Ranger Lifecycle inventor Mike Norman, of London, tests one of his motorbike ambulances for comfort, while Terence Harmse of Fabkomp in Zwelitsha, near King William’s Town, looks on. Picture: Barbara Hollands

Multi-purpose motorbikes impress prince and president

While unused in SA, these crafty carriers head to tsunami areas, reports Barbara Hollands

IN A large warehouse in Zwelitsha in the Eastern Cape, 80 bright red motorbikes are being assembled to perform a very special service.

Once they are completed they will be flown, courtesy of a Saudi Arabian prince, to the tsunami-ravaged areas of Sri Lanka and Indonesia, where they will be used as ambulances and mobile clinics.

“Many clinics and roads have been destroyed over there,” said the London-based inventor of the Ranger Lifecycle, Mike Norman, who won the Worldaware Technology Award for Development in 1999 for the extraordinary vehicle.

“This is an off-road bike and so it is ideal for the terrain. It costs very little to run.”

The 200cc bikes are fitted with sturdy sidecars which can be custom-designed to serve in remote rural areas as ambulances, clinics, pool repair vehicles, bread and grocery delivery vehicles, water purification units, and for Aids education operations, media workshops and garden service businesses.

And, at a cost of about R30 000, they are thousands of rands cheaper than conventional vehicles.

While the bikes themselves are imported from China, they are assembled and modified for the sidecars in Zwelitsha.

They may be small but they can transport all the equipment needed to service a community, and they recently impressed President Thabo Mbeki who, said Norman, was “gobsmacked” after a demonstration in Limpopo Province.

The clinic model, for example, comes with a vaccine fridge, stainless steel worktop surfaces, a hand basin, baby weighing scales, a small seat for the patient and even a sun awning.

“These really can help bedridden people, people with Aids and the very old, because health workers can visit them so much more easily,” said Norman.

“And they can get injured people to hospital during the golden hour emergency response time. At the moment many rural people are using wheelbarrows or ox carts to transport the sick to hospital.”

The bikes can also be used by entrepreneurs to deliver 100 loaves of bread to remote areas or be fitted as mobile mechanical workshops.

Norman, a motorbike enthusiast, first thought of attaching a multi-purpose sidecar to a motorbike many years ago while watching television in England.

“Princess Anne was appealing for sponsors for Land Rovers for Africa, but I thought, why pay £40 000 (R472 000) for a vehicle when you could transport all the medical kit on the side of a motorbike, which would be far more cost-effective.

“I own a motorbike business in London and so that is what made me think of it.”

Years later, his brainchild grew into a prototype and by 1998 the bikes were being used by subsistence farmers in Zimbabwe who were suddenly able to irrigate their lands and transport their produce to market.

The success story reached the ears of Prince Bandar Bin Sultan of Saudi Arabia, who was so impressed with the developmental potential of the bikes that he sank millions into further developing and funding the nifty vehicles.

Several vehicles were recently dispatched to Mali in West Africa, where they will serve as vaccination units after Bill Gates’ foundation PATH was introduced to them.

“The plan was always to run the projects in Africa,” said Norman, whose invention was first introduced to South Africa in Qunu, Nelson Mandela’s birthplace, in 2001.

Seventeen vehicles, which were set up as ambulances and education units, were handed over.

“But most of them are not being used and are stored in a warehouse somewhere. We do driver and maintenance training, but you need good project managers in place to run things. ”

Similarly, 22 motorbikes which were to be used mainly as water purification units during the cholera season are languishing in an East London warehouse after the Eastern Cape health department acquired them last year.

“We are training the department’s drivers, but they are yet to obtain their drivers’ licences,” said Terence Harmse of manufacturing company Fabkomp, which has formed a joint venture with Norman’s company.

However, Bulembu Clinic near King Williams Town is on the verge of putting these bikes into action.

“The clinic services six villages and the nurse has to walk to reach patients. One of these bikes will mean she can get to see so many more sick people,” said Norman.

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