Single shaft spoked hub motor for fatbike/trike wheel - Does it exist?

I'm trying to come up with a design for a very capable all wheel drive off road vehicle, from my experience anything which is only front or rear wheel drive fails in extreme wet, muddy or hilly terrain and looses traction.

My idea is taking a tadpole style fat trike and turning it into a four wheel drive fat quad type thing but the main issue is whether I can find the right kind of motors for it it. Does anyone know of a single shaft spoked hub motor the could be used for the front wheels of a tadpole trike? So maybe 24" or something. The power isn't too much of an issue although ideally would be at least 500w as I'd be using 4x motors that would give plenty of power and speed isn't too important either as it's for off road use so 15-20mph is fine, it's torque which is more important to get through deep mud and up steep hills.

I'm trying to come up with a design for a very capable all wheel drive off road vehicle, from my experience anything which is only front or rear wheel drive fails in extreme wet, muddy or hilly terrain and looses traction. Due to a progressive illness I'm looking into options which will allow me to continue to go to places I'm used to going to before my health declined. I've got a Tramper mobility scooter which although capable is only rear wheel drive and looks a bit too mobility scooter like for my likings, as the proud owner of a very pretty Yamaha fzs1000 and being only 30 years old I still want to look cool :lol: my dad uses a chasswheel 4x which is fantastic off road but cost £15,000 so not really an option for me... it does however show me how necessary 4 wheel drive is for off roading which I'm sure anyone into car off-roading will know.

My idea is taking a tadpole style fat trike and, adding another rear wheel and turning it into a four wheel drive fat quad type thing but the main issue is whether I can find the right kind of motors for it it. Does anyone know of a single shaft spoked hub motor the could be used for the front (and rear) wheels of a tadpole trike? So maybe 24" or something. The power isn't too much of an issue although ideally would be at least 500w as I'd be using 4x motors that would give plenty of power and speed isn't too important either as it's for off road use so 15-20mph is fine, it's torque which is more important to get through deep mud and up steep hills.

You might want to look at this trike thread:
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=88266

there are also a few quad threads that have info you might use. Not everything in the list is relevant; you'll have to poke thru to see which are.
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/search.php?keywords=quad&terms=all&author=&sc=1&sf=titleonly&sr=topics&sk=t&sd=d&st=0&ch=300&t=0&submit=Search
There's probably others taht don't show up in that search.

BTW, the term usually used is "single-ended axle" rather than "single shaft"; you may find more info about them with that term.

TriggerGee said:

My idea is taking a tadpole style fat trike and turning it into a four wheel drive fat quad type thing but the main issue is whether I can find the right kind of motors for it it. Does anyone know of a single shaft spoked hub motor the could be used for the front wheels of a tadpole trike? So maybe 24" or something.

Click to expand...

If by "fat" you mean today's usual definition of 4" or wider tires, you have the choice between 20" or 26” (nominal) wheels. In real diametral inches, that's more like 23" or 29". I don't know of any fat tires available in 24" nominal. Assuming hub motors makes the 20" size look a lot better, given your application.

The only stub axle hub motor I'm aware of that's available for sale now is Grin Technologies' All Axle hub motor.

amberwolf said:

You might want to look at this trike thread:
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=88266

there are also a few quad threads that have info you might use. Not everything in the list is relevant; you'll have to poke thru to see which are.
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/search.php?keywords=quad&terms=all&author=&sc=1&sf=titleonly&sr=topics&sk=t&sd=d&st=0&ch=300&t=0&submit=Search
There's probably others taht don't show up in that search.

BTW, the term usually used is "single-ended axle" rather than "single shaft"; you may find more info about them with that term.

Click to expand...

Thanks that's exactly the info I needed! The first link to the tadpole build is what I was thinking of for the front wheels so once I'm ready I'd contact grin tech about those all axle hub motors as they seem able to machine up the torque arm fittings and whether that motor could be fitted to fat tyres.

Looking through the second link I found the fat cat custom quad from Utah trikes which looks awesome and as the rear wheels are joined by an axle and dif then some other kind of high torque mid drive type motor could be used. Only problem is the price of the fat cat quad
Easier options would be the outrider coyote quad which looks beyond epic but costs a ludicrous amount of money

Chalo said:

TriggerGee said:

My idea is taking a tadpole style fat trike and turning it into a four wheel drive fat quad type thing but the main issue is whether I can find the right kind of motors for it it. Does anyone know of a single shaft spoked hub motor the could be used for the front wheels of a tadpole trike? So maybe 24" or something.

Click to expand...

If by "fat" you mean today's usual definition of 4" or wider tires, you have the choice between 20" or 26” (nominal) wheels. In real diametral inches, that's more like 23" or 29". I don't know of any fat tires available in 24" nominal. Assuming hub motors makes the 20" size look a lot better, given your application.

The only stub axle hub motor I'm aware of that's available for sale now is Grin Technologies' All Axle hub motor.

Click to expand...

Yes that is what I meant by fat, I think they look cool and should be great off road although if it narrows my motor choices down too much I might have to forget about the fat tyres. I wasn't sure what wheels sizes they come in but I think the recumbent trikes seems to use either 26" or 20" as you said.

Choosing fat tires doesn't diminish your motor options, but stub axle wheels do. Maybe some of the trike guys on the forum know of single sided motors I'm not aware of.

This kind of motors do exist, but i'm afraid they're somewhat expensive.
https://ebike.heinzmann.com/en/systems/cargopower/motor
Geared but clutchless, single-sided version is available too.

I think you'll find plenty of single shaft motors here: http://www.cnqsmotor.com/en/article_list_92.html

yeah, grin has them. https://www.ebikes.ca/m3540ss.html