The design:
73" long wheelbase
dual 406 wheels with room for tires 2.1 and smaller
135mm spacing on both ends for various drivetrain setups
5.5" seat height at 25-40 degrees
80 degree HT angle with about 2" trail
Remote steering with about 7" of tiller
Using a single front ring, step up pulley to raise my final gearing, and a short cage rear der with a wide range cassette in hilly areas /close range for typical race venues.
I used .049"thick 1" square tubing as my main frame tubes to help simplify layout and speed the build process. Not the light option, but it sure makes mitres easy. I triangulated the crap out of the front of the frame to help counter pedaling forces and ran the main tubes under the seat side by side to maintain vertical compliance while countering lateral movement as well. A bit of triangulation on the seat braces also to eliminate lateral movements.
I used dual steering rods to keep them under tension at all times. I'm not a real fan of indirect steering, but a three foo long tiller doesn't work too well in a shell. And I don't like trusting small steering rods under compression, so a little redundancy eases my mind.
It ends up looking like a really low version of a Tour Easy, hence the name Tour Quickly. The fenders were a late night addition, stolen from an old Stingray clone. Lowrider, eh? They are really there to keep the tires from rubbing the shell and avoid spray of course.
Believe it or not I can turn this bike around on a 10' wide lane. It turns real sharp, this was a bit of a suprise. With a little practice I should be able to whip it around real quick for TTs
The ride is very cushy as planned, maybe too cushy. I don't have enough ride time on it yet to truly tell.
Weight. I'm scared to weigh it. Just trying to keep it lighter than the Varna with the shell at this point. Lots of tubes and big brazed fillits means lots of weight.
The bike seemed rediculously long until I put the shell on it, then it's not too bad. The wheels are all the way to the ends of the shell. This puts the spare room within the shell closer to me, which is a good thing for ultra endurance where I will be carrying water bladders, food, and lighting systems.
As you might have noticed from the earlier pictures, I'm using a dual dolly wheel setup. I figure I don't want to be having to think about which side the dolly is on at the Nth hour, and they're set wide to keep me from just flipping on over anyway. Might be handy in heavy winds as well. The controls for these are still in the build phase. I know they work good when deployed and good when retracted, hopefully they work good while deploying and retracting :)
I've also got a fair bit of work to do on shell attachment, hope to finish that up this coming weekend.
These are pictures of my handy dandy fixture table at work. Nice chunk of scrap from the shop.
Here's my good friend and racing competition Rick Gritters of Pella, IA welding up my fork. Prolly the strongest part of this bike.
Another good friend, Richard(Deke) Gosen of Decorah, IA. He operates Oneota River Cycles in Decorah, great shop. Deke is my parts source and wheel man. He also puts on some the greatest mtb races in IA.
A note about the wheels on this bike. They are the nicest things on it. DT 240S disc cassette hubs, laced to Velocity Aeroheat rims with single butted 14/15 ga DT Comp spokes. Nice, light, fast, stiff, bling.
Trying out the huge Primo Comet HD tires in the pics. 406 2.1"110psi smooth tread just like the normal Comet, only bigger and beefier.
The seat I'm using is a Dave Balfour special. Very nice carbon hardshell, lightest part on the bike. Step one of conquering the world.
Anyway thats all for now. Back to building.
3 comments:
Sweet bike - take it off any sweet jumps?
Yea, flies smooth, perfectly balanced. I'm gearing up to launch it off of Squirrels Lawn Dart ramp in the next couple of weeks, just gotta finish the wings....
Maybe you could get like 3 feet of air.
p.s. have u seen napolean dynamite?
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