Check out my chainring!

[rice rocket]

http://s3.amazonaws.com/data.tumblr.com/tumblr_lb9uds96M11qcl5oho1_1280.jpg?AWSAccessKeyId =0RYTHV9YYQ4W5Q3HQMG2&Expires=1288890522&Signature=0X2B868StesBXjwOEAA2g9PJbkc%3D

[CaptStash]

Interesting front fork adaptation for the little bitty front wheel.

[victoryfactory]

1973 Dr. Allan Abbott : 138.674 mph

"Dr. Allan Abbott. a cycling enthusiast and motorcycle racer..establishes a motor paced bicycle speed record, reaching 138.674 mph on the Bonneville Salt Flats.

Currently Dean of Family Medicine at USC, Dr. Abbott has provided invaluable first-hand information for the success of the Team McCall USA attempt. A life long enthusiast of man powered speed efforts, Dr. Abbott also won his age group in the 2006 Los Angeles Triathlon."

[fiamme red]

Interesting front fork adaptation for the little bitty front wheel.Common on stayer bikes (i.e., ridden behind motorcycles, here a car).

http://www.bikespecialties.com/vintage/1934ccmpacefollower.html

"The smaller front wheel, reversed fork and forward riding position all assist in getting the rider closer to the pacing motor for maximum drafting effect."

[David Kirk]

Interesting front fork adaptation for the little bitty front wheel.

It's actually two different things going on there. The first one is that they want the small front wheel so that they can get as close as possible to the lead vehicle for the best draft.

The second is that the fork has negative rake so that it acts like a caster and if you hit the bar on the back of the car it will tend to make the bike straighten out instead of turn. It makes things extremely stable. Not so great for a crit but great for going 120 mph straight.

I'd love to try one. You?

Dave

[pitcrew]

I'd love to try one. You?

Dave

swoopy seatstays and all? That would be cool!

[CaptStash]

That looks way fun to me. Thanks for the explanation of the neg. fork rake too.

[rice rocket]

Found more info:


"Now lets face it, 150mph is pretty scary in a car, let alone on a bicycle! That is the speed that Jean Claude Rude attempted to achieve in 1979. The main aim, however, was to break the world bicycle speed record which stood at a staggering 127mph. This record was set in 1962 by Jose Meiffret. Unfortunately Rude didn’t break the record; his tyres exploded at 105mph! This is quite an unusual subject for a 1:43 diecast model, but Spark is a company that’s never been afraid to be different. The model, complete with Rude on his bicycle, features the heavily modified Porsche 935 which was driven by Le Mans legend and former F1 driver Henri Pescarolo. The rear of the Porsche was specially modified so Rude could draft behind it, decreasing the aerodynamic drag on the bike to almost nothing. This is known as motor pacing. Incredibly, the current motor pacing record stands at 167mph!"

[Stewball]

OK Dave, I'll drive the Porsche on the way out, you drive on the way back. You can't ruin for me though, no thrill look on you face; you'll have to wait till the second run to enjoy the experience.

[RPS]

Interesting front fork adaptation for the little bitty front wheel.
Looks like it provides a huge amount of trail.

[fiamme red]

Great article by Clifford Graves about Jose Meiffret:

http://www.63xc.com/ahands/meiffret.htm

Some photos of him and his bike (and enormous T.A. chainring):

http://astanafans.com/zhazhda-skorosti-jose-meiffret.html

Motor-pacing photos:

http://andrewritchie.wordpress.com/2010/01/23/motor-pacing-archive/

[victoryfactory]

When we were kids we used to whang the blades off an old fork with a
hacksaw and hammer them on to our bikes to get a cool looking extended look
then we would ad a small front wheel to complete the effect.

I wonder how stable that was?

VF

[Volant]

When we were kids we used to whang the blades off an old fork with a
hacksaw and hammer them on to our bikes to get a cool looking extended look
then we would ad a small front wheel to complete the effect.

I wonder how stable that was?

VF

Ahhh, the good 'ol days. We did the same, and if memory serves correctly, it wasn't stable at all. We'd also mount the tall 'ape hanger' handlebars. Turn the wheel past a couple inches and it'd just flop over. But, looked 'cool' going straight! (or, at least we thought - hey, Easy Rider was out back then.)

[Steve in SLO]

1973 Dr. Allan Abbott : 138.674 mph

Dr. Allan Abbott. a cycling enthusiast and motorcycle racer..establishes a motor paced bicycle speed record, reaching 138.674 mph on the Bonneville Salt Flats.

Currently Dean of Family Medicine at USC, Dr. Abbott has provided invaluable first-hand information for the success of the Team McCall USA attempt. A life long enthusiast of man powered speed efforts, Dr. Abbott also won his age group in the 2006 Los Angeles Triathlon.

Dr. Abbott was the first lecturer our medical school class had in 1985. I still remember his quote "Welcome to the process of becoming abnormal." because as docs the things we would think about and do were not normal. He was an entertaining lecturer and IIC working on his waterborne hydrofoil bike at the time.

[Mike748]

My old 911 tops out at 140. Steve's is probably faster so let use his.

BTW, my car with the ducktail sucks every bit of crap available on the road and deposits it on the back of the car. Probably not ideal conditions for a bicyclist glued to the rear bumper!

[CaptStash]

Dr. Abbott was the first lecturer our medical school class had in 1985. I still remember his quote "Welcome to the process of becoming abnormal." because as docs the things we would think about and do were not normal. He was an entertaining lecturer and IIC working on his waterborne hydrofoil bike at the time.

Wow! The small world thing strikes again. I remember him testing a bicycle powered hydrofoil at the Long Beach Marine Stadium back then. I was training in Long Beach back then with a bunch of other national team wannabes (I was a wannabe, most of the rest eventually were). We were unimpressed at the time as we could easily beat him in a quad. I wasn't there when Hegg set the record, but I remember hearing it was quite a show.

CaptStash....

[11.4]

It's actually two different things going on there. The first one is that they want the small front wheel so that they can get as close as possible to the lead vehicle for the best draft.

The second is that the fork has negative rake so that it acts like a caster and if you hit the bar on the back of the car it will tend to make the bike straighten out instead of turn. It makes things extremely stable. Not so great for a crit but great for going 120 mph straight.

I'd love to try one. You?

Dave

A standard in steher bike design nonetheless. So at the next NAHBS, will you offer a new steher line? It's about the only thing we HAVEN'T seen in bike frames recently. If you billed it for the street hipsters and excluded any fittings for brakes, and explained how they could ride up closer behind cars and panel trucks, it could sell like hotcakes.

[rice rocket]

I'm assuming there's a ton of toe overlap with that amount of trail though. No bar spinz!!!

[fiamme red]

In motion:

http://theautoinsiderblog.com/post/750363301/speedrecord