Help Goldwing California side car (CSR) Tour kit earlier model can't change tires

[GWJessie]

I have a 1993 Goldwing that has a 2005 CSR Tour conversion where the back wheels are partly covered. i went to have the tires replaced only to find out that you need to unhook the shocks and drop the axle to do so and my mechanic said that wouldn't work and CSR told him they had to "fight" with it to do it so he is suggesting I have the back cut up or something. Anyone else have this kit and how have you handled changing the back tires. I don't know how to post a picture of it but you can google CSR 2003 or so Tour Trike and you will find a picture so you will see what I mean

[Rowdy]

I have seen the kit you have and have wondered how the wheels were removed. My first thought would be to use a lift that would lift the trike by the bike's frame allowing the rear suspension to sag enough to access the lug nuts and drop the wheel out the bottom. If that is not possible I would think the next easiest way would be to lift the body up enough to do the job. You might have enough slack in the wiring that nothing would need be disconnected. Good luck and please let us know how it is done when you finally do finish the job.

[GWJessie]

That is my point, I and my mechanic contacted the manufacturer (CSC) and they said they had problems changing the tire and all they would offer is the unhooking the shock and lowering the axle but my mechanic tried that and he said it won't lower enough to take the wheel off..CSC said they built the trike and wheels first then put the kit on top of it but apparently didn't think ahead about changing the tires. I was hoping someone has run into this problem before and see how they handled it. Otherwise my mechanic suggested I have the side "cut" so the entire wheel is exposed which really means major surgery and changing the bike. The downside on this kit is that if you have a problem with a tire while traveling, no one will be able to change that tire. For a single person, like me for example, that is a pretty scary thing to think about especially if I am riding on my own.

[mhgoldwing]

Cutting the fiberglass fender would be no big deal for a body shop to complete. Considering the problems it would solve I think I would go that route.

My next consideration would be to not support any mfg. that openly says, "Oops. sorry about having our heads where the sun doesn't shine and we're not going to help."

[FRR]

When I owned a CSC Trike kit on my 2004 Wing I had the wheels off several times and they were extremely difficult to remount. Talked with a guy last week who purchased the CSC kit with the wheels an inch larger than stock and didn't know how in the world he would ever get them off and on. For the period of time I owned my Wing with the CSC kit the customer service was great, so I would keep bugging them for help.

[GWJessie]

As an addendum CSC told my mechanic that this was one of the first kits they made but I was really surprised that to both me and my mechanic they offered little solutions other than saying they have to fight with it to try and replace the tire and if I do find a place that can take it apart to put new tires on it they tell me it might be around 4 hours or so to acheive this (if they can) and at about $95 an hour every time you need to change or fix the tire plus finding someone that can even work on it doesn't seem much of a soultion. So far I am not finding people that have these kits which makes me wonder just how many they really sold in the first place....

[sekanbob]

Are the new ones difficult to change? Are Road Smith difficult to change or are they something that you can have done at Walmart?

[cscsonny]

Here is a reply from CSC in 2009 to an owner of the Tour Trike Conversion.
"For rear tire removal on the CSC Tour Conversion you first remove mufflers,all three shock bolts and let air out of tires."
Had a friend that had one and I always wondered how you would ever change a rear tire.He traded the trike before the back tires needed to be replaced.
Hope this might help.

[wiredgeorge]

Are the new ones difficult to change? Are Road Smith difficult to change or are they something that you can have done at Walmart?

To change Roadsmith tires, you just jack up the rear end under the jack points using a scissors jack. The jack point is the bottom of the shock mount. Once the trike is up about 5-6 inches, there is plenty of room to pull the rim/tire off. The problem this guy is having is that the fenders have no radius and you can't jack the trike high enough to slip the rim off the studs.



If I owned this trike, I would radius-cut the fenders for clearance. Once cut, the cut would only need a trim edge to mask the cut and the trike would look better (IMHO).

For GWJessie... how many miles did it take you to wear out the rear tires?

[Grandpa1]

My 2012 Goldwing CSC Viper tires are easy to remove. I've had them off a couple of times already.

[GWJessie]

To change Roadsmith tires, you just jack up the rear end under the jack points using a scissors jack. The jack point is the bottom of the shock mount. Once the trike is up about 5-6 inches, there is plenty of room to pull the rim/tire off. The problem this guy is having is that the fenders have no radius and you can't jack the trike high enough to slip the rim off the studs.



If I owned this trike, I would radius-cut the fenders for clearance. Once cut, the cut would only need a trim edge to mask the cut and the trike would look better (IMHO).

For GWJessie... how many miles did it take you to wear out the rear tires?

The tires aren't totally worn down yet, but I just replaced the front tire and the back tires were from 2004 so my mechanic felt it might be a good time to put on some better tires but the bike itself has 60K on it don't know how many miles it had on it when it was triked

[wiredgeorge]

I was looking at the trike kit for the new Indian up in the NEWS section. That kit may also have clearance issues removing the rear tires as the fenders are heavily skirted to keep the Indian look going. Good luck with your kit but it seems there is only one real solution... cutting the rear fenders. What if you had a flat out in the middle of no where? I can't remember the brand of my rear tires; they are off off off brands from the far east. They seem to work OK but I have thought about premium US-made tires... we will see. I need new tires on my Triumph first.

[2Trikez]

Just finished putting a (damaged but fixed & re-cycled body) CSR kit on a 1989 GL1500. Yes the wheel radius are small, but what size rim/tires are being used. Most of the early kits used 14" rims and 60 series tires. IF you have BIGGER rims/tires that is some of your problem. Some guys went to BIGGER tires (70/80 series & 15" rims) to get added gas mileage if they were using higher (lower numbered) rear gears. Some other items you could change is the wheel studs where the wheel is attached. These studs could be just a bit too long and this makes getting the tire/rim hard to remove. We used shorter studs but are running 15" rims but 60 series tires. Removing some material or putting new shorter studs in helps...a lot.


One other item, one thing CSR did was to use "longer length" (stock 13 to new 16")shocks on the rear. I read in some info somewhere that these shocks were about 3" longer than the stock shocks.

Hope this helps a little.

2TZ

[gwrra164]

I have a 1993 Goldwing that has a 2005 CSR Tour conversion where the back wheels are partly covered. i went to have the tires replaced only to find out that you need to unhook the shocks and drop the axle to do so and my mechanic said that wouldn't work and CSR told him they had to "fight" with it to do it so he is suggesting I have the back cut up or something. Anyone else have this kit and how have you handled changing the back tires. I don't know how to post a picture of it but you can google CSR 2003 or so Tour Trike and you will find a picture so you will see what I mean

I have 04 1800 with 05 CSC conversion. The tires are very difficult to remove but I found the correct height by trial and error that would allow the wheel to be removed from the bottom first by tilting the wheel up from the bottow to clear the bottom lugs then lowering wheel down enough to tile wheel from top to clear the wheel well. No an easy process, but it will work