Inspired by the 'Virtual' Light Cycles from the 2010 film 'Tron : Legacy', Parker Brothers Choppers, a Florida bike shop first put together ten custom-built look-alikes of the Light Cycles to coincide with the December release of the movie. They were completely based on the visuals they could get from the movie and the internet. Since then these bikes, which ride like any other sport bikes except for the huge bulky tire front, have become a craze among the fraternity of bike aficionados.
When Parker Brothers Choppers' mastermind Jeff Halverson first manufactured these replicas, each weighed around 474 pounds and were 100 inches long and 23 inches. The customers could choose between standard gauges and an iPad dock which displayed the vital statistics on the screen. Anyways, let's take a look at the five replicas that tried to do justice to their virtual counterpart. Well, almost!
1. The Light Cycle
This is the street-legal motorcycle faithfully rendered and inspired from the virtually animated cycle featured in the 2010 film Tron: Legacy. Mostly designed for slow and easy rides, the steel frame and the fiberglass cowling faithfully imitates its imaginary virtual counterpart. Electroluminescent strips in the rims and the cowling give that sleek metal sheen to the machine. Powered by a hefty 4-stroke fuel-injected Suzuki 996cc engine, the Light cycle like its virtual model requires the rider to lay at a semi-horizontal position astride the leather seat. Another feature that stays true to the virtual model is the hub-less wheels custom-shaped to fit the rim.
2. Tron Legacy bikes
A crazy biker, a Tron movie fan or a fan who loves bikes too, has designed one of the coolest rides out there. This one here features a sleek steel frame; the entire bodywork done in sleek fiberglass and a Suzuki TLR1000 engine. The brakes are taken from a custom made friction drum that pins the bike true to Daniel Simon's design. It has the same option between actual gauges and an iPod dock. Physically they weigh the same as the other models and are available for a cool $55,000.
3. 2nd Generation Light Cycle
The 2nd generation Light Cycle is a meaner, faster and a better looking version of the previous Light Cycles. Claimed to be the "the fastest thing on the Grid", the second generation light cycle is succeeded by three more generations of light cycles and has the distinct thick wheeled look in the front that is common to all Light Cycles.
It however is different from the previous models in many ways. It features a covered canopy that opens above and most notably its white color scheme sets it apart from the previous models in black.
4. Icare motorcycle concept
Now this one's a class apart and if you ask me, I'll put my money on this one any day. Infamously claimed to be a cross hybrid between the Tron model and “a kind of Porsche or Aston Martin for the two-wheeled world” by its France-based designers, it houses a six-cylinder 1.8 Liter Honda engine.
It takes the hot prize simply because it is significantly different from the shape of the Tron models. It is a lean, chiselled machine with enough muscle to prove just what that hybrid stuff their fathers keep bragging about means.
5. Ride the Machine
Last but not the least, these awesome toy Light Cycles designed by Medicom Toy. True to the designs of the virtual models and the real life ones hitting the automobile markets this toy series will definitely set your kid's adrenaline running with these little monsters creating walls of colored light as they are set running.
