Building and restoring motor bikes is what Michael O'Shea, a mechanical technician at the department of engineering at University College Cork, does for a hobby. More like a labour of love, it takes a special dedication, one that came easily to him some 20 years ago when he acquired his first Yamaha to dodge the traffic on his way to UCC each morning. He then became interested in restoring and assembling motor bikes.
Some years ago, he created "Mike's trike", which was something of an amalgam. Featured in the European Custom Bike magazine, the machine took almost three years to build. With one wheel up front and two at the back, the basic outline of the trike is a bike engine with a car back axle. Enthusiasts will eagerly digest the fact that the engine is an XS 1100 Yamaha and the frame was made by Podge of Eurocustom Cycles.
It cost £4,000 to create and incorporates bits and pieces from machines as diverse as a Honda Civic and a Fiat tractor. It was hard enough to bring the vision of the trike from design stage to the road, but further travails lay ahead.
Insurance companies wondered how they would classify it. Several considered it to be an unacceptably high risk, but finally they relented and classified it as a motor bike.
Custom bikes are to motor cycles what free verse is to poetry. They can range from minor alterations to an original design to building a Harley Davidson without using Harley Davidson parts.
"Mike's trike" has won awards in the UK and regularly appears at motor-bike shows abroad. This summer, he rode it through France and Spain on his way to a show in Faro in the Algarve.
With winter setting in, his attention will now turn to the restoration of an early Yamaha, as well as working on a Suzuki and a 1926 Douglas.