making bike by yourself

[mariaq...@gmail.com]

Hi Peers,

I am Maria. I love to cycle and have few bikes. Been thinking about building a bike myself or for my kid.

Any ideas or suggestions?

Share with me your experience?

Thanks.

[EdwardDolan]

> wrote in message news:d3ee0853-a9e6-4526...@googlegroups.com...

Building your own bike is like reinventing the wheel. Why bother? If you want to build something with wheels, I suggest a recumbent bicycle. Yes, you can buy them too, but they are expensive. You could save a lot of money (maybe) if you were to build your own. Some Easy Racer plans may still be around somewhere.

 

You can buy very good looking bikes for kids at Wal-Mart for not much money. They are not light weight, but are perfect for just running around town.

 

Regards,

 

Ed Dolan – Minnesota

 

 

[slto...@gmail.com]

I went on a cruise to Mexico last year. Among the various things was a talk by a man and his girlfriend that crossed the USA three times on a recumbent tricycle. He had had some sort of injury that left is right side more or less paralyzed but he fought back to the point he could walk though with a heavy limp. He then took up riding as an exercise and the distances gradually got longer and longer. I was pretty impressed. I tried the tricycle in the auditorium and was pretty impressed both with how comfortable it was and how easy it was to ride. A friend of mine who was always a strong rider moved down to Fresno and without a group to ride with he tried a recumbent bicycle. He told me he can easily ride along at 40 mph on it. That's like the top speed of a pro peloton so that's pretty impressive. I wonder how you can deal with getting used to that sort of speed since that is way faster than drivers are used to handling with estimating closing speeds of bikes. I'm having problems with people opening car doors or pulling out of parking spots or driveway and WAY under-estimating closing speeds when I'm just riding at 19 or 20 mph.

[EdwardDolan]

Edward Dolan wrote:

> Building your own bike is like reinventing the wheel. Why bother? If you
> want to build something with wheels, I suggest a recumbent bicycle. Yes,
> you can
> buy them too, but they are expensive. You could save a lot of money
> (maybe) if
> you were to build your own. Some Easy Racer plans may still be around
> somewhere.
>
> You can buy very good looking bikes for kids at Wal-Mart for not much
> money. They are not light weight, but are perfect for just running around
> town.

>> I went on a cruise to Mexico last year. Among the various things was a
>> talk by a man and his girlfriend that crossed the USA three times on a
>> recumbent tricycle. He had had some sort of injury that left is right
>> side more or less paralyzed but he fought back to the point he could walk
>> though with a heavy limp. He then took up riding as an exercise and the
>> distances gradually got longer and longer. I was pretty impressed. I
>> tried the tricycle in the auditorium and was pretty impressed both with
>> how comfortable it was and how easy it was to ride. A friend of mine who
>> was always a strong rider moved down to Fresno and without a group to
>> ride with he tried a recumbent bicycle. He told me he can easily ride
>> along at 40 mph on it. That's like the top speed of a pro peloton so
>> that's pretty impressive. I wonder how you can deal with getting used to
>> that sort of speed since that is way faster than drivers are used to
>> handling with estimating closing speeds of bikes. I'm having problems
>> with people opening car doors or pulling out of parking spots or driveway
>> and WAY under-estimating closing speeds when I'm just riding at 19 or 20
>> mph.

No one can ride a recumbent at 40 mph. Recumbent trikes especially are
slower than 2 wheelers. And all recumbents are slower than upright bicycles.
Folks ride recumbents for the comfort factor and not for the speed factor.
Most recumbents are ridden at speeds of about 10-15 mph. If you are riding
any kind of bicycle at 20 mph, you are already in a high speed group.

The only advantage a recumbent when it comes to speed is going downhill. You
are more aerodynamic on a recumbent, On the flats, you may or may not be
able to keep up with uprights, but you will lose badly going uphill. All
recumbents are terrible at going uphill - and you can't make up that loss of
speed on the downhills. Uprights will leave you in the dust.

Ed Dolan - Minnesota