A blast from the past – Team kits from yesteryear!

Winter "Transformers" fashion of 1929 (Nationaal Archief)

As we do our annual review of the pro-team kits for 2012 I can’t help but wonder what the bike nostalgics of future generations will think when looking back to today’s pro cyclist. Corporate billboards, cheap spandex, annual turnover and totally disposable. Call me nostalgic if you want, but… weren’t those classic sports-suits great? Ah, the good old days. You know, those golden times when “sports wear” hadn’t yet become synonymous with a one-piece, silver skinsuit! These “2 in 1″ designs are so simple, they are almost naive. And yet, there’s so much charm and elegance to them. That lady looks ready to jump onto her bike, win the cross town race and then go for a tea and some stroopwafels. Really, imagine how crazy-strong she must be if she’s going to hand you your ass while wearing a pair of convertible breeches!

I came across this picture in the Flickr account for the Nationaal Archief in The Hague. They have an impressive photographic collection of more than 2 million photographies, 500,000 of which have already been digitalized and are available at low resolutions if you contact them through their site.

Apart from glimpses into the fashionistas’ choices of  foregone eras, you can find this small collection of old photos from the Tour de France as part of their Flickr photostream. Some of my favorite shots include this one of the finish line for the very first edition of the Tour, in 1903:

The finish line of the first Tour (Nationaal Archief)

This classic shot of a fellow countryman, Ezquerra (is he really wearing aviator googles?!!?):

Ezquerra in the mountains (National Archief)

And this devastating image of Giusto Cerruti – riders were definitely more stylish back then, but they also had it harder!

No help for Giusto Cerutti (National Archief)

A Visit to the Brodie Framebuilding School

Tim, Stephen and I went out to visit the Brodie framebuilding school at the UFV aerospace facility at the Abbotsford airport last night. It was an informal open house, but it was great to see the facilities and just how set up Paul is out there. It’d be one thing to learn framebuilding skills from a local legend like Paul, but it’s another thing to have the potential to learn in such a well outfitted facility. Paul has a serious collection of jigs, milling machines and a good collection of “tricks-of-the-trade” to create a top-notch environment for learning. He even got the interest high by letting those who wanted to get a free first lesson.

I’ve got to admit, I’m pretty tempted to make the investment before Paul takes his handbuilt 18th-century full suspension “Whippet” to NAHBS and the program enrollment explodes. I met Paul years back when I was doing my thesis bicycle project at Emily Carr. He’s a chill guy and he knows his stuff, and he’s completely open to doing new things… or in his case, really old things, from 1888.

For more info about the course: www.ufv.ca/bicycleframe

Oregon Manifest Design Challenge – Winners announced

The Oregon Manifest Constructor’s Design Challenge held their annual contest in search of the ultimate utility bike for everyday transportation made by boutique builders. We looked at the winner in a little more detail, and were critical of some points.

Patricia: It seems they’ve found… a scooter?? Well, maybe not quite that, but almost. This year’s winning design reminisces of old-school motorcycles and features a stereo system, a front-rack lockbox made of carbon fiber and… an electric pedal assist engine!

Lawrence: Hmmm. Well, at least the electric assist motor would certainly be an advantage to win the race that each of the builders were required to participate in as part of the contest! But is that… that’s not cheating is it? I wonder how much race performance scores you?

Patricia: As far as I understand it, the designs are required to complete a road trial to ensure the bikes actually work. But no points or advantages are awarded to those who complete it faster. I may be wrong… But, in any case, Tony Pereira stated that his main objective while building his hot pink bike was “to get people out of cars, introducing amenities that drivers have grown accustomed to on the road”. So I guess the engine may be coming to Pereira’s design from this line of thought, not so much to make this design the fastest in a race against the rest of the bikes competing for the OM award. Maybe it’s just because I don’t fall into that category of people who needs to get out of their cars, but I must confess I am not a big fan of the electric engine and… well, this design is not my favorite.

Lawrence: I’m curious to know more about the constraints used in the contest. Let me get this out right away: Pereira is an awesome builder, and he makes great bikes, but I feel like this defies the most interesting constraint that a bicycle designer must face…. limited Watts and human power. Introducing the electric assist makes it as much a bicycle with motor as it makes it a scooter with pedals. It’s a hybrid electric scooter really, and the motors, cool as they are, aren’t innovative in the year 2012. I’m also confused by the contradiction of parts: Steel frame with carbon box, Retro, relaxed styling with race-tech Shimano cranks. It’s not my favorite, either…

We both preferred the runner-up design (seen below) made by Tsunehiro cycles which featured retro-reflective powder coating, kids back seat with built in handle bars, internal hub and hoards of storage. What do you think? Check out more on the website: http://oregonmanifest.com/ All in all, the contest features some amazing builders, with sick skills and even if some of the bikes aren’t completely our preference, or we have some gentle critiques, the results were inspiring and very interesting. Maybe someday we’ll enter a bike…

Oregon Manifest Design Challenge

A friend forwarded this on to me and I’m looking forward to seeing the results of this. It should be interesting to see what people come up with in terms of an “everyday” bike. It looks like the final results will be released in early October. Check out their website for more information.

http://oregonmanifest.com/

Human power stations

My good friend Ruben, and I, were having a discussion this week about human power devices and it was very fitting as I was looking into developing a human power station. Something of a single device, powered by pedals, that could be used to attach to numerous different tools around the house, with the end result being more human power and less electrical dependancy.

I’ll admit that my main motivation behind this is the old german coffee hand-grinder that I use to hand-grind my espresso in the morning. It takes a while, and in fact, is quite and inefficient little machine. Hand power is very sensible for numerous kitchen tools, egg beaters etc., but the coffee grinder really takes time – about 5 minutes per double dose. Imagine, if we are hosting friends, someone(s) can be grinding for quite a while. So leg power! It would be way faster! But then, I don’t want to make an individual leg-powered coffee grinder, a separate blender, a separate sewing machine, etc. I, instead, would like to make a small power station which can be moved around and accept all of these tools from the same device.

Ruben linked me to this blog (Low Tech Magazine and it really peaked my interest on the idea on old-tech solutions to our small-scale mechanical problems such as grinding, splitting, spinning and cutting.)

What is we only had our legs, and didn't have these little guys?

How can we re-conceptualize the standard wall outlet and what exists behind the faceplate? Wall outlets are a completely ubiquitous part of our lives, but what if they weren’t there? What if we only had to use our legs to create mechanical solutions vs the electrical solutions we find everywhere today?