Oh dear, I can't imagine this ending well!
Maybe give this technology a few years to mature then upload other riders Strava files to the control unit and go chasing KOMs?
Or bring drunks home from the pub?
Why does the trike need more rear wheel camber than F1 front wheels? 😆
I think of our mission as...
I'm out.
Looks as though it has already been in an RTA.
Joking aside though, I think it probably will happen in some way.
The solution I was thinking about was an MBB recumbent trike with a bottom bracket and cranks holding two rear electric wheels. There would be some kind of locking mechanism so that it could either be ridden the same way a two wheeler or the cranks could be locked for autonomous driving.
Can't find any examples of exactly what I'm thinking of but it's similar to this, mine will just have the rear wheels staggered:
It's an experiment, seems reasonable to me in the light of self driving cars.
Disclosure - former frankenbike owner.
Why does the trike need more rear wheel camber than F1 front wheels?
Smaller footprint and higher COG?
Sinclair C5 would be great for this sort of thing.
Sinclair C5 would be great for this sort of thing.
I think the problem is that you need to approach these things from the point of view of it being a human powered vehicle first and have the assistance as a secondary consideration. Many of these solutions, including the C5, focus on the assistance part and make the human powered element secondary.
Ergonomically the C5 looked like a bit of a nightmare with the non-adjustable bottom bracket/seat and the handlebar position.
Just thinking that for this sort of thing to properly take off, it'd needs some sort of out of the elements feature. For this country any way....
Obviously the actual C5 would still have the same issues, but could be a decent base model.
There was an interesting Cautionary Tales podcast on the C5 a few weeks ago, what he got wrong and where he was ahead of his time:
https://timharford.com/2022/04/cautionary-tales-the-false-dawn-of-the-electric-car/
I remember seeing one at the time, driving along an urban High Street in the rain where I lived, guy with a canoe type spraydeck on to keep out the cack the lorries were sluicing over him...
And that, I think, was one of the biggest issues. Trikes are just lower to the ground, so are inherently less visible and open to getting sprayed. The one the OP posted is at least taller, but I really don't like setups with the two wheels at the back.
This all goes back to how bikes/trikes and cars interact on the roads and, right now, I don't think that is too positively, so something that is self driving is just on a hiding to nothing.
Trikes are just lower to the ground, so are inherently less visible
While I think that's true, I think the risks are also overstated.
Most recumbents/velomobiles sit at roughly the same height as a Lamborghini Miura or a Volkswagen XL1 and you don't see many people complaining that they can't possibly avoid running over these low slung cars.
I think for the most part it's just people freaking out because it's something they don't understand, like a dog seeing a plastic bag in the wind for the first time:
It's not a concern to be dismissed out of hand but given the fact that drivers seem to have a lot of problems seeing upright bikes I don't think height is the main issue.
That story just sums up the Daily Record/Evening Times mentality.
it's understood the driver - a woman from Germany - is deliberately taking her bright green mode of transport round the whole of Scotland.
I mean, it would be a rather unfortunate accident to take a wrong turn in Hamburg and suddenly find yourself in Hamilton.
It's unknown the motivation behind the driver of this green Velomobile's ride around Scotland
Quality journalism, let's not bother finding out (because she will be so hard to trace) and instead just ask the local scheme rats. Brilliant.