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My daughter Ciera, 13 years old, has an assignment from school to write about the inventionof some everyday item, and how it came about, and what other things resulted from its invention. Of course, I'm going "the bicycle, the bicycle". Of course, she chooses the invention of sunglasses. What can you do?
Fast Company is a great magazine that we have been receiving the past few months. It is filled cover to cover with great articles about businesses and business people. In this month's issue they ask for recommendations about preferred business blogs, and gives a web address, which forwards to this page:
http://www.fastcompany.com/articles/2004/12/best-blogs-form.html
If you enjoy this humble blog, feel free to mention it to them. The winner gets, absolutely nothing as far as I can tell.
Early bikes used a tire that was basically tubular, and was glued to the curved side of a rim. The glue and air pressure in the tire held the tire to the rim. This type of tire was later called a "sew-up" because a tire was sewed in place around the tube, and the tube and tire were glued to the rim. This is a pretty good illustration of an early bicycle tire design.
Hans Renold was 21 when he moved from Swizerland to Manchester to find his place in the world. Six years later, in 1879, he bought a small chain company, and in 1880 invented the bush roller chain. The figures below are the drawings from his British patent on the bush roller chain.
The difference between a roller chain and a bush roller chain is that the bush roller chain includes an extra tubular section which surrounds the bush, through which the pin extends. The roller is free to rotate, and protects the bush from wear. This extends the life of the chain. An exploded view of a bush roller chain is shown below.
James Starley incorporated a Renold chain into his Rover bicycle of 1884, the prototypical diamond framed bicycle.
Renold's invention revolutionized all kind of industries, especially the textile industry in England, which was huge. Renold expanded his business, and in 1925 purchased his largest competitor. Further acquisitions followed, and Renold became established as a supplier of excellent quality chains, gears, couplings, and freewheels to industry.
Renold presently has about 3300 employees, and facilities in 22 countries around the world. Their current offerings of chains are found at their site under: Renold Roller Chain.
You have to check out the little video called the Numa Numa dance. Go to this site, and click on "watch this movie", then "play" after it downloads. Choose the version with subtitles unless you speak Italian. Its a crack up. This site has had 1.5 million hits lately for this video, so if it is so backed up you can't get a copy, do a google search for "numa numa dance" and you'll find other copies. Its worth a few minutes for the laugh you'll get.
http://www.newgrounds.com/portal/view/206373
This guy just had his 15 minutes of fame.
An early bike design by Harmon D. Moise included a freewheel that allowed the rider to coast, and the pedals would remain in one position during coasting. It only had one gear, but multiple gear freewheels would follow. This U.S. patent for a very modern looking was in 1895, two years before Isaac Johnson's patent for a folding frame bicycle, and ten years after John Starley's Rover. This frame is more like a modern frame than the Rover, because it has a seat tube.
Peter Eland is the editor of Velo Vision Magazine, a quarterly magazine and daily news web service. He also appears to be quite a machinist, as evidenced by his recumbent tande
m bike displayed on his website, Peter Eland's Tandem.
The bike is actually a tricycle, and is shown here negotiating a sharp turn, with the wheels at about full turn.
The bike is pretty much a long bar wi
th seats attached, and two wheels in front which turn together to steer.
Pete says he machined the needed parts that he could not get from another tricycle and a recumbent.
In one configuration the rear rider can sit back to back with the pilot, and see the road behind. In the configuration shown in these photos the rear rider faces forward, and has his own set of pedals and a brake lever. The front wheels have disc brakes.
Peter says that the speed is about the same as a normal bike, it is very comfortable to ride, it is rideable by one person, and he is only making special orders for rediculous prices. His labor in building the trike probably would make it enormously expensive!
Steve Nipper, world renowned Idaho Patent Attorney (and my partner), has a post on his The Invent Blog about a great site for a chart to figure out if a photo has entered the public domain. The chart is on the Cornell University Law site, at copyright chart. How this relates to me is that I bought a great book on invention and technology on ebay, published in 1919, and thus ALL the photos in the book are in the public domain. Sweet!
The bicycle as we know it came together from the innovations of many inventors, such as the inventor of the roller chain, and first person to put a crank on a Dandy Horse, the first person to invent pneumatic tires, and the first person to adapt ball bearings to bicycles wheels. 
But enough of these features came together in one machine in 1885 to form a device we would recognize as a bicycle. It was built by John Kemp Starley of England. John moved to the big city, Coventry England, to work for his uncle, James Starley. James was an inventor, and was in the sewing machine business, had perfected the penny farthing high wheel bike, and had invented the first tricycle, which was sold as the Rover.
John Starley built an improved Rover, which was a two wheeler with a chain drive on the rear wheel, equal sized wheels, diamond shaped tubular frame, tangential spokes, ball bearings in wheels and cranks, and pneumatic tires. It was a truly modern bicycle. The photo below is of John Starley's Rover of 1885. Other early bikes were Isaac Johnson's folding frame bike, and Harmon Moise's bike with a freewheel, both of which came after Starley's Rover.
The Rover company also experimented with motorcycles, and also started a car company. The Rover Motor Car Company went on to build Rover cars, which run from luxury sedans to the famous Land Rover and Range Rover.
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