Amphibious Bicycle

Posted on May 17, 2013 by admin

We come up with crazy inventions ourselves from time to time and we love ‘far out’ ideas, so we had to mention this bicycle from 1932.

This is the Cyclomer Amphibious Bike. You ride as normal on the roads running on the two main spheres which are equip with rubber treads. When you approach deep water, lower the external stabilising spheres and voila! your bike will float. Pop on some wellies and you’re ready to go.
The rear drive sphere has paddles to help push through the water, what could possibly be the down side ? Note the relaxed look of the rider as he cruises across the pond in straw hat and pipe. Total Genius !

PS : How do you steer on the water ?

Cyclomer

Cyclomer

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ColaLife

Posted on May 10, 2013 by admin

I was just reading about this charity project in an engineering journal and it’s an inspirational idea that requires as much publicity as possible – hence the blog.

ColaLife capitalises on the strange fact that many remote villages in the developing world have a reliable deliveries of Coke-a-Cola, but are often in need of basic medicine. ColaLife founders Simon and Jane Berry developed a packaging solution that utilised the space between bottles of Coke in a crate. These “Aidpods” can be sealed with medicine to help villagers, particularly children, recover from acute illnesses. Simon and Jane we salute you. If you would like to donate or find out more then visit the ColaLife website.

ColaLife

Cola delivery bike in Nyimba, Zambia

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Stoopid Tall Bike

Posted on April 26, 2013 by admin

If (like me) you’re not good with heights then you’ll find this video from Richie Trimble a nerve wracking ride. His “Stoopid” bike stands an amazing 14ft tall and was built by Richie in just 12 hours to ride the Los Angeles’s CicLAvia. This Los Angeles event involves cycling 20 miles to finish at Venice beach, not an easy task in city traffic when you can’t just stop and put a foot down. Marvel at Richie’s riding and balance skills; and enjoy his perils of low bridges and kite strings in this short video filmed from the saddle. Yikes !

Stoopid Tall Bike

Stoopid Tall Bike

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Ski Boys

Posted on April 17, 2013 by admin

Just enjoying a lunchtime read of the latest Boneshaker magazine and the article on tall bikes got me looking for a short film called Ski Boys. Thanks to the power of the Internet it can be found on Vimeo here.

It’s a finely produced Super8 film set to music and located in an anonymous location stateside. The big skys and empty roads are reminiscent of the endless summers of the 70′s. It reminds of a time before television numbed our brains, a time when out door fun was the most fun to be had and and time before health and safety stole our childhoods.

Enjoy the video; then get out there and do something fun.
I’m off to try some grass sledging.

Ski Boys

Ski Boys

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Bespoked 2013

Posted on April 13, 2013 by admin

This year’s Bespoked shown was another unrivaled collection of the finest in handbuilt frames.

Three items in particular caught our eye.

The Bicycle Academy were showcasing their famous frame building c0urses and also presented a selection of useful tools and jigs for sale. One of their exhibits was a miniature frame, built to practice mitring and brazing without wasting materials. How cute ?

Loopwheel.com were looking for crowd funding to support manufacture of their innovative sprung wheel. They gave a convincing argument on the benefits of tangetially sprung wheels, it’s an interesting concept. Head over to Kickstarter to give them a boost.

Finally Donhou presented a 100mph bicycle ! No one could fail to be inpressed by that 104 tooth front sprocket!

Bespoked 2013

Bespoked 2013

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Bike’s Bar

Posted on April 12, 2013 by admin

Ahead of this weekend’s Bespoked Bike Building exhibition, here’s an inspired custom build a idea.
It’s a Bicycle that carries everything you need to enjoy a picnic in the park. What a clever idea, and it even provides a table to hold your drinks as you sit and enjoy the weather. The box between the frame parts can transport drinks, snacks and condiments. The back rack takes a fold out rug and there’s even a cup holder on the front.
Simply brilliant.

Bike's Bar

Bike's Bar

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The CARMA project

Posted on March 28, 2013 by admin

Here’s a cool project called CARMA featuring a bicycle made from scrap car parts. Not only is this an exciting technical challenge but there is also an environmental element to the idea, the idea of a bicycle making up for everything a car has done, a chance for the car to repair its environmental damage.

The donor car is an old Mercedes saloon and the construction is base around the rear axle which forms the main frame of the bicycle. There is clever use of door handles to make brake levers, head lining to make grip tape and seat upholstery to make the seat cover. Watch the video here to see other neat ideas such as using the cam belt as the drive chain and rear light reflectors on the pedals.

Now it’s finished, people will be given the chance to ride the bike and once it has completed as many miles as the car did we can consider the car to have paid its debt. This is a nice idea and the resulting bike looks really good.

CARMA

CARMA

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Raleigh Caprice Front Rack

Posted on March 20, 2013 by admin

The Raleigh Caprice ladies cycle is a fine machine with classic lines and available with a range of accessories.
Best of all it has headstock lugs to allow the fitment of a frame mounted front rack. As we know, carrying the weight on the frame and not the forks has great benefits in terms of its affect on the steering.

This front rack was manufactured for a friend of ours. Two flat plates were used to provide a strong level foundation for the rack. Then a simple tube and wire deck was brazed in place. To finish it was painted a cool battleship grey to match the bike and topped with a rustic orange crate. Very chic.

Raleigh Caprice Front Rack

Raleigh Caprice Front Rack

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Beetle Balance Bike

Posted on March 19, 2013 by admin

If the Flintstones rode bicycles – surely they would look like this !

This is the “Beetle Balance Bike” from Leap Year Industries.
We all know balance bikes are a great way to learn, enabling kids to learn the concept of balance and counter-steering before adding the propulsion part of the system. The Beetle bike is another balance bike, but it’s super cool – just look at it.
Better still, the wood used is taken from trees which have been killed by the Pine Beetle, wood which otherwise is just scrap.

Just one question – can we have an adult sized one ? Imagine that !

Beetle Bike

Beetle Bike

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Bent Basket

Posted on February 27, 2013 by admin

Bent Basket is a new revolutionary design of front basket for a bicycle. We all know that porteur racks are cool and wicker baskets very chic. But Bent Basket addresses some of the practicality issues with these devices. The rack itself is made from 7 layers of Maple veneer glued under high pressure using skateboard production technology, then finished in a durable resin. This process gives nicely radiused sides to the deck to help hold cargo in place. The rack is also fitted with a clever strap configuration to securely hold loads of different shapes and sizes. The straps are permanently fitted but are stretchy and wide enough to produce a securing force whilst minimizing damage to any delicate cargo. The support frame is powder coated stainless steel for durability and it is designed to fit most city and road bikes.

We especially like the fact that is can hold two six-packs of your favourite drink (inset).

Click the image to find out more about this product and a nice video of it in action in New York.

Bent Basket

Bent Basket

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