StephenH

If I'm riding a bike at high speeds down hills, I want one that is actually designed by somebody that does actual structural analysis/testing on bike frames, OR one built in conventional ways from conventional materials, where the combination is known to be reasonably adequate. Not some guy's "Reckon this'll do" cowboy-engineering.

Pinigis 

I just purchased two beautiful bamboo frames that I will be building out over the next few months as time permits. I am very interested to see how a grass bike will perform.

Mr IGH

I woodn't ride it if it were made of wood, wood you?

I'm holding out for hemp!

OldTryGuy

Perfect sense regarding booking down hill with a structurally sound frame. I did lots of sitting up and brake tapping last Sunday during Six Gap and still was in the upper 30's mph where it was twisty. In the straighter sections with knees hugging the top tube and down it was mid 40's mph wise still with brakes. A young, very good descender with our group hit 70mph.

Mr IGH

Knute Rockne trusted wood, didn't go so swell. The pilots of Spitfires and Hurricanes trusted Reynolds 531, how'd that go?

turkey9186

Yes. I have ridden a Renovo and someday will be able to afford one.
They are technically an epoxy impregnated wood frame though.

yadder

I make one. Cool feeling ride

Jseis 

Perhaps I'd ride wood in an emergency.

Mark Kelly 

Bugger.

That is my fatigue tester per ISO4210_6 (or at least it was, until the frame broke it).

I'm currently rebuilding it. The frame is fine, in case you were worried.

Mark Kelly 

If you're quoting WWII British planes, the obvious comparison is the deHavilland Mosquito. Faster than a Spitfire*, famously damage tolerant, made of wood.

.


* If both had equivalent spec Merlins fitted. The Spitfire was faster if fitted with the Griffon.

Kaze6

The Spit had wood control surface structures. The Hurricane airframe structure had far more wood than steel.

And then there was the Mosquito, the nearly-all-wooden plane which was in production years after the last Spitfire (much less Hurricane) rolled off the assembly line, and was in service for nearly two and a half decades (years after the last Spitfire was taken out of operational use).

The moral of this story is that there is no perfect material, so there's no point in bragging about one or the other.

CaptKelly

Don't kid yourself.... nobody here is worried about your frame at all so much as your test rig.... achilles heel of ISO "certification" is that it's self certified with little to no checks and balances. There are no guarantees about your rig and/or that you know what you're doing with it. (Nothing personal, just the facts). The fact your test rig failed before the frame is very telling.

Mr IGH

I'm not bragging, just observing that wooden structural components are deadly. It's one thing to ride around Burning Man on a wood bike, completely another to hit 50mph on one. There's a reason wood isn't making a comeback as a structural component, steel is cheaper and stronger. All steel planes, trains and automobiles were a safety innovation.

Stadjer

That's not the whole story. Engineers are only humans, they suffer from the 'new is better'-idea too, they tend to stick to what they know best too, and they are not free from fashions and hypes in their industry.

The DeHavilland Mosquito was designed in wood because steel was getting scarce in the war effort. But in turned out to be a light and strong material, while there were still a lot of people around with woodworking knowledge and skills. It was an excellent plane. The reason planes were build in alumium after the war was probably more about the costs of all the skilled woodworkers needed than because of the properties of the material.

Mr IGH

Yeah, right, they wood have made the F86 outta wood but for lack of woodworkers, woodent ya know....

xaosbp

It's a beautiful bike, I'd love it, but I don't know how comfortable I'd be riding it. I'd always have that feeling that it'd end up breaking under me.

Stadjer

Some of DeHavilland's aluminium planes came falling out of the sky because aluminium didn't hold up as well as the wood did, so if safety was the reason to use aluminum, it wasn't a very good one. Of course wood has it's limitations, but if you can build a fast bomber out of it, would also have been possible to build small cargo and passengers planes out of wood.

Kaze6

Or big ones. VERY big ones. None bigger!

The Spruce Goose | Evergreen Aviation & Space Museum | Wings & Waves Waterpark | McMinnville Oregon

Maelochs

As far as I know the Mosquito was pretty easy to build--it was mostly plywood, and anyone who could build boats or even furniture could easily build the plane.

Aluminum offers more design freedom and beyond a certain size, (the Spruce Goose never did more than a brief hop and was never even tried a second time ... a failure, sorry) better strength for weight, and is probably a lot more durable (warplanes need to be rugged but not durable.)

The idea with wood as a structural material is using it in applications where it will do the job ... not that it can do almost any job. Steel and aluminum and CF are more versatile ... but for a lot of applications wood can do the job as well and look better. (Pretty sure most of us don't have stainless steel or titanium furniture in our homes.)

By the way ... for the first 20 years or so of aviation, All planes were made of wood ... and most of them, with canvas.

No reason wood couldn't work for a bicycle frame ... as has been proved by the many working wood-framed bikes which have already been sold.

Some folks here are like a guy muttering "Cars ... Hah! Passing fad ... " in 1904 while investing his life savings in a buggy-whip manufacturer. The guy simply refused to see that Ford was rolling cars off his assembly line, because he was happier being stubborn and wrong than changing his mind to accept the existing reality.

Wood bikes are already here, and they already work just fine, regardless of what some people fear. They won't be taking over, but they might not be fading away .... They serve a certain niche. i'd buy one if I had the budget.

People buy Porsches to have Porsches ... and then drive them like Toyota Corollas. I would buy wooden bike instead of a Porsche; and if a smaller number of people thought I was "cool' because I had a Porsche, so also would a smaller number think I was compensating for my age and failing energy.

Most would probably think that it was a waste that such an old, fat, slow guy had such a pretty bike. Which I am used to.

Kaze6

Just FYI, the Spruce Goose was NOT a failure -- it met or exceeded the standards set for it when construction began. The need for very large flying boats was eliminated because of the thousands of airstrips built during the war. Calling it a failure is equivalent to calling the adult-sized pedal bike a failure, just because few people have need for one.

Lakerat

If you don't tell I let you ride my wooden bicycle, I won't tell you've got splinters in your butt.

veganbikes

I am not an expert on WW2 planes but I can say I would ride a wooden bike. The first time I saw Renovo I was pretty impressed. Would I go with wood over quality steel or titanium, no but I certainly wouldn't be opposed to owning one. I probably wouldn't buy one until I have at least one titanium rig built and maybe another steel rig or two. But who knows.