Hasta La Gadget!

Gabriel Wartofsky’s e-bike exist in real life

You know all those concept bikes we see which look like they’d break in two as soon as you jump on them? And how it doesn’t matter anyway, as they’ll never make it outside of a CAD rendering? Well, Gabriel Wartofsky’s e-bike is not one of those concepts. Not only did he come up with a plausible-looking design, but he managed to get it funded already on Kickstarter.

Strength-wise, the bike looks good, sharing the fat tubes and chunky joints of the super-tough (although slightly wobbly) Brompton. The fold, too, is smart. The handlebars fold first, and then the front and rear wheels simply swing around on their tubes too end up tidily tucked inside the loop of the frame.

Drive comes from an electric motor in the front hub, and by a rod-based direct rear-wheel drive connected to the pedals. This last eliminates the chain, which is a real pain to deal with on folders.

No CG renderings here. The direct drive keeps pants hems clean

Most important of all, Gabriel has a fully functioning prototype, and it looks great. Amazingly, the Kickstarter buy-in price is a mere $25,000. Not bad for a bike, when sometimes we see iPhone case makers asking for upwards of $60,000. This probably has something to do with Gabriel’s design being rather well developed already — he’s been working on it since 2008.

Folding Electric Bike for Commuters [Kickstarter]

A pair of non-electric Bromptons, packed for a flight. Photo Todd Fahrner/Flickr

Oh, man. First Bob Dylan went electric, and now Brompton. The London-based folding bike maker has at last revealed the truth behind its long (and somewhat tedious) “Project X” teaser campaign: An eBrompton.

The information is still just dribbling from the company, though. Little more has been revealed than that the bike will have a small electric motor, and that this motor won’t interfere with the legendary “fold,” which makes the Brompton one of the smallest bikes around when packed down. The new e-bike will go on sale in the UK and Germany next year, and the rest of the world will follow in 2013.

One thing is pretty certain, though: a motor will add weight. When riding a Brompton, it’s 9-12.5kg (20-28 pound) weight is light enough, but when you have to carry the folded package up five flights of stairs (as I do most days) it starts to feel a little heavy. Then again, I guess anyone frail enough to be buying an electric bike probably lives in a building with an elevator.

Weight issues aside, I’m excited to find out how the eBrompton will work. The now classic status of the original often hides the innovation of its design. I hope the electric version is similarly clever.

eBrompton announced by West London biker maker [Road.cc]

See Also:

• Brompton
• Review: Brompton M6L Folding Bicycle

Instead of just glancing backwards for free, you can glance downwards for $180

You know how you check what’s going on behind you when you ride a bike? You look over (or under) your shoulder, that’s how. And for the stiff-necked, a cheap mirror will do the job just fine. What you don’t need is a $180 camera and LCD screen.

It looks like somebody forgot to tell the Owl 360 people that nobody needs their product, so they went ahead and made it anyway. The camera mounts on your seat post, and is surrounded by LEDs which come on in the dark to save you buying a separate bicycle lamp, and the 3.5-inch LCD screen attaches to your handlebars so you can shoot a glance straight down instead of backwards, as God intended when he invented the bike.

Think about it. In low light, the camera will be all but useless. In bright sunlight, the screen will be invisible, which somewhat reduces its utility.

Add to this the fact that you’ll have to take the thing off every time you lock the bike up and it starts to seem rather tiresome. And don’t even get me started on charging the thing after every five hours of use.

Should you decide you have to have a rear-view camera, you can order one right now from Owl 360, for the aforementioned sum of $180.

Owl 360 product page [Owl 360 via Oh Gizmo!]

See Also:

• Rael Concept Bike With Rear-View Camera
• Make a Camera Mount for Your Bike
• Chrome's Niko, A Camera-Carrying Bikers's Backpack

Ford tries its hand at e-bikes. What next? A Specialized SUV?

Ford is the latest car maker to turn its talents to bicycles, and this concept E-Bike is the result. Unlike most other car-branded bikes, though, this one actually brings automotive tech to the party.

The bicycle part is pretty standard, if outlandishly styled. The frame is fashioned from aluminum and carbon fiber, the wheels look like 1980s mags, the gears are internal Shimano Alfine (11-speed), the “chain” is a carbon belt and the brakes are disks.

But the electric part is way neater. The li-ion battery inside the frame drives a 350w motor in the front hub. Also inside the hub are magnetostriction sensors. These sensors, which change shape when a magnetic field is applied (and vice versa) allow the wheel to detect when it is turning and apply power appropriate to how hard you are pedaling. These sensors come from F1 cars.

The setup can be tweaked by an app on the Android phone up on the “dash.” This app also shows you all the usual bike computer info like speed and distance, along with more car-like functions like “service reminder” and “System diagnosis.” An iPhone app is planned, which makes me think that this concept may actually make it into production.

I’m not sure how I feel about car companies making bikes. On the one hand, it shows that cycling is definitely on the up. On the other, seeing a car manufacturer muscling in is like seeing a cigarette company making candy for kids — chilling.

Ford Rides into E-Bike Market with Stunning Concept [Ford PR]

See Also:

• Behold! The Car-Crushing Monsterbike
• Cycle Law: Should Bikes Be Treated Like Cars?
• Cash for Clunkers: BMW M Bike Disappoints
• Audi's Wooden Granny Bike Costs Almost $7000

With such tiny, close-together wheels, it’s no wonder the Union folds up so well

Good lord! What on Earth were Weiche Wu and Minhan Lin thinking when they came up with this absurd concept. design for a folding bike? Perhaps the goal was to make a bike so tall and with a wheelbase so short that only a child with very long legs (think Kermit, only human) could ride it? Or perhaps they planned on making a bike that could be made to look like a golf cart when folded?

I’ll settle on my favorite theory: that they simply allowed a shopping cart and an stationary bike interbreed.

The Union, as it is named, might be all but impossible to ride, what with those tiny wheels and the aforementioned wheelie-tastic wheelbase, but the folding mechanism is pretty clever. First the seat “post” folds int the “top-tube,” and then both scissor shut into the bottom section.

Then the steerer telecopes down, and the bottom wheel hinges into the main body. The result resembles a Dyson vacuum cleaner more than a bike, and it can be easily dragged along on the remaining visible wheel.

The boys do get extra points for actually making the Union, too, instead of just mocking it up inside a computer. And if your commute involves a train, and perfectly flat and smooth terrain to and from both stations, I guess this might work out.

A Better Folding Cycle [Yanko]

See Also:

• Tern Folding Bike Company Breaks Away From Dahon
• Gorgeous Folding Bike Places Form Far Above Function
• Ingenious Folding Bike Nails Form and Function
• 'Contortionist': A Folding Bike Cool Enough for Batman