Aerocoupe-Advanced Trike Design from the 1980's w Jeff Wills

Step back in time to the "virtual free-for-all" of the early 1980s American recumbent revolution! In this episode we sit down with industry veteran Jeff Wills to uncover the forgotten history of the Aerocoupe—a pioneering human-powered trike born out of the Southern California HPV racing scene. Jeff shares incredible stories from the 1980 Speed Championships at Ontario Motor Speedway, where garage-built "missiles" and "streamliners" first challenged the traditional bicycle establishment. In this interview, you’ll discover: The "No Rules" Era: How the IHPVA rose as a reaction to strict conventional racing associations.Engineering the Aerocoupe: How Jeff and designer Mark Murphy used moped hubs, awning fabric, and sailplane-inspired chrome tubing to build a trike from scratch.Lessons in "Dangerous" Design: Jeff gets candid about the "exciting" frame flex and "tank steering" that defined early prototypes.The Legacy: A look at how these early experiments provided the DNA for the high-performance trikes we ride today.In our second segment we interview the Spezi 2026 team. This year the world's largest recumbent bicycling event takes place in Freiburg, Germany. We'll find out all the details and highlights of this exciting event which we'll be attending in April.00:00:00  Intro00:00:30  What’s on Today’s Show00:01:35  Panel Introduction00:03:00  Sponsor Introduction00:07:35  Honza Galla with Recumbent News Segment00:11:06  Spezi 2026 Preview with Producers01:32:30  Jeff Wills and the 80s Aerocoupe Recumbent Trike Build and Racing01:14:15  Sponsor Thanks01:18:50  Announcements01:20:15  Goodbye to panel and crewPlease subscribe to us on YouTube (https://goo.gl/CHOOgX) and Like us on Facebook (https://www.facebook.com/laidbackbikereport/) if you haven't already done so. We would love to have you as a Patreon Patron where you can support all we do for as little as $1/month. Check out how it works and the benefits you can reap here: https://www.patreon.com/laidbackbikereport*Thanks to these wonderful sponsors for making the LBR webcast possible*TerraCycle  https://t-cycle.com/  800-371-5871TerraTrike/Greenspeed https://wizwheelz.com/  800-945-9910Laidback Cycles https://laidbackcycles.com/   916-668-8766Bicycle Man https://bicycleman.com/ 607-587-8835AZUB https://azub.eu/  RecumbentPDX https://recumbentpdx.com/  503-231-1000Steintrikes https://stein-trikes-us.com/  931-237-0889Utah Trikes http://utahTrikes.com 866-446-2065Catrike http://catrike.com 407-999-0200Bacchetta Bikes http://bacchettabikes.com 818-358-2740Angletech cycledifferent.com 719-687-7475*Honza’s News Report Links*--Recumbent News  https://www.recumbent.news/*Guest Links*Spezi 2026  https://en.spezialradmesse.de/Jeff Wills  https://www.facebook.com/jeff.wills1*LBR Review Team Links**LBR Crew Links*-Recumbent News-online news website by Honza Galla  https://www.recumbent.news/-BentRider/Larry Varney  http://www.bentrideronline.com/-Nina Paley’s Links-Nina’s blog  https://blog.ninapaley.com/-Nina’s bike merchandise  http://www.palegraylabs.com/other-stuff-1/protective-bicycle-amulet-Peter Stull  https://bicycleman.com/-Josef Janning  https://www.facebook.com/josef.janning-Tim Segard https://www.bentrevolution.com/-Tray Bourgoyne  [email protected]**The absolute best archive of early recumbent history is Recumbent Cyclist News**  Find years of publisher Bob Bryant’s hard work here:  https://rcnpdf.com/**Viewer Submissions or Questions**Send to [email protected] the show