Why did we wait so long for the bicycle? • Hacker News Board

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#231

Post by duxup » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:20 PM UTC

Excel_Wizard wrote: post #29

>Yet it was a simple mechanical invention As a mechanical engineer, this statement baffled me. All manufactured technology exists in the context of the manufacturing capabilities available to the designer. The manufacturing tech had to be tremendously complicated before a decent bike could be made. Hollow steel tubes aren't simple. Ball bearings aren't simple. There is a reductionist viewpoint among "theory" people t…

The TV series "Connections" did a great job demonstrating how often that more often than not we're not short on ideas or inventions or inventiveness.

Usually there are a lot of great ideas, but availability of materials in quantity, or a key part is what is missing, sometimes for centuries, and often comes from someplace you might not expect.

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#232

Post by analog31 » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:24 PM UTC

lucideer wrote: post #26

> (Some commenters have suggested that it was not obvious that a two-wheeled vehicle would balance, but I find this unconvincing given how many other things people have learned to balance on, from dugout canoes to horses themselves.) I'll be one of those commenters I guess.... What!?? Balancing in a canoe is in no way similar to a bicycle. I can jump in a canoe having never been in one, and it will balance itself. I…

I read a biography of the Wright Brothers, which pointed out that they spent quite some time and effort with their gliders, learning how to fly. So they were already skilled pilots before they attempted powered flight. The book suggested that this idea occurred to none of the other airplane inventors.

There might have been a similar problem with the bicycle: Anybody who built the first one had no idea of how to ride it, and lacked the advantages of being six years old, namely closer to the ground and quicker to heal from minor injuries.

What I want to ask: Why are we still waiting so long for the bicycle? There just seem like so many barriers to more widespread adoption.

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#233

Post by bsmith » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:28 PM UTC

dTal wrote: post #176

dmurray wrote: post #142

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The back fork should be connected to the seatpost with a pair of horizontal braces. It's an exaggeration to say it would immediately break. But if you put weight on it, it will tend to spread out (imagine putting weight on a bent piece of metal shaped like a ^). Still, the front fork isn't braced, and bikes exist with quite a large rake angle on the front fork (think a Harley-Davidson style chopper). So maybe you can…

As it's a single speed with no derailleur and the missing braces would be in tension, might not the chain itself fulfill the role?

It could, but undue tension on the chain vastly decreases the efficiency and longevity of the chain, and potentially, the cog/chainwheel. This would also present a safety issue because chains can (and do) break.

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#234

Post by lazyant » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:34 PM UTC

Excel_Wizard wrote: post #29

>Yet it was a simple mechanical invention As a mechanical engineer, this statement baffled me. All manufactured technology exists in the context of the manufacturing capabilities available to the designer. The manufacturing tech had to be tremendously complicated before a decent bike could be made. Hollow steel tubes aren't simple. Ball bearings aren't simple. There is a reductionist viewpoint among "theory" people t…

And if you don't have smooth roads you need rubber for the tires no? there is a lot of technology involved in making a useful bicycle (ie not a toy).

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#235

Post by tlb » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:41 PM UTC

The unicycle was invented shortly afterwards. Here's a patent from 1869, for an over-complicated unicycle with a treadle mechanism instead of pedals on cranks. https://patents.google.com/patent/US87355

Many of the objections about how complicated the bicycle is don't apply to the unicycle. The Romans could have made a perfectly good one out of wood with brass cranks. But maybe it was even less obvious than the bicycle that it was possible to ride.

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#236

Post by WalterBright » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:42 PM UTC

Excel_Wizard wrote: post #29

>Yet it was a simple mechanical invention As a mechanical engineer, this statement baffled me. All manufactured technology exists in the context of the manufacturing capabilities available to the designer. The manufacturing tech had to be tremendously complicated before a decent bike could be made. Hollow steel tubes aren't simple. Ball bearings aren't simple. There is a reductionist viewpoint among "theory" people t…

The article also didn't mention weight. The lighter a bike is, the more effective it is. One made out of wood and iron would be simply too heavy. Imagine a cast iron wheel.

Lots of people dismiss the Wright Bros as "bicycle mechanics". They kinda miss that lightweight bicycle technology, like chain drives and steel wire, were essential for their working airplane.

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#237

Post by WalterBright » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:44 PM UTC

entee wrote: post #108

Animats wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right. And one point that cannot be stressed enough. Good steel, in quantity, only goes back to 1880. Lots of things that "could have been built in antiquity" foundered on that basic fact. Before Bessemer, steel was as exotic as titanium is now. The alternatives are not good. Cast iron? Too heavy and too brittle. Wrought iron? Maybe, but not that great. Lead? Too soft. Brass? Could work, but expensive. A king's kid m…

I often wonder as I am building/fixing something (often my bicycle as it happens) and I happen to toss an extra screw in the trash how miraculous a simple screw of this type would have been to a middle-ages craftsman. The precision of keeping all those threads perfectly spaced is one thing, but the technology to make them in such volume at these sizes (often quite tiny), and in volumes so as to make them essentially…

It's similar with nails. If you tour Jefferson's home Monticello, there was a "nailery" where the nails needed were forged by hand, one by one. Being handmade, the each nail was valuable.

People would burn scrap lumber to recover the nails.

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#238

Post by emanuensis » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:47 PM UTC

dTal wrote: post #149

nine_k wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good steel would only be strictly needed for axles. Bearings could have been polished and oiled wood. The frame, wood. The hinge of the front wheel, brass or another small bit of steel. Transmission could be a leather belt. Wheels, wood again. Would such a device somehow emulate a modern bicycle? Very likely. Would such a device be practical, reliable, fast, to say nothing of comfort? I greatly doubt it.

Bamboo-frame bicycles exist today as a fashionable item, and as far as I can tell without having ridden one, they work for practical purposes just as well as metal-frame ones. I suspect you could make a perfectly acceptable modern bicycle with 18th century technology, albeit not as durable. Metal axles aren't much of a problem. Light and strong wheels are trickier, but you could get away with solid wooden ones, or em…

Good design may not have made up for the "wealth inequality" aspect of ancient bike production ... but it could have surmounted the issue of bad roads: The Rungu 3-wheeled electric bike seems to be well suited to rough, off road, conditions:

https://electrek.co/2019/05/23/first-ride-rungu-three-wheele...

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#239

Post by Florin_Andrei » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:51 PM UTC

runarberg wrote: post #211

Florin_Andrei wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But you don't need advanced materials and technologies. You don't need steel. You don't need ball bearings. Archimedes could have built a velocipede, using mostly wood, same tech as ox-driven carts, just the wheels being lighter and more narrow since the load is much less, and it would have worked fine. I'm just not sure about road surface quality back then. I suspect that was a bigger limiting factor. Also, bikes ar…

I think even horses was more of an upper class thing. Most humans throughout our modern history have used their own muscle power for work and transportation. In poorer rural communities a bicycle is immensely helpful in getting your products to a market more quickly and economically then walking. This is as true today as it was in the early 19th century.

I've seen rural roads in poorer parts of Eastern Europe some decades ago. They definitely used bicycles and found them useful, but that was more of a fair weather type of thing. And bikes were exclusively used to get one person from point A to point B; to carry goods they preferred 4 wheel vehicles, either motorized or not.

Perhaps that's just my experience.

You're right about horses. Oxen were the preferred power source to move goods. Sometimes donkeys. Horses were used for the same purposes, but that indicated the owner was definitely not on the lowest rung on the social ladder. The context here is the Eastern Bloc decades ago.

Re: Why did we wait so long for the bicycle?

#240

Post by safepants » Mon, Jul 15, 2019, 10:52 PM UTC

jonsnowman wrote: post #83

closeparen wrote: post #4

Why did we wait so long after the modern bicycle to see it as transportation rather than recreation? Awareness of climate change maybe? It seems that a) bicycles were not primary transportation even before cars, and b) the push to replace cars with bikes could have happened at any point, even before cars took off. So why now?

Bicycles were heavily used for transportation before cars at least in those countries where they were available at reasonable cost. Anecdotal, but my grandpa and his pals ride bicycles their whole youth and even later, got his driver's license when he was 50, and didn't give a about any environmental issues (though he was no fan of consumerism and made pretty much everything he needed himself and overall preferred si…

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/bike-blog/2011/aug/1...