When Tim Brummer started Lightning Cycles, his whimsical manufacturing business seemed to promise the staying power of a corner lemonade stand — cute but temporary.

Sure, the laid-off Vandenberg engineer had set speed records on the souped-up bikes he assembled in his garage, but really, recumbent bicycles?

Those low-slung affairs built like bananas with the pedals out front higher than the seat — who would take those seriously, let alone buy one?

Cynics scoffed. Try stationary exercise bikes, they sneered.

But 16 years later, the gold mine prices of gasoline have Brummer beaming. His business is up 30 percent over last year. And it isn’t just because of gas prices, it’s the falling dollar too.

“U.S. sales are up 10 percent.” Brummer smiles as he puts finishing touches on a Lightning P-38. “Foreign sales are up five times. They see my Web site on the Internet and send me an e-mail.”

Brummer exudes the joy of a man who loves his hobby and makes a living at it, too. “I could work somewhere else but I wouldn’t have as much fun,” he grins. He wears khaki shorts and a T-shirt. “Every day is casual Friday.”

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Slim, and with no gray in his light brown hair, Brummer looks younger than his 54 years. He bikes eight miles a day to and from his 3,000-square-foot shop in Lompoc’s Sobhani Industrial Park.

Brummer says his production has risen to “the hundreds” and estimates he ranks No. 2 among U.S. manufacturers.

“Dealers are calling and they tell me people are parking their cars and they want a bike,” he says. “Nobody’s ever told me that before, that they’re selling their car. Before, they wanted exercise. Now it’s not just exercise but it’s money, too.” He noticed the trend this spring. “At $4 a gallon, people started calling.”

He lines out the economics. “In my car a fill up is $80.” He points to a Lightning Phantom. “This model is $1,500. Probably in one year it pays for itself and after that you’re saving.”

Brummer has pieced together a network of 50 dealers in 17 states. With a trade show scheduled this week in Las Vegas he is confident he will pick up more.

And the booming overseas market? Brummer has sold recumbents direct to consumers in Austria, Argentina, Hong Kong, Japan, Switzerland and Great Britain this year. He says foreign buyers have grown to 25 percent of his production.

He remembers the explanation he received from a British buyer. The Brit cackled, “Everything in the U.S. is half price to us.”

Brummer is optimistic for the future as well.

“I don’t see it going down,” he predicts. “I think we’re going to keep selling like this.” In May he hired another employee to keep up with demand. Now he employs three full-time and two part-time.

“They’re not a novelty,” Brummer says of his low riders. “The average person takes them seriously. But you’ve still got the nose-in-the-air racing bike guys.

“For anything more than five miles our bikes have a big advantage because they’re a whole lot faster and for longer distances a whole lot more comfortable. Our bikes are 30 percent faster than an upright.”

When Brummer was still working in aerospace, his early version of today’s Lightning was the first human-powered vehicle to surpass 50, 55 and 60 miles an hour. Later, it set a Los Angeles-to-New York record of five days and one hour.

Recumbents are not allowed in the Tour de France or the other big bike races, for their competitive advantage, Brummer contends, but they fare well in small races in the Midwest and in Europe.

For 14 years, Brummer’s dealer in Northwestern Illinois has been Tyger Johnson in Dakota, Ill.

“It’s really different now,” Johnson reported by phone. “Last winter I had a whole bunch of demo recumbents and I sold them all. At the end of June I sold as many as I sold all last year. Everybody’s the same in the whole Midwest. Road bikes are up, too. It’ll keep going the way it looks.”

Besides selling recumbents, Johnson races them.

In 1999 he set the record time at the Grand View Firehouse 50 in Wisconsin. His time of 1 hour 43 minutes still beats the fastest upright by eight minutes.

On a recent Saturday, Johnson participated in the Northern Illinois Time Trials, a 25-mile event for time. He was clocked in 55 minutes, 20 seconds, or a speed of 26.5 miles per hour even though he was riding in a rainstorm. Nearly all of his competitors were younger than Johnson and rode uprights. But Johnson, now 68, and his Lightning recumbent outpaced all but one.

“Everybody thought they were a fad 10 years ago, but they are starting to accept them,” Johnson said. “They aren’t going away.”

Freelance writer John McReynolds can be reached

at 736-6352 or johnny544@verizon.net.

September 25, 2008