Modular Bike

Hi

This post is part of a cleaning out process for my website, it had existed as a separate tab on my web page, but I will be replacing that tab with a 3d printing blog soon, one that may even earn me money.  My friend Ann Thompson of Thinking Eye has been coaching me on all these changes which include opening an Instagram account here .

So how did the modular bike end up? Well - Ok I guess!  The best version of it I made is presented here and although it looked quite good and was capable, it was made of steel and was always a bit heavy.  An aluminium version might have done better, but it was beyond my motivation, funds and welding abilities to make one.  The builds resulted in a chapter in my book, and I remember a nice afternoon and a visit to the pub with Adrian Gotts and Struan Little after a working bee building one of the versions, and a visit with our recumbent cycling mob to Fringe Inventions where it was exhibited for a while.  My nieces and nephew still remember racing at an ozhpv challenge at Broadford on it. 



"Modular: constructed with standardized unit or dimensions allowed flexibility and variety in use; modular furniture: modular homes"
A few years ago, I built an adaptable tandem bike from two abandoned Malvern Star folding bikes. It was made with an "insert" between the halves of a folding bike. The bike was good, but I started thinking of the possibilities of something better or different. My modular bikes are the end result. The bikes are designed from the ground up to be assembled as tandems, recumbents &: load carrying bikes and the aim is to make these specialist bicycles affordable by using a cost-effective modular construction.

The design was patented and featured in the Jan. 2005 issue of Velovision (you can find the patent here, search for 'modular bicycle' to find the patent documents. Pick the top entry you find).

This construction includes standard frame units with extras, like a suspended rear triangle, steering link, rack, trailer and recumbent seat & boom. The frame has attachment points at the ends for holding another frame or extras, a tube that acts as a static handlebar mount, and tubes that can support pulleys for a front-wheel drive mechanism. The seatpost doubles as a mount for the recumbent seat, as do the bottle mount bosses on the top tubes.

I have taken care to ensure that the extra features on the bike don’t look scrappy when unused – for example a plastic plate can fit over the front attachment points. So far there have been 3 designs of the modular bike and I have designed a set of models of the bike which you can make for yourself at home. "

Tony Hazeldine on one of the modular bike's predecessors, a conversion from 2 Malvern Star Folding Bikes.

Standard bike with load carrying

Front Wheel Drive bike with trailer. Note redundant rwd drivetrain.

Load Carrying Bike, my employer at the time was Trimcast, and the blue box which we still have is a storage box for military and 4 wheel driving use.

Steers from behind tandem at a Broadford OzHpv challenge with my son Ewan.

Atholl Reid is captain and steers from behind, counterpoint tandem at a Canberra ozhpv rally.

Racing at Broadford with my niece Josie, counterpoint tandem

Back to back tandem, the Jewel in the crown. We are going left to right.

Front steer counterpoint tandem

Long Wheelbase

Audax Head Tube Badge

Audax bling as head tube badge on Malvern Star Sportstar.

1st try was not quite so successful, this was an attempt to make a brooch or display case mount for the older series of French Audax badges.

2nd go quite a bit better.

RHS, note biopace.

LHS

Final badge detail, the 3d printing is not much good at handling stress, and the timber at the sides makes most of the forces on the orange printed parts compressive.

In the Wild #1.....

and #2

Hi

For a while I have been accumulating Audax Badges.  These are small pats on the back you can give yourself after finishing a ride and come in French, Australian, and cloth badge varieties with different distances from short (ish) 50k to much longer 600, 1000 and 1200k rides. Every few years the badge style is refreshed, so you can start collecting, or slinging them into a dusty old box all over again.

Anyway, the French enamel badges don't come with any pin on the back, so they can't easily be mounted on a board or worn as a brooch, or even put on display in the pool room .  I decided to do something about that, so about 2 months ago tried scanning one of the badges, tracing over the resulting profile in Autocad, importing that into Solidworks, and then 3d printing it as a mounting plate for the badge.  Unfortunately that attempt came out no good (top photo, a small problem with scale!), and I shelved the idea for a while.

Then, a few weeks ago, more bling arrived by post courtesy of Rober Wikinson's Big Al Rides 200 brevet, and at about the same time as a Malvern Star Sportstar bike frame arrived in my life courtesy of Wecycle.  I was motivated to start again, and did so, and the above photos are the results of both the bike resto and badge mounting.

Here are the relevant details!

Bike: Malvern Star Sportstar frame, fork and seatpost with pieces salvaged from other bikes & my stockpiles, 11-34 6 speed cluster, Shimano 38t biopace single chainring, non-indexing gear shifter, 27" steel wheels, Selle Royale suspension saddle.

Bling: Audax 2016 -2019 French 200k medal, mounted in 3d printed plastic and timber frame, suits 32 diameter head tube.  3d print completed at home on Cetus 3d printer, in orange PLA+ material. 19 x 7mm pine timber.

Regards

Steve Nurse

Flower of the month for July

Stopping to collect Brassica, or cabbage-type weeds in Studley Park Road, just near the Yarra River

There is masses of the stuff, and its easy to pull out. I am not sure if they appear every year, or this is just the first time I've noticed it.

Some of the weeds I pulled are now in planters at the side of the house.  Instant garden!  Note bike under repair, it was rescued from a hard rubbish pile and is in pretty good nick.

More captive salad leaves in the kitchen.

Of course, once you see and notice a plant once, it seems to be everywhere.  Here is another patch in Royal Park.

Hi

In previous posts like this one, I documented a Melbourne "Flower of the Month" but have been a bit slack on that lately, but I'm reviving the series.  And maybe it should be called weed of the month, as my recent involvement with plants has involved edible weeds including Fennel, and this month's Brassica.  Our ex neighbor was Greek and used to pick edible and cookable weeds and plants from the nearby creekside, and a recently acquired book, The Weed Forager's Handbook has rekindled the foraging weed instinct in me. Anyway, enjoy the pictures, and the book is highly recommended!  Regards

Steve Nurse

My trike and more Brassica plants (at left) Other unknown plants (at right)

About my trikes, the heart

Local letterbox, with decorative steel support, and

another one, and

yet another one. This style of fence and post decoration has been celebrated in the local Green Bins artwork on Hoddle Street, which is still there and thriving.

Letterbox and house number, now that's thinking!

Lego house number and letterbox, that's really thinking! 

Bluebower Letter box with diorama

Bluebower Letterbox with lego diorama.

Bluebower #3

Bluebower #4

What's with all the letterboxes, then?  It's really just showing off some local creativity and everyday playfulness in our neighbourhood, and to draw attention to their similarity to the ideas present in the Bluebower letterboxes and some of my trikes.

Just like in "about my trikes, the bones" on the structure of my trikes and lack of chain stress in the frame, there is an appeal to a higher theory here, and that is contained in Jules Pretty's "Manifesto for the Green Mind" which is an anti-sloth, pro-happiness, pro-learning and pro-environment wake-up call. It calls for regular physical activity outdoors, continued cognitive engagement  and socially based activities and creativity low in material consumption yet delivering health benefits.

After picking out photos of my own creations, a phrase welled up for some of the enabling tools (bluebower letterboxes, my trikes when they go on sale) for this creativity and that is "gifts that keep on giving".  That is, like learning to play the ukelele say, these are things that don't stop, and can be played with, learned about, and used to provoke satisfaction and discussion and interest and friendship.  A certain amount of vanity needs to be thrown away, your diorama, your ukelele playing, your bike side panel, your bike pedal will never be perfect and some of your friends might disagree but what the hell, life's for living. Or something.

That is probably enough rabbitting on for now, photos of some bikes and trikes and their customisation follow, which is just the same as my usual blog, but a bit of a summary and showcase.

Regards

Steve Nurse

Experimental speed trike, the seat is laid back further and the steerer is longer than usual

Wooden trike as seen at fringe furniture 2017

Timber trike with clear sides and internal lighting

Clear sides on timber trik tailbox.

cutting out clear panels

Cloth covered panel #1

Corflute panel internals

Plywood panel

Plywood panel internal

Decorated corflute at master's degree exhibition and celebration

In the wild near Melbourne town hall

Cloth panel #2 from an old cycling jersey I owned but never wore.

Sold this load carrying trike during the year.

Cloth Panel #3

In the wild with a trike including cloth panel #2, Audax 100k ride.

Pedal modification for recumbent bike, the red parts are 3d printed

Another Pedal Mod

My wife Christine at work on cloth panel #4

Graham Signorini's bike foreground, mine background at U.N. International Bike Day

With James and mike from Wecycle, U.N. International Bike Day