History of the recumbent in the Netherlands

by Henk Zwols

JOUTA LIGFIETSEN.

Ferwerd 1998.
In the extreme north of Friesland lies the village of Ferwerd.   Riding in the direction of Hogebeintum, we find on the right a brand-new building:  Jouta Metal Fabricators.   Sijtze Marcelis Jouta, now 57, stands behind the lathe, turning a long synthetic workpiece.  During his 12-year recumbent adventure, he never completely gave up his original profession of free-lance metalworker.  In the modern office, he shows off a series of photos of tidy bungalows and stately farms.  "I'm making more and more decorative metalwork and garden ornaments, as well as fences and sundials.  Through Jouta Art and Design, my son Hans' company, I can even supply bronze and concrete sculpture.  Hans is the artistic one in the family;  he completed an evening course at the art academy Minerva in Groningen.'' Remarkable that the same artistic tendencies are also encountered in the builders of the Roulandt and the M5 recumbents.

The inventors.
Around 1980 Sijtze Jouta got into the newspaper with a chair on a long rotating arm with which he could float from one machine to the other in his workplace.  He also built a wheelchair with a lift mechanism and improved the Green Cross crutch.  "A couple of users were enthusiastic, but we didn't storm the insurance companies.  If I had to live from my inventions, it wouldn't be very good."  In the past, Hans sawed apart many bikes and welded them back together.  Among the results was a prone recumbent, not really something that could be put into production.  After seeing a photo of a trike, and especially after seeing the international recumbent competition organized in 1983 at Zandvoort by the magazine "Fiets," the then 17-year-old Hans and his brother Wijtze, one year younger, took up recumbent-building.  According to Sijtze, Bram Moens was still riding a Roulandt in competition.  "During his junior high school years, Hans didn't have much appreciation for my metal subcontracting business, but after this race his technical abilities came to the forefront." 

The Jouta trike.
 Hans made hundreds of drawings of recumbents with various seat angles, front- and rear wheel drives.  Two-, three-, and fourwheelers were considered.  "We were busy with that for half a year altogether.  The rest of the family finally couldn't stand to hear the word recumbent."  The first recumbent, welded together from two old bikes over a weekend, was a two-wheeler that later went out with the metal scrap.  "Two wheels is for speed records;  we weren't looking for that," explains the father Sijtze, "so it turned into a much stabler three-wheeler."  This recumbent was steered with two levers, one on each side of the seat.  Hydraulic steering worked perfectly but would make the trike too expensive.  Hans spent weeks building a streamlined shell, first a mold from wood and plastic foam, from which Vrijburg in Nijbeets made a polyester fairing.  The Jouta family came with three of these so-called "egglets" to a race in the auction hall in Aalsmeer.  "Two of them crashed and were a total loss, but the third made it across the finish line."  After that, the steering was moved further forward and the inadequately-streamlined cap was changed. 

Patent and production.
  On September 24, 1984 a patent application was filed for the very special tilt/steer system.  The first trikes still had 24" wheels and were unsuspended.  Later the Jouta VX (V for "vering," i.e. suspension) was built with 20" wheels and rear suspension.  The front-wheel drive employed a 66-tooth chainwheel, later a 72-tooth, and a five-speed 13-28 cassette.  Braking is by a Sachs drum-brake in the front wheel.  The two steering levers under the bucket seat steer the two rear wheels.  A 50-degree-angled rod behind the seat connects the front and rear sections.  By pulling backwards via the steering lever, the bike tilts into the curve and can even be steered with the fingertips or no-hands.  The front wheel has a full fender;  the rear wheels have a piece to protect the arms and shoulders in the curves.  The trike weighs 17 kg, has a width of 64 cm and a length of 2 meters, and is approved by the Ministry of Traffic and Waterways.  In late 1984, they started with a small series of this "camel," in which you sat in between two humps (wheels).  These white Joutas were completely sold-out for 1500 Dutch Gulden after a production time of 4 weeks, among others to van Weelden in Bilthoven and Wim Kok in Utrecht.

Publicity and promotion.
With a large photo of the Jouta trike, the egglet, and its three inventors, the October 12, 1984 Leeuwarder Courant first called attention to this super-fast Frisian recumbent.  At a recumbent race in Sloten, near Amsterdam, Wijtze Jouta even reached 60 km/hour in the 200 meter sprint.  "The Jouta won everything, even against a streamlined M5" says Sijtze proudly.  "Too bad that it got so little attention in HPV Nieuws."  "Simple, fast, maneuverable, and light, and considering that it's made of ordinary steel alloys that is a super accomplishment," explained bike-builder Cees van Weelden from Bilthoven in the March 22, 1985 Utrechts Nieusblad/N.Z.C.  The same journalist, Gijs van Bremen, observed the brothers Jouta and Cees van Weelden competing in a variety of races at the international HPV meet in Milton Keynes, England.  The perfectly-functioning rear-wheel steering especially astonished the British, who had been busy themselves for years trying to build one.  The Joutas were also successful at races in the Netherlands.  In Haarlem in 1986, they took fifth and sixth.  On an obstacle course and practical bike competition in Almere in 1987, the Jouta trikes even came in first, second, fourth, and seventh.  On August 5, 1986, 21 Joutas were brought to Tiel by "Fly High Productions" for a recumbent race in the pre-race program for the pro-race, "Profronde van Tiel."  You could expect well-trained riders to reach speeds of about sixty to seventy km/hour.  Joutas were also ridden in Sweden, according to  enthusiastic articles in the "Karlstads Forum" and "Värmlands Folkblad."  "In a comparision with a 2-wheeler in HPV Nieuws, we came off badly," grumbles Sijtze, "especially because Marco Ising was a fervent two-wheel rider."  From July 10 through September 11, 1993, the Jouta recumbents were also on display at an HPV exhibition in the glass pyramid of the Aeolus Technology Center in  Sexbierum.

Jouta 2000.
  "If I had to give a prize for design, I would know just what to do:  I'd go straight to the new plastic Jouta 2000.  As soon as they showed up at the race in Almere, beautifully-finished in a superb silver-grey auto paint job, it immediately brought the famous Italian designers of top-class sportscars to mind."  These are the words of Bernd Zwikker in HPV Nieuws, July 1987. The chassis was integral with the frame, with steel attachment points for the bottom bracket, and also formed the fenders and luggage compartment.  This design didn't come into production, since the price would have come out at a minimum of 2800 Dutch Gulden.  The choice was made to go with a model that would be less expensive to manufacture.  In their own shop, they built -- first from cardboard, then from plaster and polyethylene -- a self-supporting body which was later formed by a poured rotational molding process.  Steel-spoked wheels were selected, faired with plastic shields.  The steering principle is the same as with its big brother the Jouta VX.  This trike was brought to the market in 2000 in cooperation with the bike manufacturer Rivel for a price of between 1200 and 1600 Dutch Gulden.  Color choices were grey, red, and yellow with a three-speed hub or single-speed.  This plastic bike drew a lot of attention at the 1988 bicycle-RAI.  The reactions ranged from one extreme to the other;  some thought it was a great design and others found it to be a children's toy.  Previous purchasers preferred the ride of the steel Jouta.  After one large series, the plastic model was only available by special order. 


"365-Day Bike" contest. 
  Several recumbent manufacturers took the initiave to consider and discuss the criteria that a recumbent would have to fulfill in order to be usable for the entire year.  To celebrate its 10-year anniversary, the magazine "Fiets" ("Bicycle") decided to offer a prize of 25,000 Dutch Gulden for this "365-Day Bike."  Together with the Technical University of Eindhoven, they organized a contest.  The participants first had to qualify by riding 35 kilometers in one hour, and would then be assigned points for:  1) usability in all weather conditions, 2) general rideability, 3) usability in traffic, 4) comfort, 5) speed, 6) luggage capacity (minimum of 15 kg / 80 liters), 7) maintenance and repair, 8) production quality.  In addition, an expert jury awarded points for manufacturability.  On March 17, 1993, the 35 km qualifying round was ridden on the 2.1 km oval DAF test track in St. Oedenrode.  Jouta entered with a DX (D for 365 Days) and a ZX (Z for the latest model).  The DX was an adapted VX with a polished streamlined cap and an enclosed luggage compartment.  The ZX was a Jouta trike that was specially developed for this race, also provided with a first-rate fairing.  This trike, in addition, had two fixed front wheels and a steerable rear wheel, all 20" and elastic suspended.  The left front wheel was driven with an enclosed chain and had, through use of a mid-drive, 36 speeds.  The steering lever could be set to give a small wheel-response at high speeds and a very large wheel-response at low speeds.  The Jouta ZX prototype, with its superior design and workmanship had a total weight of 35 kg, and would cost between 4000 and 8000 Dutch Gulden.  Of the 26 participants, only 9 achieved the qualifying speed.  "To my great surprise, the Alleweder was declared the winner, although we had achieved the most in all of the criteria.  Thus it was for us, despite very much work, quite disappointing.  I would have liked to take a look at the jury report," complains Sijtze Jouta. The Jouta ZX did achieve a divided second place at the end of 1993 in a design competition sponsored by HPV Nieuws.  

New model.  The End.
 At the 1992 RAI a new version of the Jouta VX was on display, with a 2x6 12-speed Orbit hub and hydraulic brakes, for a price of 2300 Dutch Gulden.  At the 1994 FietsRAI Jouta astonished the recumbent world with a modular two-wheeled recumbent, the Jouta RX.  On this short-wheelbase recumbent, everything was adjustable, the boom telescoped, as well as the rear section, where the wheelbase could be changed.  The angle of the seat, which was made of four foam-covered tubes, was adjustable.  The bike had two 26" wheels and was priced at 2775 Dutch Gulden with the standard Shimano 400CX components.  A suspended front fork was available at extra cost.  But the end came swiftly and unexpectedly.  "We stopped, out of frustration with the 365-day bike contest and the fact that the whole thing was taking too much time," explains Sijtze Jouta.  "The phone calls for information, and purchase inquiries, the interviews, RAI and other expos, printing folders, it just didn't make business sense any more.  We sold the Jouta ZX prototype after the contest.  Of the trikes, about 150 Jouta VX's and 250 of the Jouta 2000 and ten of the Jouta RX were also sold.  We had a good time, but it didn't really put any money in the till."  At this point, there is nothing in the whole place to remind one of the recumbent era. 

Originally published in "HPV Nieuws"(Nr 5/98, page. 4 ff.), as part of the series "History of the recumbent in the Netherlands." 

Translation, Mary Arneson, November 30, 2005 (send corrections to velomaster -@- velomobiling.net)
Source:  http://wwwtios.cs.utwente.nl/export/persons/axel/jouta/jouta-geschiedenis.html

 Axel Belinfante's photo page and information on the Jouta Trikes is at http://wwwtios.cs.utwente.nl/export/persons/axel/jouta/
HPV Nieuws was the Netherlands HPV association newsletter (since replaced by the magazine Ligfiets& and the Ligfiets Plaza website).