Street skating, part adrenalin sport, part party and part social gathering. Great exercise, great fun and good people.
There are organised street skates in almost every major city in the world but no one does it like we do in London. The thrill of skating public roads in a huge group can hardly be described, adding a sound track makes the party. The idea of putting a sound system on a bike was not a new one when we came to the London Skate project. Another skate, based in London had a Brox four wheeled recumbent with a fairly impressive sound system consiting of a pair of moulded PA speakers and a wooden box housing the electrics. There is no doubting the vibe it created. No one forgets the first time they street skated with a sound system.

The London Skate had grown in popularity since its inception in the millennium but after four years it had no sound system. Funds being short at the time a small trailer mounted sound pulled by a bicycle was built for the 2004 season. With more will power than cash it was under powered and unstable. On its second outing it flipped over suffering irreversible damage.

As 2005 opened the skate was in a much healthier position and all agreed that a sound system was a priority, not just for fun but for the events continued success. Clever fund raising during the previous season, mainly from the 2004 launch party, raffle and personal donations meant there were some funds available. The project to build a sound fit for the London Skate was initiated in February that year. The system had to be as loud as possible and run off batteries for at least two hours. The bike had to be fast enough to keep up with the skate. First thing was to find a suitable bicycle to build it on.

It is suprising how many types of load carrying cycle have been designed. From the outset we discounted a trailer system and wanted to avoid the recumbants due to issues of visability, ease of use and storage. A brief search threw up a myriad of options. Ice cream vendor’s tricycles and quads with a big box on the front, butchers delivery bikes with big baskets and tricycles of all shapes and sizes. Our budget did not help with some of the more interesting solutions like hybid trikes and rickshaws. By March 2005 we were getting ever so slightly desperate. With a little over 6 weeks till the start of the season we still had not found our vehicle. A trip to London Recumbents in Dulwich, a hire company specialising in special needs and fun cycles was hoped to bring us nearer to a solution.
One clear winter morning we made the journey across town meet the owner (also a skater) who had several options for us. We hacked around on hot dog bikes, quads, trikes and a couple of tandem sort of things, putting each one through its paces. To quote the mechanic as we put a special needs trike up on two wheels, "It’s not a f%*#ing BMX mate.

As much fun as it was we came no closer to a solution. They were all either too heavy, too small or in the case of the trike, totally unstable. Those that could carry the load we needed were far too expensive and too big to store. Disapointed we made to leave. As we did we were told of a load carrying bike a cycle shop near Holborn had for rental. With nothing to loose we set off back across town.

Bike Fix is a well established cycle shop on a little street in Holborn and the bike we were looking for was out front. The 8 Freight owned by Bike Fix was bright yellow, long and low. The carry space looked sizable and we couldn’t wait to try it out. Despite its length and somewhat quirky design the 8 Freight handled like a dream, accelerated like a racing bike and fitted the bill in many other respects. It wasn’t for sale but a phone call to the manufacturer paid dividends. Luckily he was in the course of building a batch of them and there was one to spare. It could carry the load, perform on the streets, be easy to store and was just in our price range. We ordered one there and then, hurried the deposit up to Norwich and awaited delivery in the first week of April. Just in time for the first skate of 2005.