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A neat question from @idlestate
Q5. Does anyone know of a use of "training-wheel" type outriggers fitted to adult bicycles as a guard against the worst from an ice-related wipeout?
@ascentale @idlestate @bikenite A5) I'm guessing my daughter's upright tricycle doesn't count. ;-) #BikeNite
@ascentale @idlestate @bikenite I just rely on several puffy layers to provide some cushioning.
@ascentale @idlestate @bikenite I think they might exist, but they wouldn't be called training wheels since those aren't meant to both sit on the ground at once and I think you would want that for ice? Maybe?
Anyway this is for sale by me so I know full scale adult wheels exist: https://orangecounty.craigslist.org/bik/d/irvine-vintage-1980s-malibu-hopper/7831595077.html
@ascentale @idlestate @bikenite You have no idea how tempting that post is for $40 (but I really, really don't have space or need for it)
Cool find, thanks!
Honestly, I'm not sure how crucial both touching at once is to what I have in mind. It might be fine! Or, like training wheels, the ability to just move along at speed when it's all going ok, without the outriggers dragging, is probably good.
I'm thinking of the various times I've wiped out on ice, either walking or cycling. One moment you're moving along upright and then BAM! You are flat out. It seems FAST! and it's hard and it hurts a lot.
So, something to catch that on the way down is mostly what I'm wondering about. A little slip or wobble might be ok, so long as momentum isn't completely flipped around?
(And I should have put my caveat from my original post in my repost over the hashtag: I know studded tires, which have been mentioned, exist. Was really looking for something like this.)
@ascentale @idlestate @bikenite A5 Just get studded tires?
@ascentale @idlestate @bikenite I haven't heard of it, but apparently there are adult-sized training wheels. https://zizebikes.com/product/adult-bike-training-wheels/
I'd be more likely to use a recumbent trike or quad if I lived someplace it was a risk. And studded tires.
@meganL @ascentale @idlestate @bikenite Yeah hard do not recommend on these. We had a guy with balance issues ask to have them installed and they really weren't up to the task. He really needed a trike. They ended up donated to the bike coop and are probably still in storage five years later.
@HayiWena @meganL @ascentale @idlestate @bikenite
I wonder how hard it would be to install them so they *didn't* have a .5-1" rise off the ground "like traditional training wheels". That would make them more stable to begin with.
@deirdrebeth @meganL @ascentale @idlestate @bikenite The structural engineer in me (which is tiny--I gave that up after undergrad) will tell you that you need three constraints to be statically determinate, which is a very fancy way of saying a 3-legged stool will never wobble, but a 4-legged stool almost always will because you can make a plane with 3 of the legs that excludes the fourth. In this case, you've got three points between front wheel, back wheel, and one balance wheel.... (1/2)
@deirdrebeth @meganL @ascentale @idlestate @bikenite ... (2/2) so since the ground is never perfectly level and constantly changing, no matter how you configure the training wheels, if you have training wheels you've got four potential contacts = two potential planes that the balance point will hinge around. Hence, a tricycle (or quad with suspension) will always be more stable.
@HayiWena, Swinging Wheels look much better than this.
@andrew_shadura @HayiWena @meganL @idlestate @bikenite these are fascinating. I wonder how they make a bicycle handle while turning.
@andrew_shadura @meganL @ascentale @idlestate @bikenite Swinging Wheels look exactly like the ones we tried to install for someone. I guess mobility issues vary for people and this woman looks like she had a few wobbles and mostly dented her confidence and doesn't rely on them. Adults and teens with more serious balance issues would get rocked back and forth and terrified every time the balance point shifts.
@HayiWena, I think a big difference is that Swinging Wheels are actually mounted on springs, so they allow you to lean in turns if you need to, unlike rigid alternatives such as Zize’s.
@andrew_shadura @meganL @ascentale @idlestate @bikenite Well turning isn't the issue I'm describing. It's when your balance point shifts left or right and your bike switches from which auxiliary wheel it's using. The springs will dampen the jarring on landing but it's the feeling of falling you feel that's just as scary as you teeter over that balance point. The woman in the video is mostly riding without a wheel contacting the ground, it's there in case. Not good for people who always need it.
@ascentale @idlestate @bikenite
I'm sure I remember watching a YouTube of a guy who did this.
It was a pretty simple set-up; high pressure air cylinder, a stack of plumbing and piping adaptors, pneumatic actuators, solenoids, inertial sensors, a couple of Arduinos, a temperature sensor, a few weeks coding, testing to find batteries which worked in cold temperatures, some CAD work and CNC machining, 3D printing and testing which filaments worked in cold temperatures, and then real world tests.
@ascentale @idlestate @bikenite A5. Someone else may have a better answer, but I don't know if that would really help all that much. The risk as I know it is more that you spin out more than just fall to one side that a training wheel wouldn't really help with. Maybe it you had them in both front and back and they stuck out kind of far? But then you have a lot sticking out.