What bikes can do for you
Do You Feel Helpless about the Rising Cost of Oil? What do you do towards this situation. You can do like me. You may not afford to keep your car on the road.
But you can surely afford awell-accessorized bike! Install a bike flashlight, you can use you bike during the day and night time. You will don't bothered with the rising cost of oil anymore. Your bike can work well just like you car.
Last edited by Bullzeyebill; 03-31-2012 at 10:10 AM. Reason: Title edited for clarity-?Cafe type thread
Re: What bike flashlights can do for you?
And a job that's close enough to home. That would be nice.
If not so fortunate:
Re: What bike flashlights can do for you?
depends on the distance job <-> homeOriginally Posted by Abbot
Re: What bike's can do for you?
My work is 28 miles from home. That's about 45 km. I'd ride it once or twice a week except that there are nothing but hills between here and work and I start work at an early hour. Not only that, but, I work close to a major university and bike theft is a real problem here. A 28 mile walk home would not be good.
Back in the day I used to ride to work on Fridays when I worked a lot closer to home. That was 28 miles round trip. On Mondays and Wednesdays I rode to the metro station, which was only 8 miles round trip. That's about 12 km. On Tuesdays and Thursdays I drove to the metro station. I was in much better shape back then.
Last edited by Bullzeyebill; 03-31-2012 at 10:11 AM. Reason: Edited thread title
Re: What bike's can do for you?
Title changed to reflect the true nature of the topic, which is "Your bike can work well just like you car". Moving this to the Cafe.
Bill
Re: What bike's can do for you?
Electric bike can do for me
Re: What bike's can do for you?
I feel very fortunate because I found a job less than 10 minutes walking from my home.
We don't know where you live, but if you are from USA, then you should check gas prices here (just a hint: roughly twice as much, IIRC).
Re: What bike's can do for you?
thats the best looking elec bike I've seen so far
got a link or info?
Electric bike can do for me
Re: What bike's can do for you?
We would be lost with out our bikes. Aside from the cost and chaos, when you get in the driver's seat of a car you lose half of what's left of The Bill Of Rights.
And besides, bicycles are faster than cars:
http://preview.tinyurl.com/2euxpz7
Re: What bike's can do for you?
And my mom wonders why I want to build an electric bike. Little additional maintenance, I can park in prime spaces (I spend 20 minuets to find parking for my 1988 suburban in ojai proper vs I just roll up on my bike to the bike rack,) and I can go pretty fast on my bike without electric assist, so it is reasonable to assume that with 400 watts helping me, I could do 15 mph on the hills.
Re: What bike's can do for you?
That's the Zero-S; a less-than-$1 charge nets up to 114 miles range. No gears, no fluids or exhaust, no sound. McGizmo has one..
Re: What bike's can do for you?
Probably closer to 60 miles/charge in combined riding for the ZF6
That's tight when you want to go cruising for an afternoon.
In a couple years w/ battery advancements, that could easily double.
Last edited by orbital; 04-03-2012 at 10:10 AM. Reason: ..
Re: What bike's can do for you?
anyone who has a afford to buy/spend 10000usd for a electric bike has no need to worry about fuel price rising. they obviously have plenty money to go around.
*MaKiNG SeNSe iS NOT My PRioRiTy* *One is None, Two is One, But Butter is Better*
*Flashaholism: DeeP DaRK HoLe im falling into, glad that I have my flashlights to light the way.*
Re: What bike's can do for you?
Despite living in a city with decent public transportation, I couldn't tell you the train stops or bus routes, cause I ride my bike to work year-round, rain/snow/whatever, and it makes me feel good. And a damned fine reason to get cool lights too.
john
Re: What bike's can do for you?
My car has become a bird poop refuge...
9 months car free (fuel cost antithesis not...it's because...click on jch79's video link)
Re: What bike's can do for you?
I'm trying to build an electric bike on a budget of 500 usd max for everything.
Re: What bike's can do for you?
Thanks Bill. I found the topic title a bit too confusing.
To deal with that issue . . . No. A bike running on pedal-power cannot work well, just like my car. Here's a few reasons why:
1) I've used my car for picking up and transporting a week's worth of groceries to my home. Can't do that with a bike.
2) My last full-time job could only be reached from my home by going on the expressway. No way am I going on an expressway on a bike. I'm not suicidal.
3) When I pick up my friends to have fun on the weekend, I need extra seats. Even if I'm only picking up one friend, I can't ask another grown man to ride on my handlebars.
4) The places I go to for fun are about 15 miles away from where I live. (That's one way.) I'd rather do more than just spend my life working and being bored to death.
5) I'm not pedaling to work in the rain. Even if it's just a short distance away.
6) During Summer, without air-conditioning, I'm not going to risk collapsing from heat-stroke and ending up with a huge hospital bill after being admitted into the ER. Or, even worse, leaving my elderly mother without someone to look after her because I dropped dead of heat-stroke. (Same situation in Winter with the issue of frost bite or freezing to death with no heat.)
7) No mature, sophisticated, woman in the world is going to date a guy who only rides a bike. No immature, teenaged, girl is going to date a guy who only rides a bike.
There you have it. Seven good reasons why gasoline is a necessary expense. You pay rent to have a place to live. You pay for food so as not to starve. And you pay for gasoline because in many parts of the world, a car has become a necessity.
"The World is insane. With tiny spots of sanity, here and there... Not the other way around!" - John Cleese.
Re: What bike's can do for you?
I commute daily on my bicycle, I'm lucky in that I ride around 5km to the train station, then catch a train for the next 35kms into the City. My work and University are both within 15 minutes walk at the other end of the train trip. When I really need a car, I can usually borrow one from a family member, although that is becoming less commonplace.
I have a bike locker at the train station for which I pay a small fee each year to rent from the state rail authority, which guarantees me a secure parking spot right next to the train station, plus it has a hook for my wet weather gear on less pleasant days!
It does help that the weather here is pretty nice, in summer it can get a bit hot (40+ deg C), thankfully my workplace has staff showers! At least I don't have to worry about snow and frostbite!
Having said that, I'm looking into getting a (diesel) 4wd pickup in the near future for camping/hunting trips, and for those days where it just is no fun to ride a bike!
Cheers,
Alex
Re: What bike's can do for you?
I bike for small errands when the outside temp and weather allows. I take mail to the post office, go to the bank and store for small items. I bike for exercise as well. I am fortune enough to live near a good system of paved bike trails where one can go for miles and travel to different cities and towns.
Re: What bike's can do for you?
I don't currently bike for errands because of inadequate safe, off-street bike parking (this is NYC after all-the capital of bike theft), but it is definitely viable in an urban environment. With a decent bike trailer I could easily carry 150+ pounds. I've found over years of riding that bicycle travel times in the city are often comparable or better than car travel times, even in the outer boroughs where traffic flows more smoothly. I can usually average 15+ mph overall on most trips. You're often hard-pressed to do much better than this by car unless you can do a significant portion of the trip on an expressway (and the expressway isn't jammed).
I think human-powered transportation is on the cusp of a revolution. The next step in the evolution of bicycles are faired HPVs (human powered vehicles). Some of these have been shown to be capable of bursts past 80 mph, and 1 hour average speeds in excess of 50 mph. With suitable roads (i.e. bicycle highways with no lights or stop signs), even the longer trips some say aren't practical by bicycle could one day be viable for HPVs. The vast majority of car trips are under 40 miles. That's well into HPV territory, basically the distance a rider in fairly good shape could cover in one hour with a decent HPV. Sure, human-powered transportation can't replace every type of motorized transport, but it can replace quite a bit. For those not in good shape, or who can't arrive at their destination sweaty, electric assist is available.
For me the beauty of biking is once you purchase the bike, it's essentially free. No insurance, no gas. Yes, you wear out tires and the drivetrain, but I figured out that those costs are well under 5 cents a mile. Even walking costs more once you count wear and tear on your footware.
Re: What bike's can do for you?
If a woman is that shallow, she's not worth dating. I rent a car when I need one, but all of my dates with girls involve a bike ride through the city exploring the sites and all of them have asked me to do it again with them even in rain or winter. We all have an idea of what we want in a partner, but sometimes someone comes along and makes use realize that everything we wanted was wrong, and they're exactly what we need.
I drive a cargo truck at the airport for work, but I take the transit system get there because it saves me $8 a day in gas alone. Factor in insurance, parking fees and maintenance fees and I'm saving anywhere between $400 and $500 a month on top of the initial cost of the car.
Transportation is a necessity, but there are alternatives to owning a car.
Re: What bike's can do for you?
Don't be a Debbie Downer!
Shave your legs, and get out and ride your BICYCLE!!!
Re: What bike's can do for you?
The biggest thing holding most folks back on saving energy is their minds.
I can carry 50 lbs of cargo on my bike in a pretty civilized fashon. I can tow 150 lbs behind it. This is not a hypothetical statement. I do this (though not both at the same time). I don't have superhuman strength or reflexes, though I'm very studied when it comes to moving things. I'm 61 years old and have highly advanced heart disease. If I can figure out how to get the load to my bike I can load it and move it with less effort than I may walk with no load. That's how well bikes really work.
Of course, in order to make this work we had to think about it. I took responsibility for my own life and thought about it. Moving to a city with no snow wasn't hard at all.Finding a place I wanted to be that has no hills was more of a challenge, but still very doable. I've lived in the same city for 31 years. The closest thing we have to a hill is a bridge.
For simple day to day running around, check out The Velomobile:
http://preview.tinyurl.com/2u763yx
I don't have a Velomobile. I post the link only to show that you may peddle your own way, go much faster with less peddling, stay out of the rain, and even look sexy while you do it. OK, the last part was a stretch.
Velomobiles make today's conflicted, pathetic designs for unworkable electric luxury cars look amazingly wasteful, wrongheaded and inappropriate.
That takes us back to the mind part. Rinse and repeat.
Last edited by Sub_Umbra; 04-04-2012 at 06:35 PM.
Re: What bike's can do for you?
Honestly, then the vast majority of women and girls are ridiculously shallow. Another example would be going out on a blind date, and then referring to her as a Prude or "fridget" because she slaps your hand away when you reach for her chest five minutes after meeting her. A tandem bike ride sure is fun. It's a good activity on a date. But you tell the average woman or girl that you don't own a car, you can't really be surprised if she gets turned off. That's not being shallow. The average woman expects the average guy to have his own car. That's just a realistic expectation. If I invite a young woman to join me at a formal restaurant, I have a realistic expectation that she will get dressed up. If she shows up in sandals, pajama bottoms, and an old T-shirt . . . Date is over. Some might consider that shallow. I consider it a case of a realistic expectation not being met.
If I go to the public library, and a homeless man sits down next to me stinking up the place with that distinctive smell that drunken, filthy, homeless men give off . . . I'm getting up and leaving. I'm not going to continue sit next to him because someone at the other end of the library might think I'm shallow for wanting to get away from the stench.
I pointed out several reasons in my previous post why a bike is not a realistic alternative to owning a car. As far as public transportation goes, New York City is one place where that would be a realistic alternative. But even then, there are going to be times when you'll need to use a taxi for certain errands. Yes, there are going to be morons who'll try to climb aboard a bus with a week's worth of groceries. But their stupidity, rude, and thoughtless actions doesn't change the fact that access to a car or taxi is the best way to go about that particular errand. Also, many places have poor transportation networks in place. NYC has a great system. Travel just outside the city into neighboring Long Island, and all you can rely on for public transportation is piss poor bus service that frequently runs so unpredictably that only the poorest residents of L.I. use it. And that's because they have to.
You want to live in L.I. or many other parts of the world, then you need a car. It becomes a necessity with no other realistic alternatives available. If your job, home, loved ones, favorite places to hang out, and your friends are all contained in the same neighborhood; then biking becomes a realistic option. But in that case, walking becomes a realistic option too. Why buy a bike when a cheap pair of sneakers is even more cost effective.
"The World is insane. With tiny spots of sanity, here and there... Not the other way around!" - John Cleese.
Re: What bike's can do for you?
Should have thought of this sooner . . .
#8
Handicapped and elderly individuals.
Just not realistic for them to bike. Arthritis, limited mobility in the legs, damaged limbs for a variety of reasons. For them, a car is the only way they can enjoy the freedom of going to places they need or want to travel to, when they decide to go out.
"The World is insane. With tiny spots of sanity, here and there... Not the other way around!" - John Cleese.
Re: What bike's can do for you?
And it gets even better than that. Today's velomobiles, even the Quest, aren't as close to aerodynamically optimized as they could be. I suspect down the road we'll be able to design velomobiles which an average cyclist can pedal at 35 mph, and a strong one at 50+ mph. That's sustained speed, not peak speed. If we ever get a handle on how to reliably develop laminar flow, which increases with velocity instead of velocity squared like turbulent flow, then we're talking sustained speeds well above the speeds most people drive on highways. Like I said in my last post, I think we're on the cusp of a revolution in human powered transport.
Re: What bike flashlights can do for you?
You can consider go by bike when you take short trips
I just cannot commute 80 miles round-trip to work daily. Just not enough time or energy in one day.
Interestingly, the automobile has only been around for about 100 years. I wonder how people got anything done for the first 5900 yrs of human existence without them.
Probably there were were no elderly or handicapped people, no storms or inclement weather conditions, heavy loads to carry, or lengthy trips until the early 1900s.
My point, while a bit facetious, is that non-motorized transport is a viable solution in many (though maybe not all) situations, and that as an obese, heart-disease-afflicted, diabetic nation we'd all do well to consider a few bike rides a week.
Monocrom: I know you love your Mazda6, but ease up on these folks. It's not a bad thing that some people have cut out cars from their lives. In the long run, they are almost assuredly better off.
McGizmo Haiku Review Mac's Tri EDC Review MY LIGHTS!! Why buy a cheap bright light when a dim expensive one will do?
Re: What bike's can do for you?
I've had neither a car nor a driver's license in my entire life. I can assure you I was always able to do whatever I wanted with little trouble. Granted, I live in NYC, but there are quite a few people even in my neighborhood who insist they would be lost without their cars. It may not always be as easy or convenient to do things without a car, but if the willpower is there, you will find a way.
For those who are trying the carfree lifestyle, this is an excellent site covering the ongoing movement to make our streets more pedestrian and bicycle friendly.
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