Category: Miscellaneous
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Nice design from Garmin
Garmin has the best looking new heart rate monitor on the market with the Forerunner 305. OK, it is really more than a heart rate monitor because of the GPS capabilities; they refer to it a “personal trainer”. Still, I’d rather keep calling it a heart rate monitor and at over 350 bucks, it’s a…
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More homebuilt bikes
In an earlier post, I showed a picture of a few homebuilt mutant choppers that I saw in New York. Though bikes like these are very different than the ones that I am typically interested in, I must admit that it is a lot of fun to look at them. The Bikerod and Kustom Gallery…
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Another post about Greenville
Yeah, I know this is a little off topic, but I can’t help it. My last post about Greenville, South Carolina had some design content (at least it mentioned the bicycle industry and product development). This follow up, I must admit, is just a blatant plug for Greenville as a great cycling town. I am…
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Old bike patents
A few months ago, I linked to Bob Shaver’s Patent Pending blog in one of my posts. For those of you who missed it, the bicycle technology section of Bob’s site is definitely worth a second mention. Yesterday, Treehugger wrote about the blog and featured the above pictured full suspension bike from 1890 as well…
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Thoughts on a bicycle Mecca
This weekend, I picked up my copy of the Greenville Journal and read the headline, “Greenville lands national cycling championship.” By now, that is pretty old news to most cycling fans. Still, I thought that the article and the accompanying photos were great exposure for the local cycling community. I was even more interested in…
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A great suspension simulator
Anyone who is interested in the design of full suspension bicycles needs to check out Hannes Fleischer’s new simulation tool for mountain bike kinematics. A free light version of the online software is available so you can try it out before you buy. It is fun to play around with simulations of the most popular…
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My shortest post yet
I just read a great article that I feel the need to share. I’ll refrain from much commentary, just suffice it to say that I really enjoyed Tim’s interview with Scott Nicol (aka Chuck Ibis). Check it out here at Shut Up and Drink the Kool-Aid.
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Velomobiles in Wired
My post yesterday prompted a couple of comments about HPVs. It is certainly worth acknowledging that recumbent bikes and trikes are fast and also that they are quite efficient in most situations. I have only ridden a recumbent once, and I must admit that my knowledge about them is somewhat lacking. Still, I am interested…
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Reinventing the UCI
In case anyone has not picked up on it, I am not a big fan of the UCI’s restrictions on the bicycles used by professional cyclists. The evolution of road and track bicycle design was accelerated in the 90’s when Graeme Obree and Chris Boardman were trading the hour record back and forth. So what…
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Cannondale Jackknife
In response to my last post, Philippe Holthuizen sent a few images of a concept bike that he recently co-designed for a contest sponsored by Cannondale Europe. Philippe developed this concept along with his partner on the project Rodrigo Clavel, a fellow graduate student of transportation design at the Elisava Design School in Barcelona. The…
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Your turn- take two
Back in November, I posted a CAD template for drawing a mountain bike. I am not sure if anyone has used it, but if so I would love to see the resulting work. For those of you who are more interested in road bikes, here is another really basic template to use for sketching. Just…
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A homemade velomobile
Here is an interesting project that I spotted on Treehugger. Steve runs a kayak company on Canada’s west coast. In his spare time, he is building and refining a velomobile that is based on a Hase Kettwiesel recumbent trike. Steve started out with the simple goal of making a replacement fairing for his Vision recumbent,…
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Bike tubes in the sky
I heard about this idea on the Smart City radio show this weekend (for those of you who missed it, a podcast of the show is available here). Chris Hardwicke is a Toronto architect with an interesting conceptual design for a bike transit system in his city. The Velo-city project proposes a network of elevated…
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Danish design part 2- Biomega
When I wrote the last post, I did not intend to start a series about Danish bike design, but yesterday I received my latest issue of ID magazine. This year’s annual ID Forty issue, which prompted today’s entry, spotlights 40 people who the magazine feels are not getting enough credit, in the U.S. at least,…
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A nice Danish design
I just saw this week old post on Biking Bis. The trioBike is one of the best looking utility oriented designs that I have seen. The front carrier for two kids converts easily into a stroller while an extra wheel under the stroller transforms the bike into a regular disc brake equipped two-wheeler. In my…
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The top ten Bicycle Design posts of 2005
Happy New Year! Though it really has nothing to do with the content of this post, I thought the picture to the left, which I borrowed it from we make money not art, was appropriate for this time of year. I started this blog in September of the past year as a place to occasionally…
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Another product idea
I don’t know how many of you keep a training log, but I suspect that many of you do. Maybe some of you are resolving to start keeping a cycling diary in 2006. Even if you don’t race, keeping a somewhat detailed log that includes the basic stats from your ride, a description of the…
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The lights are back on
When I mentioned that my posts this month would probably be sporadic, apparently I meant it. I have been traveling and working a lot lately, but I planned to post when I returned home late last week. As it turned out, Mother Nature had a different idea. We had a pretty nasty ice storm that…