pedal.

masiman

Now I see about not having to weld. I had no idea what a Raleigh Twenty looked like.



Unfortunately, I too do not see an easy solution to synching the cranks up. If the Burley was cheaper and easy to get you could modify the Burleys stays without much heartburn. It would make it unusable in the original config but you would have the homemade tandem TAB.

A weaker and less stable idea would be to attach a single to the Burley dropouts via the forks of another bike. I'd think you'd want to have the forks fixed if you did that. It would make for longer chain too. Really not a good sounding idea as I think of the details.

ChrisM

Our first test rides went very well this weekend. I added footpegs to the threaded rod and also added a clamp to the brake bridge to help hold everything together. I'm still debating adding cranks for the stoker.
CIMG1514..jpg

masiman

Looks great!

Whatever gets you all out riding and having fun is a good thing.

I can't quite make out the tandem you are on. Is it a Univega? I am not sure if they made tandems.

ChrisM

It's an 1989 Santana Rio. I picked it up on craigslist this spring. After upgrading the brakes, it's been perfect for us.

LeftinFlint

What is the mod you did to the rear cranks on the Santana so your son could pedal? I'm looking for ways to ride with my three small ones and I'm not sure I want to invest in a tandem Adams.

Thanks.

ChrisM

I started with a kidback. It's a separate bottom bracket shell that attaches to the seat tube. Sheldon brown has a picture here: https://www.sheldonbrown.com/gloss_i-k.html#kidback

I've actually just removed the kid back and put crank shorteners on instead. It lowers our center of gravity quite a bit but not all of the kids are tall enough to ride there.

LeftinFlint

That's pretty cool. I'll have to look into those.

Thanks.

jacabo

Has anyone ever explored the possibility to a custom seat-post that would allow two tag-alongs to run side-by-side? I have in mind a "T" that runs perpendicular to the axis of my bike and two uprights to attach the tag-a-longs. I have 4 year old twins. the Adams tag-a-long might be fine, except for the requirement that they both pedal together.

masiman

That sounds like a pretty wide load. The TAB's are only slightly narrower in width than an adult single if at all. You'll have to give them enough spread so that they don't bump into each other. Could be painful getting caught between handlbars or pedals.

ChrisM

I've debated doing this with an adult tricycle. You could weld up something fairly easily. The only problem is that the tricycle would be tippy (with or without the tagalongs).

jacabo

"That sounds like a pretty wide load. The TAB's are only slightly narrower in width than an adult single if at all. You'll have to give them enough spread so that they don't bump into each other. Could be painful getting caught between handlbars or pedals."

Yeah, or i was thinking about devising a way to stagger them a bit. I am leaning against the idea. the coolness idea (and it would be fun to mess around with it) is probably not worth the safety trade-offs (ssshhhh, don't tell my wife I am getting sensible, she might start expecting it all the time).