It's alive!


I think it might send me back in time if I can pedal up to 88mph.
Definitely needs some tidying up. I think I do too! It's just typical that the day (or few days) you don't bother to shave you end up bumping into everyone you haven't seen for a few years. People seemed pretty interested in the bike though, despite how silly it currently looks.
I doubled up the springs holding the wheel down. I think I might add a third since there was a bit of slipping, although at this point i'm a little worried about over-loading these bearings. The tyre on the idle wheel got flung off, which says to me that the wheel couldn't spin so freely, perhaps because of the load. The top bearings are 69012, 12mm inside, 24mm outside diameter, which is fairly thin. I might try boring the holes a size bigger to fit a 28mm OD bearing that can take about double the load of the current ones according to the website i'm buying bearings from.
Also with the enormous spring pressure the idea of using a break cable to release the arms from contacting the wheel seems kind of hopeless. Fortunately the motor turns fairly freely when not running, and doesn't cause any noticeable resistance.
Still, i'm quite pleased that it's actually moving now. I'm just a little concerned about how it's going to hold up in the long run. I'll need to tart it up a bit before I can take out down to the cycle path for a stress test though.