[Closed] Concept bikes = bikes of tomorrow?

Interesting. I don't think I understand "design", but I'm not 100% convinced those designers understand bicycles. The obessession with being able to plug your I-phone into it is troubling. 🙂

Someone needs to speak to Jerome Blanchard about engineering and triangles vs squares. I ahve some issues with the stresses in that frame.

Having worked with a few product design eng students I can say they have some amazing ideas and seem to be very good at saying "I want to do this, this looks like it might work, you find some way of making the impossible possible please?"

Aaaahh the beauty of rendering, where physical properties are meaningless!
I like the teague one though.

The obessession with being able to plug your I-phone into it is troubling.

Indeed. An incontrovertible truth.

However, I'm happy for non-"cyclist" designers to revaluate and come up with some innovative thinking about bikes. The point is not that these can be considered finished "solutions", but that they attempt to change the way we look at bikes.

I like that.

I'm not sure why designers feel as though they must constantly molest the cycling world with their idiotic and useless bike designs, since there are few machines in this world which require less improvement. Apparently, "design" is the art of taking functional objects you know nothing about and completely screwing them up.

Some of those don't look particularly suited to late night fettling with a beer or two on the go.

I agree, it makes you look at the whole "concept" (deep apologies) of a bike and question the form.

Interesting

but that they attempt to change the way we look at bikes.

But do we need to? And do they, really? Personally most of those still just look like bikes but with whacky frames, I don't see any great leaps there. Ultimately the bearings on the peugeot and others that use the "bearing rim" design are the big change, but unless we make some pretty huge advances I'm not sure they'll ever compete - it'll have lower rigidity, more friction and more weight almost by definition as far as I can see from an engineering perspective. It's ok to design something pretty, but don't re-design something that IS functional and make it LESS functional. Its like taking a seat and removing the legs, then claiming it's the way forward as it's a new view on seating; no, it's the floor with a backrest, and it's not comfy.

lol @ bikesnob, always good for a laugh 😀

[url= http://bicycledesign.blogspot.com/ ]This[/url] blog is pretty good for keeping uptodate with bike design, i was particularly impressed with the [url= http://bicycledesign.blogspot.com/2009/11/cannondale-dutchess-follow-up.html ]Cannondale Dutchess[/url] that they had on there a few months ago

cyclists are very closed to new design,, but most of those bikes,, fail to take into account that the most important feature of the bicycle is the rider ,,

the other problem is the UCI stifling bike designers by making them work within their rules,,

the other problem is the UCI stifling bike designers by making them work within their rules,,

i was particularly impressed with the Cannondale Dutchess that they had on there a few months ago

Beautiful bike. An illustration of how "wacky" design ideas can then be evolved into something more likely to be found on the streets.

I read somewhere that the guy who designs iPods etc never does renderings. He moves straight to a prototype model, to get an understanding of how it feels & looks in reality.

It's an unusual approach nowadays but if maybe if some of these guys had done that first, they wouldn't have persevered with these designs.

They've all tried to change things for change's sake, especially the bits that actually work well like chains, spokes, handlebars becoming joysticks etc. Then they've all spent ages on the rendering, especially fold up guy, but it's meaningless without the details. It's like car designers always sketching cars with 22" rims, as this makes the sketch look more dynamic, despite the fact they would never reach production.

It's what turns me off with a lot of industrial/transport design. They all apparently think getting the perfect form & surfacing on the wing mirror of a car is the ultimate design quest, whereas the fact that car has balooned to 2 tons is just a minor engineering detail.

How the hell do you get onto the Peugeot, there's no standover!

a guy at the GF's uni designed this a few years back.

can run as SS or with Alfine hub. it folds down to almost nothing for storage but can be folded half-way and easily wheeled onto a train or pedestrian areas.

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meanwhile, back in the real world!
FFS, blooming waste-o-time mac monkeys and their cocking ipods! I don't give a big fat curly one. Show me something that'll get me up Jacobs without dabbing.

I like the 'iBIke' (*gag*)

Especially the way the pedals are equidistant between the handlebars and saddle.

Oh and the eco bike needs the rear-wheel spokes to point in the other direction.

cyclists are very closed to new design,, but most of those bikes,, fail to take into account that the most important feature of the bicycle is the rider

The trouble with these concepts is they're really just an exercise in creativity for industrial designers. They look pretty and often feature nice visions of the future, but are usually unbound by the limits of engineering and materials, so they're about as realistic a prediction of the future as meals in pills and shiny jumpsuits.

I quite like that Cannondale one (although 14kg is still a great big lump of a bike for something that's designed to be ridden by a woman).

The rest are pure twonkery created by a bunch of people who are apparently fixated with Softrides.

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Like the bike pictured above by Alpin, the designer obviously isn't a bike designer.

Show me something that'll get me up Jacobs without dabbing.

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