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Whirling Twirling Propeller Trike

Posted by CmdrTaco on Wed Jul 04, 2007 11:13 AM
from the mit-students-with-to-much-time dept.
It's funny. Laugh. Science
hankmt writes "A student at MIT has built a tricycle that applies force to a giant rear fan, instead of directly to the wheels. The effect...well, it's best to look for yourself, but it would be pretty useful on the post-apocalyptic roads of the Australian Outback. The blades of the trike even have built in LED lights which display colored patterns...and also warn pedestrians of their impending deaths."
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  • There would be a lot more room to ride on Multi-Use Paths...

  • Crazy (Score:4, Funny)

    by grub (11606) <slashdot@grub.net> on Wednesday July 04 2007, @11:18AM (#19744357) Homepage Journal

    Those crazy MIT guys are lucky that Massachusetts just made health insurance mandatory!

  • First prize for impracticality (Score:3, Funny)

    by trolltalk.com (1108067) on Wednesday July 04 2007, @11:19AM (#19744371) Homepage Journal

    From the looks of it after watching the vide, its terrible at transforming pedal energy into forward motion, and I'd really hate to see what would happen in any sort of wind. At least a "real bike" you can get off and walk. Add bird strikes to the blades, the excess width, etc., and you've got a real problem.

    Unless,of course, you're Wiley Coyote, and ride it off a cliff - you could autogyro down, I guess.

    • I don't think the guy is trying to transform the energy debate, he just thought it would be fun. It reminded me of the bicycle in Miyazaki's "Castle in the Sky" (aka Laputa). And by the way, that's "Wile E. Coyote".
    • This thing couldn't even get started on an uphill, or with more than a light breeze for a headwind. Forget climbing out of a pothole.

      It's a very clever toy, nothing more.

    • Re:First prize for impracticality (Score:5, Funny)

      by timeOday (582209) on Wednesday July 04 2007, @11:49AM (#19744647)
      Oh well, millions of people per year spend good money on devices that do nothing *but* waste energy, such as elliptical machines, treadmills, and exercycles. And you can't even hack people to pieces with those.

    • Re: (Score:2, Interesting)

      by hszp (1023419)
      Disclaimer: I would not want to pedal that sh!t uphill under any circumstances.

      But it's simply great. How many of you would have thought such speed was possible in such an unefficient way? Sure: he could be three times as fast with an everyday ( "run-off-the-mill"? ) bike, but that's only better by a factor of 3.

      Add a big helium-filled balloon to the thing and next thing you see he's flying (don't try this at home kids, you're not coming down the way you think you would).
      Or build something similar for a gli
      • But in this case, he'd autogyro down, with that big sh*t-eating grin on his face, holding up a sign saying "PHEW!" and just as he gets to ground level - BAM! a truck driven by the RoadRunner runs into him and creams him.

          • Re:First prize for impracticality (Score:4, Informative)

            by tylernt (581794) on Wednesday July 04 2007, @05:19PM (#19747951)
            Gyroplanes (or gyrocopters, if you wish) auto-rotate all the time and can still do a zero-roll landing without a collective. The rotor speed is controlled by the angle of attack to the relative wind so you come in at speed and then flare at the last moment... not that that would really help a guy going down in this trike though, as he would have no control surfaces.
  • This isn't science, this is technology. Very cool machine though; I especially like the complete lack of any safety measures concerning the big spinning blades! Can I hire that thing to get rid of my evil enemy Mr. Naughty?

  • Pfft.... (Score:4, Funny)

    by Digitus1337 (671442) <{lk_digitus} {at} {hotmail.com}> on Wednesday July 04 2007, @11:29AM (#19744477) Homepage
    That thing blows.

  • I can't believe Slashdot. (Score:5, Funny)

    by pclminion (145572) on Wednesday July 04 2007, @11:35AM (#19744541)

    This guy builds a trike with great glowing, whirling blades of death on the back and actually manages to ride it around for a while without getting shipped to Gitmo, and people just complain how it's not practical?

    You people fail utterly at nerd-dom.

  • Looks like something for Burning Man (Score:4, Interesting)

    by Animats (122034) on Wednesday July 04 2007, @11:37AM (#19744563) Homepage

    The Burning Man crowd likes stuff like that. It's too late for this year's Department of Mutant Vehicles [burningman.com] registration, though.

    By playa standards, this is unambitious. Check out the Neverwas Haul [tribe.net], a steam-powered 3-story Victorian house on wheels that moves under its own power.

  • You noticed he's walking it?

     
  • It seems like if he build a simple lightweight fan cage, he'd probably solve most of the problems with unhappy police or others. It also could save him money and trouble if he ever tips over, cuts a corner too close, hits a bird, etc. I'm sure fiberglass over foam wouldn't hold up too well to a sudden interruption.

    That said, it's still pretty cool. I wonder how it compares to normal bicycle drive for efficiency.
    • A regular bike is much, much, much more efficient. I don't know exactly how much without a wattage output vs. distance measurement, but there's no way this could be anywhere as efficient as a normal bike.

      However, it is really awesome. :)
    • Weight! If he tips over the blades should be able to support their portion of the bikes' weight - the operator simply falls out. Fiberglass is rediculously easy to repair. An enclosure for the fan would probably increase the weight of the bike by 20% or more if it was at all load bearing.
    • Hmm, if he fully encloses the fan and adds a vacuum pump, then the fan will spin much easier and his forward speed will be pretty much the same...
  • Or at least drew it first in Kiki's Delivery Service [imageshack.us].
  • Anyone see any brakes on the thing? Or does the driver just start blowing air out of their mouth forward?

    -m

  • "durr, they jump out of the way even..." (Score:5, Insightful)

    by SuperBanana (662181) on Wednesday July 04 2007, @12:46PM (#19745251)

    (from the video) "...and they jump out of the way even if they're 20 feet away."

    That's pretty smart on their part. Pay close, careful attention to how he restrains these spinning blades: A FUCKING PIPE CLAMP.

    Maybe if he's so smart with matlab, he can work out the pulling force at a few hundred RPMs on those blades, frighten himself, and put a bolt through the blade and hub shaft.

    Also, the design of the frame is pretty sketchy, with no bracing; he's relying purely on the static-load-bearing capacity of the tubing and his welds. If he collides with anything, the frame is going to come apart, and he stands a good chance of getting a chromalloy chest transplant.

  • Hwever, adapting the LEDs to beanie propellors could be cool.
  • The American Society of Civil Lawyers "Suing The Pants Off^w^w^w Everybody Since 1969"
  • The real question: can you use it to decapitate zombies? Because if not, phbbt, don't waste my time.
  • "Whirling Twirling Propeller sTrike"

  • From TFA.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by (arg!)Styopa (232550) on Wednesday July 04 2007, @04:11PM (#19747379) Journal
    "I spend a month a year working on a commercial fishing boat with a loud diesel engine, and the greatest sound in the world is to hear it turn off," says Damon Vander Lind, the creator of a soothingly quiet trike"

    As opposed to a normal trike, which operates with ear-shattering volume?

    • Re:Dumbass Rolled Up Pant Leg (Score:5, Funny)

      by Dan East (318230) on Wednesday July 04 2007, @11:23AM (#19744423) Homepage
      You know what also is funny? The way he rolls up one of his pant legs to be 'in style.' Real original, is he an MIT gangsta?

      Actually, the bike pulls to the right. So by rolling up his right pant leg that side creates less drag, which helps trim the bike back to the left.

      Dan East

      • Reminds me of a pilot... (Score:4, Interesting)

        by iknownuttin (1099999) on Wednesday July 04 2007, @11:47AM (#19744639)
        Actually, the bike pulls to the right. So by rolling up his right pant leg that side creates less drag, which helps trim the bike back to the left.

        I once knew a pilot for parachutists and he would trim the plane so well that all he did to turn was to lean in the direction he wanted to go. I believe it was a C172 or something small like that.

        • Only old Koreans would lean to turn a C172. It's all the rage now to do it in an Antonov, n00bs maybe can get away with a Starlifter

      • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

        by rrosales (847375)
        I believe the reason why he pulled his right pants leg is so that it doesn't get caught in the gears.
    • It helps keep the pants leg from getting caught in the chain. Don't let that get in the way of your "gangsta" knowledge, however.
      • It makes you wonder if any of these posters ever rode a bicycle with long pants. As usual, there's nothing quite like a non-application of Occam's Razor [wikipedia.org]. Example: "My car won't start! Rogue clowns from Venus must have stolen my spark plugs!"

        Why he/she interpreted the rolled up pants leg as the MIT guy trying to be "gangsta"is beyond me. For crap's sake, it isn't even "gangsta" anymore. LL Cool J popularized that in the late 80s. Since it is a covert form of communication, by definition if suburban
        • ...I know I've ripped wide-ankled trousers more than once because I didn't roll them up or use clips. [wikipedia.org] So yes, absolutely, it is a risk. An alternative is to tuck the trouser bottoms into your socks. I can only presume that people who don't see the need exclusively wear narrow-ankled trousers (or don't cycle much!)
    • Maybe his mom got gunned down during a meth lab robbery by the local Knitting Devils gang
      • Already been done. Go to Hokey Spokes [hokeyspokes.com] and take a look at the demo video.
        • Great link, thanks. I did think he might try something along these lines since the rotation plane is actually more suitable for displaying it to traffic (perpendicular to the road and would work when the bike is stationary or moving slowly). Too bad TFA is not saying what exactly he does with the LEDs.
    • It depends. If he took the time to optimize the fan blades (that's a fun aerospace problem), that would be cool. Especially if he had the ability to feather the blades. He obviously also rigged gearing in an interesting way (watch the video). Maybe not revolutionary, but interesting.

      Far more interesting than the stupid computer 'hacks' that show up here all the time, which take little skill or imagination to pull off.

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