You know all those hub-less wheels that “designers” like to throw onto their CG concept bicycles? Well, a student of Loughborough Design School in England has actually made one. He even threw in a belt-drive for good measure.
It’s called the Lanartic, and it was designed and built by Luke Douglas. Despite being having a full sized wheel, the wheelbase is much shorter than that of a regular road bike, and because the seat sits over the rear wheel the seat-to-handlebar distance remains similar to a bigger bike.
The hubless design opens up a lot of extra opportunities, not least of all luggage carrying. You could put a bag or basket inside that rear wheel (taking care to keep it away from the rider’s heels) and it would put the load at or even below the bike’s center of gravity for a very stable ride.
I imagine the friction of this kind of wheel is a lot higher than that of a regular hub, thanks to so much more contact between wheel and the “frame”. It looks like crazy fun to ride, though, and wheelies should be dead easy with the seat so far back over the rear wheel.
Lanartic [Loughborough University via Doobybrain and Make]
"
No comments:
Post a Comment