
The bicymple. The bicycle, simplified. - Garbage
http://www.bicymple.com/
======
nateberkopec
I don't understand why you'd "simplify" out the most important part of the
bicycle - the gears. A bicycle (even a fixie/single) is the most amazing,
important human-powered machine because of the mechanical efficiency
introduced by the gears.

Without gears, it's just a unicycle with two wheels. While interesting, and
probably a nice novelty to ride, I wouldn't call this a triumph of "Design" by
any means.

I hate shitting on people's inventions on HN (way too easy to potshot and
armchair QB) but the way they sell this as a "design" product sort of irked
me. It looks fun but good design it ain't.

EDIT: Maybe the headline should have been "the unicycle, made slightly more
complicated"

~~~
alexkus
A 27" gear from direct drive is utterly impractical. Direct drive is only 8mph
at 100rpm. You go at a nice cruising/commuting speed of 20mph you'd need to
spin out 250rpm. I can only maintain 200rpm for short bursts!

It needs something akin to a the Schlumpf "mountain drive" cranks (to lengthen
the gears rather than shorten them) to give a gear up in to at leas the
60"-70" gear inches range that's more suitable for road use.

~~~
snogglethorpe
They say this in the comment section:

> "To address the problem you bring up, we have designed an overdrive hub
> system that will make the gearing comparable to that of the average
> singlespeed bike."

Of course, there goes the "simplicity"...

~~~
alexkus
Aha, thanks, missed that.

------
gamache
Nothing really got simplified here. There's now twice as many steering
columns, the rear hub became more complicated, and so did its dropout because
now there's pedals there. We've lost gear ratios other than 1:1. And I didn't
see braking of any sort.

It's basically a swing bike (fun, but taxing on the core muscles and not very
stable at high speed) with the rear axle aft of the saddle (so I'm guessing
it's a nutbuster).

Freakbikes are great, but this reeks of concept fluff.

~~~
DGCA
I hate the concept and I agree that they complicated the bike, if anything,
but it does have brakes.

~~~
glenntzke
Honestly, I expected the rear hub to lock with backpedaling reminiscent of
training bikes. Looks like I join the negativity train here in that it looks
less comfortable and certainly is less stable than your normal bicycle. And it
doesn't solve size issues well compared to folding commuter bikes.

Looks like a novel take on the bicycle (perhaps for an industrial design
course/exercise?) but the weight savings don't cut it.

------
51Cards
Watching the video the bike looks to be inherently unstable even when rolling
forward. The rider is using his body to control the direction of the rear
wheel and corners look pretty shaky if you don't keep the alignment right. It
may have fewer parts but to my eye it looks like it has more ways this could
go very wrong. Sort of like when you are pushing one of those rolling dolly's
where all 4 wheels rotate independently.

~~~
HyprMusic
For what it's worth, the specs say the rear steering has a lockout.

------
junto
It looks both uncomfortable and impractical for day to day commuting. There
seems to be a constant pressure on the leg muscles because the back wheel also
pivots. No luggage rack and shortly wheelbase makes the breaking more
dangerous.

I think I'll stick to my classic Dutch Gazelle:
[http://www.gazellebikes.com/Collection%20bikes/Urban_bicycle...](http://www.gazellebikes.com/Collection%20bikes/Urban_bicycles/Comfort/Tour-
Populair-Export?type=men)

Although what I really want is one of these:
[http://www.gazellebikes.com/Collection%20bikes/Urban_bicycle...](http://www.gazellebikes.com/Collection%20bikes/Urban_bicycles/Specials/Cabby-2013?type=men)

------
alpine01
Looks more like a 2 wheeled Unicycle, than a "simplified" bicycle.

"In geometry, there's nothing as strong as a triangle. Diamond-frame bikes
consist basically of two triangles. The elegance and simplicity of this design
is very hard to improve upon. Billions of diamond-frame bikes have been made
from tubing for over a century, and during that time, hundreds of thousands of
very smart people have spent billions of hours riding along and thinking about
ways to fine-tune the performance of their bikes. The tubular diamond frame
has been fine-tuned by an evolutionary process to the point where it is very
close to perfection, given the basic design and materials. " - Sheldon Brown

------
mikestew
So they effectively reinvented the boneshaker[1] while forgetting why the
highwheelers evolved (you're not going to go very fast on this thing).

[1]
[http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boneshaker_(bicycle)#section_...](http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boneshaker_\(bicycle\)#section_2)

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jschulenklopper
See <http://vanmoof.com> for a nicer, better, more practical and more stylish
bike from Dutch designers. Quote from their site:

    
    
      We stripped the traditional Dutch bike from redundant hoo-ha [...]
      and added sensibility instead. The result? Simplistic striking
      bikes so smooth that they fit your style demands, yet so functional
      they make you go to work whistling. The no-nonsense VANMOOF bike
      is the ultimate urban commuter tool, anywhere around the globe.

~~~
davidw
In many places, you don't want a cool, visually striking bike for commuting,
because it's a lot likelier to be the target of thieves.

~~~
jschulenklopper
True. Especially in The Netherlands, when you buy a second-hand bike (for
example for commuting to the train station) it is very common to invest the
same amount of money in a quality lock.

At bigger train stations in NL, often there are guarded parking areas for
bicycles. Smaller stations are likely to have 'bike lockers' for rent.

------
debacle
Sometimes people throw out hundreds of years of engineering and are lauded as
geniuses.

I don't think this is going to be one of those times.

------
oinksoft
Dynamic has been selling drive-shaft bicycles for a long time:
<http://www.dynamicbicycles.com/>

This looks like it could be good to ride for fun, not so much for everyday
transportation.

I'd be worried about the stability of such a short bicycle, and the speed of
such small wheels and wide tires.

------
droithomme
From an ergonomics standpoint, having your hands and butt at the exact same
level has always been bad for your body. On competitive racing bikes this made
some sense where one was trying to reduce the last bit of drag, but in all
other cycling contexts it would make more sense not to be doing this. Here we
see the same layout, this time apparently only to preserve artistic symmetry
of the frame design since this bike without gears is certainly not suitable
for competitive racing.

~~~
harlanlewis
This is an oversimplification - good cycling form has many benefits beyond
aerodynamics and power.

For example, your typical commuter bike allows the rider to sit in a standard
upright position. While many new to bikes find this more comfortable, each
bump in the road sends a jolt up through the seat post that continues
unimpeded vertically up the rider's spine, compressing each disc in the
vertebrae. Sore butt and an aching back at the end of the ride.

Adopting road cycling form, aside from strengthening your core, allows your
torso to act as a shock absorber, harmlessly waggling away the energy.

~~~
eru
Or you could just ride a recumbent.

The only reason they ride uprights at races is regulations.

~~~
harlanlewis
There is no shortage of vehicles to ride :)

As this thread started with a commuter bike, I'll stick to commuting. The low
visibility of recumbents in traffic (both of the rider and what the rider can
see) is a bigger issue than ergonomics.

Each rider determines their own level of acceptable risk, etc etc, but
regulation has nothing to do with their lacking adoption for commuters.

~~~
eru
You could stick a neon flag on top.

> Each rider determines their own level of acceptable risk, etc etc, but
> regulation has nothing to do with their lacking adoption for commuters.

That's true. The greatest drawback of my recumbent is the inability to use
backpack at the same time. (Sure there are saddlebags, but that's less
convenient.)

------
davidw
Otherwise known as "The Faceplant".

A head tube angle of 74 degrees would make a normal bicycle a pretty sketchy
ride, IIRC, to say nothing of a 31" wheel base.

~~~
001sky
73 degrees is standard road bike, 74 is NBD

~~~
davidw
Put your average person on a road bike, and they're going to freak out just a
little bit. They're not real stable, comfortable or natural, especially at
slow speeds.

~~~
army
They're actually very stable once you're moving, more so than some other bike
geometries and at low speed I can't tell much of a difference. If someone else
was used to a different bike design then I can see it might take a bit of
adjustment. Once you're used to them they handle better and are more
comfortable on long rides than most other bike designs.

~~~
davidw
> Once you're used to them they handle better and are more comfortable on long
> rides than most other bike designs.

Well, yeah, that's what they're made for: the best possible experience for
people who know what they're doing. Commuter type bicycles are generally meant
to be reasonably comfortable for the less bicycle-oriented.

------
GotAnyMegadeth
Reminds me of this from South Park
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NUNEm6DWsU8>

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bagosm
The claim that the moving parts are less than a regular bike is just... It not
only has more moving parts, it also has movement on two new axis too!

But I dont see the problem with the regular bikes that this solves. Even if it
were true that regular bikes required a few maintenance more, the cost to buy
a new chain and oil it up now and then is close to nothing

~~~
smacktoward
Not to mention that the biggest design problem with current bikes is that they
are simultaneously fairly expensive (multiple hundreds of dollars, except for
the lowest of the low end) and extremely easy to steal.

If someone could make a reasonably reliable bike that's so cheap you wouldn't
care if it got stolen, or an expensive bike that was extremely hard to steal,
that would be a design improvement of the first magnitude.

------
eru
If you actually want to go minimalist, get a unicycle.

~~~
klodolph
Ah, Portland. Where the fixie just isn't hipster enough.

~~~
eru
It's a tough world. (Though, I'm actually based in the old world.)

------
winkerVSbecks
Everyone here has pointed out why this bike is not simple or usable and the
designer has sort of justified this argument by not even mentioning why this
is a simplified bike on the website. It marketing 101, if you are making a
better product – tell people why it's better!

------
andrewcooke
is jobst brandt still around? would love to see what he says about this, if
it's printable.

~~~
davidw
+1 - I recall reading that guy's commentary in rec.bicycles.racing:

<http://luddo.freehostia.com/Climbs/Climbs5.htm>

------
zerostar07
Is this for real? I would like to see a video where it's not a parking lot or
an empty square. The guy seems to be visibly trampling around corners in the
park. I can't imagine what could happen in a sharp corner at anything above 2
km/h

------
knowaveragejoe
Can someone explain the point of having a freely rotating rear wheel? It makes
no sense to me. I can see myself constantly worrying I'll turn too much and
burn my inner calf on the tire.

------
alimbada
Site needs some UX work... <http://i.imgur.com/Gm2jO.png>

------
chinmoy
Honestly, this did not look simple to me.

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viseztrance
I wonder if anyone will bother stealing this. And will the thief ride it for a
quick getaway?

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user24
dupe: <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=4635505>

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indiecore
This looks more complicated than a chain driven bike.

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bravoyankee
In regards to bikes in general, the formfactor is nearly perfected and there
are designs to accommodate almost anyone. I think the innovations need to be
in the public's perception and increased usage of them (and not cars).

~~~
eru
Yes. And you can learn much about that, by looking at bike usage in different
countries.

------
ktizo
Looks a lot like the things a mate of mine keeps welding up. He has loads of 2
wheel steering bikes now, and he's pretty good on them.

