What can I do to pedals to help kids or smaller riders use the bike We recently bought a recumbent tricycle second-hand for our special needs daughter (catrike pocket). The bikes pedals are a little bit out of reach for her (~4 inches). These bikes are expesive and we purchased it knowing that it did not fit her currently but that she would grow into it.
We can sit her a little further forward with some foam in the seat but the pedals at their farthest in rotation are too far. The pedals are also adjustable but not short enough still.
It was suggested that I could use some wood blocks attached to the pedals but that idea raises more questions i.e. I should put blocks on both sides of the pedals in case she loses grip and can find them again..
Are there any other DIY suggestions on how I can make the pedals accessible to a rider whos legs are just no long enough yet.
There are always options.
 From OP's link, showing boom and bolts.

Shorten the boom, if you can.  There are two pinch bolts in the main frame, under the boom  Back them both off and see how much can be inserted into the frame.  You probably already did this, but revisit it and see if there's extra length to be saved.  Perhaps the inner tube bottoms out, and you can get some distance back by trimming the end that is inside the frame.
Downside Its really hard to extend again in the future, so be miserly at cutting.  Or try the other options before whipping out the grinder.
from https://tadpolerider2.wordpress.com/tag/tadpole-trike-boom-adjustment/

Block the pedals with wood.  This will get you closer, but the full distance would need 4 inches / 100mm of wood on each side.  Example:


Shuffle the seat forward even more.  Hard to be detailed without knowing how your seat is mounted.  The backrest can often be adjusted for tilt but that doesn't move the hips forward which is required.  You might find that reclining the back counterintuitively helps push the hips forward.

Thicker cushion - Adding a &quot;tailbone cushion&quot; between the hard and soft layers of seat might buy you another half-inch or 12mm perhaps.

Crank shorteners - the cranks are not the problem, its the distance to your bottom bracket (front bracket?)  and therefore the pedal the farthest away from the rider.  There exist bolt-on crank shorteners which will move the pedals closer to the BB axle line, effectively bringing the frontmost pedal back a bit.
Shorter cranks are common on recumbents.


You can also drill and tap cranks to make them shorter permanently, though this is risky and requires some excellent machine shop skills to get the hole angle right, and the threads tapped in straight.  My adult sized `bent has 160 mm cranks, which were professionally shortened by a previous owner and you have to look hard to tell.  Depends on having enough metal in the right place too.
Most pedals are 9/16&quot; thread with 20tpi which is weird (18tpi is common but incompatible)  and only common on bikes, and the left pedal is left-hand thread, ie backward.  So its not a home-shop job.
Given this is a kids bike, it may also have 1/2&quot; pedal threads, though your specs link doesn't say.


More info at https://bicycles.stackexchange.com/a/64370/19705




You don't want to use swinging crank adjusters like the Pulse Swing Cranks; they will do the opposite of what you want.