The 4MC four-wheeled prototype

It's not often that a bloke who has spent 20 years designing and building a unique vehicle gives you the okay to get wild and lairey with his baby. But when someone so normal and downright trustworthy as Nick Shotter, who has painstakingly explained how it all works in fluent lay to this layman, says "Lean it right over, snap the throttle open and when the back comes round steer into the slide", you just find yourself smiling and giving it a go.

I'd been riding the 4MC prototype up and down the UK airstrip for about 20 minutes before Nick reached the conclusion that either I was ready for the experience or that standing in the rain watching a stranger from Australia go up and down was getting pretty boring.

The 4MC is Shotter's vision. He's a former motorcycle courier, but more importantly a gifted engineer with a belief that a motorcycle doesn't need to be limited to two wheels, so long as the fundamental principles and attributes remain. Things like being easy to ride with the feel and maneuverability of a motorcycle, but with the stability and safety of a four-wheeler.

TELL ME MORE
It's a four-wheeled motorcycle -- this thing countersteers to lean just like the real deal, feels like the real deal, but successfully sidesteps the unfortunate reality of spitting you into the scrub when everything gets sideways. You could be forgiven for being one of those who thinks "Yeah interesting, but stupid".

After all, everyone knows that a four-wheeler is spelt C-A-R, and motorcycles are for those that accept a bit of risk because it's F-U-N. Well having ridden it, I'm here to tell you that this is an important part of the future of motorcycling. What's more, if the likes of Yamaha are taking it seriously then it's only a matter of time before you see something very similar in the showrooms.

Twenty years is along time to build something by hand in a single car garage in north London, and is a testament to Nick's patience and inventiveness. The underpinning principle was that the MC4 was simple to operate -- and it is, which is great for people like me. Although I like the drama of revs and gears coupled with big lean, experience has taught me that the howl and thrash are not necessarily essential when there's a new and equally dramatic avenue to explore.

But change is hard to implement and being the first is even harder, so it's possible that in some small way the Piaggio MP3 may have prepared the ground a little.  After all two leaning wheels at the front was and still is fairly radical, but the fundamental problem with the MP3, which is brilliant laugh incidentally, is that it carries most of its weight forward and high up. The result is lots of front end 'push' if you try and hurry. Nonetheless, the MP3 is gifted with staggering levels of grip in the wet, and is arguably the most useful scooter vehicle in production.

Ironically it was an accident as a courier that prompted the genesis of the MC4. With this in mind it was obvious that the thing needed to be not just ultra safe, but also narrow. And at 560mm it is, although the bars are set at 660mm. interestingly, the width is the same as the ubiquitous Honda CX500, which was the mainstay of the London courier industry in the 1980s.

By adopting a four-wheeled platform the bulk of the weight can be carried very low, which again provides terrific stability when travelling at low speed -- well in fact any speed as my test ride discovered. Even so, with the profound pragmatism of a true engineer, Nick went one step further by building in a no-tilt function so that the delicate art of lane splitting (legal in the UK) could be engaged in with even greater safety.

I'm not going to go into a full breakdown of the technical development of the 4MC as Nick's website www.4-MC.co.uk provides far more detail with greater authority than I can generate. The reason being, I'd rather talk about what it's like to ride.

WET AND WILD
Being in the UK usually guarantees a bit of rain, and so I found myself standing on the runway of historic North Weald aerodrome east of London with Nick in cold and wet conditions -- perfect for trying out a prototype. Prior to emailing Nick and arranging the test, I'd had a look at his website and been mightily impressed by the videos of Nick rounding up police driver trainers on a skidpan, so I knew the 4MC had the credentials for wet weather silliness.

The power for the 4MC is provided by a Yamaha 400cc single-cylinder engine with CVT, so getting underway is as simple as twist and go. Brakes are linked and operated by the right-hand handlebar lever. There is a lever on the left, but this engages the anti-tilt mechanism, something Nick was at pains to point out was not desirable at high speed, so best left alone.

Initial impressions were of how low the seat felt and how low down the weight felt. The result is that there is an immediate sense of balance. And there is a fair bit of weight in the prototype, although Nick is confident that once in production as much as 80kg or more can be lost very easily. Once out onto the airfield the 4MC felt pretty much how I thought it would: solid and very planted.

The little 400cc unit provides reasonable acceleration up to about 90km/h and, within about two minutes, I felt confident enough to start exploring the limits of its handling. The prototype has a built-in lean limit of 30 degrees, although in the future Nick asserts that a sportier version could quite easily manage 45 degrees, which is right slap bang in sportsbike territory. As with a motorcycle you have to countersteer to change direction, and at the time of the test there was a fair bit of rolling resistance that has since been engineered out.

And is it good on a wet surface! There is just so much grip available from the small scooter-sized wheels shod with Michelin Pilot tyres that you can literally throw the thing into a turn and slap the gas on. One of the challenges I set for the 4MC involved last second avoidance swerving around cones at about 90km/h. This requires a savage reef on the bars to countersteer and initiate the lean away, which happens very violently. Undoubtedly the same maneuver on a motorcycle would have resulted in a world of pain, yet the 4MC simply dismissed the exercise with a grin-inducing composure.

Braking performance is equally impressive, exhibiting the kind of stability you'd expect with four wheels, although to be fair the brakes aren't massively powerful. Even braking hard mid turn leads to ballooning confidence, which is slightly disconcerting. After all, we all know what will happen on two wheels right? Sure the thing wants to straighten a little the way a motorcycle does, but the retardation achieved from first application to vertical came as a real surprise. I'd be lying if I said you couldn't get into trouble, but with ABS fitted the capability would be enhanced enormously.

SLIDEWAYS
I don't mind admitting I felt a bit circumspect when it came to try some sliding, as I hate crashing another person's motorcycle. All the same, I was intrigued enough to give it a go. The first time the back came around was an education in itself, simply because what should have ended in a highside didn't. Like a rank beginner I snapped the throttle shut from sheer fright and should have been jettisoned -- yet the plot simply straightened itself out and carried on as if nothing had happened. Not being highsided makes most riders brave, and so the few slides I did manage were hugely enjoyable and demonstrated that not only will the 4MC slide on demand, but you can control the direction in the same way as a rally car.

I know Nick has set out to make a safer motorcycle, and that is a noble goal. The result is a tailor-made platform for all the safety technology that exists in cars today. Some purists will dismiss the concept while others will see the safety benefits. Personally, I'd like to see the 850cc engine from the wonderful Aprilia Mana, 45 degrees of lean and some sexy bodywork.

It's not often you get to see the future with such clarity, but it's my opinion that with the right backing the 4MC heralds a brand new direction in motorcycling that will generate a whole new market and capture a fair slice of the existing one.