Next prototype ideas?

Hello there!
well i have returned from Maker Faire Rome with many ideas, too many to compile and put up. but slowly things are turning on in my mind!

here’s an interesting site i found:
http://weburbanist.com/2009/03/03/futuristic-strange-concept-bicycles-designs/

and a very very beautiful concept:
http://www.instructables.com/id/Bow-The-Amazing-Bike-Wheel-Bow/

the latter one can be an amazing base for the wheel. So in fact there will be two 20″ wheels, for each leg, however one will be cut and bent to fit inside the othere.. the space between the original sized outer wheel and the modified inner wheel wil be fitted with balls to act as a giant bearing!!! interesting isn’t it?

solves the problems of load distribution (that was causing a lot of friction in prototype 4) and also the jeans getting stuck in the upper parts of the skate(the upper wheel in prototype 4).

should be light weight too i guess?

another interesting and similar concept:
http://www.toxel.com/tech/2010/03/24/skateboard-with-hubless-wheels/

dont know if its a practical idea, yet.

First real testing of Prototype 4

As you can hear the noise, its because the rubber wheels are rubbing on the aluminium frame. Ila had a wonderfully simple solution, just a few drops of oil. The huge amount of friction that allowed the noise to be made and very importantly allowed me to walk, however vanished with the oil. Luckly we took the video before applying the oil cause after it, it was just impossible to stand on and walk with the smoothest ride possible (if i could i mean). So now the picture is clear, its not as easy as it seems from the video. I’ll need to put brakes onto the wheels, to learn atleast.

The team and place!

Well the most important part of this project is the team here:

  • Nicola Calitaux, Technican at TFL, UCLouvain – the real technical and ideation partner for all of the project
  • Ila Gupta , my wife, sounding board and the real support behind this idea and the maker.
  • Others include
    • Julien Vervotte, Technicain at TFL, UCLouvain
    • Benjamin Berger, colleague at the lab, also responsible for some important ideas and discussions
  • and that subir over there 😉

All the work has taken place at the Thermodynamics and Fluid mechanics Laboratory (TFL) at Université catholique de Louvain at Belgium, with the amazing freedom allowed by my supervisor Prof Hervé Jeanmart.

Prototype 4

Finally i have finished the prototype number 4. This one is the most complete one with each set for the two legs. Here for fitting the legs Nicola suggested i use his inline skate shoes for the purpose so that there is no need of other kind of wheel supports(the ones needed to  keep the wheel upright and at a certain angle to the leg).

However its clearly visible the support to attache the shoe to the aluminium stand did not survive the pressure of me standing on it. The welding may have made it weak since its aluminium. Just to give an idea, the main structure looks somewhat like this:
So finally i had to resort to rethinking about the most important thing. Finally i made the following design.

The 2 base wheels are attached the the shoes through a 10 degree bent 3 mm aluminium plate and bolted with spacers together. note that the plates on each side of the wheel are of different sizes to incorporate the shift due to 10 degree angle. The rest of the support and wheel are attached like this:

 And finally its not so difficult to stand on them independent of any support, atleast for a moment now 😉

And ila tried it too, although the shoes are quiet large for her. So we have a first review and needed improvements:

  1. We need brakes, for safety and for learning
  2. could be made and should be made far lighter than the 2.63 kg each, as of now.
  3. there is some constant pressure on the front part of the foot to keep the wheel in the right angular position. this is so because of the flexibility of the skating shoes at the ankle which needs to be minimized.
  4. the wheels of one of the wheel sets is jamming too much due to correct fit. To take into account the little irregularities of the rim(spoke holes) and the wheels too, we must make them slightly undersized.
  5. sharp edges must be removed.
So today and tomorrow, we will try, and lest see if i can post a video!!

Project description

The intention is to create a personal transportation system that is a cross between a bicycle and a skate. Each leg is strapped to a large wheel, 20″ bicycle wheel as shown below in the third prototype.

Such a device will help in skating on rough terrain and village roads. A real application is addressing public commutation problems when large distances are involved to access public transportation services in developing countries.
Check out this interesting video :

Surely its not an easy implementation due to the various challenges. But more prototypes are on the way. This will be presented in whatever form, working or non-working in the makerfaire at rome this october 2013. www.makerfairerome.eu.

To make it really opensource and to see any light of the day, all are really welcome to comment and post experiences and suggest updates. I would be delighted if you have better ideas or totally opposite views. I don’t believe in any licensing(as if its a really great idea), so please feel free to use this for any use, it will only be my pleasure.

about the insignificant


it feels like writing again,
feels that what needs to be
can only be begun sometime
an inconspicuous time,
often this is the romantic spirit of idealism
often this minor effort will wither away into the average
but wont it be, even otherwise, the average i mean?


why make fun of the little ones
why neglect them as trivial and unimportant
why so, even when these
in ever so insignificant ways build what we understand by momentum
and momentum isnt that all that matters?


i doubt if major efforts and waiting for them
have ever been of significance
and one may question wherein comes the major effort from
but from a general momentum
built in ever insignificant ways
in ever miniature forms
little revolts here and there
the littleness hides the human nature


and a momentum is sure to be built
a momentum that is anyways built
and when it is built, its hard to brake it
to tame it, to control and release
and who comes to the rescue?
are little friends, miniature efforts


the making of an artist or an inventor
of an leader and a peasant
is not due to the bold stroke of genius we all hear about
it is the nurturing and practicing of the medium of expression
of years of little efforts
years spent in learning the language that can speak creativity
that can dance and walk on a tight rope, with energy and lack of fear
and all we notice is the miniature effort that makes all the difference
that sums up all the rest and thus hides from us
the ignorant bystander


and then we ignorant people, we ape these minor finishing touches
as real standalone efforts
to replace the artist/creator and fail
fail miserably cause we come to know how difficult an effort it would take
and thus we conclude, oh the ignorant bystander, how much of a genius it takes


and we live our lives with this learning embedded into our living
the importance of a certain kind of effort ever increasing,
of bold strokes and radical ideas, the illusion of glamour
and we neglect that what can build a momentum
and thus we fail again, and again we conclude what a genius it takes,
but this time, we also conclude that we can not.


and sometimes, we wait for our bold stroke of creativity,
and never make the smaller ones that might give momentum,
because our yardstick is just so bigger than what we can manage to do,
and so we wait for the enlightenment, we dream for the big moment,
we are desperate for the minor sparks of opportunity that we might come across,
and we neglect so much…


and thus fails another artist, even before the journey began,
ignorant and disillusioned, and convinced that it takes a genius,

and mistakes it as hardwork instead.