hotbike

fairing pannier system.
My original design, touring bike, fiberglass fairing, but panniers weren’t finished

My daughters original design for cargo bike.

Pannier/Tailbox

Big Panniers

hotbike

My original fiberglass fairing design. I’m perfecting this, but in polypropylene instead of fiberglass.

Traced the Pannier/Tailbox pattern from a template

Mock-up
The fairing, panniers, and Tailbox, should all be designed as if the bike is of one piece, in my opinion.
It should not be too difficult to make a handlebars basket molded in plastic, with the aerodynamics of a motorcycle fairing.

TiHabanero

Looks like a fun and challenging project.

hotbike

Images rotated by themselves, but this is the current status, rear bulkhead is in, a cardboard box was used to hold the wheel well square while I squeeze the hotmelt glue. Likewise a piece of scrap material held with the green tape keeping the top square. Boards and clamp setup to hold while glue cools.

Image rotation by iPhone

Yes, a challenging and rewarding project, but I made templates this time to make future copies a lot quicker to make. I had to do this in my living room as there was water in the basement from Hurricane Elsa, but the templates were spared , thank God.

skidder

You're going to trade that nice 15-20mph breeze you make while riding for increased aerodynamics? Not sure that would be a good idea in the summertime. Crosswinds might be a concern with all the flat surfaces.

veganbikes

I wouldn't want to schlep that kind of weight(even if made of old lawn signs) for maybe a tiny advantage and probably not. There are other ways to do aero and if I was looking for more integration for touring or commuting or cargo carrying that would be one thing but then I would do the whole bike (and probably in both cases but we already have that sort of stuff going on)

indyfabz

Must be easy to flip over the bike to change a flat.

hotbike

Actually, I can stand the bike on end, on the rear Pannier/Tailbox, to work on the bike.

indyfabz

*smh*

I'll stick with my Ortliebs and rain gear.

hotbike

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My belief is that more work needs to be done on streamlining upright bikes. Bunau-Varillla built his Streamliner in 1913, set a world record which went unbeaten until 1977, when the Vector recumbent was built.
You can keep your Ortliebs, I don’t believe vehicular design can include anything that looks like a sack.
An upright Streamliner can be made of plastic today. In 1913, they used aircraft materials, which were canvas and wooden stringers.
The more surface area I have , the better, because I’m going to install solar panels.
I intend to make people aware that the UCI is stifling innovation in the bicycle industry.

indyfabz

And yet it does.

But you do you.

veganbikes

But what about these?

hotbike

Argh , well I’ve been hoisted by my own petard...

the crux of the issue is, the IHPVA has virtually disbanded. The editor of the IHPVA/MIT Press journal “Human Power” passed away last year, and with the shift to the Internet, the print version of the newsletter had become insignificant.

It seems I have very few peers in the upright streamlined bike field. Everyone seems to have gone recumbent.



The undeniable evidence is the sprint speed, speeds which would be impossible if the bicycle did not have aerodynamic advantage.

University of Toronto provided this cgi image


I hope someone can start a group to preserve the technology of upright bike streamlining, since I’m so old, I could die at any minute...

Probably the best Streamliner would be faired in carbon fiber and polycarbonate, without any cargo space, and with a higher top gear , like 84:12 for instance . Without a big dish chainring, I’m not getting the top speed to demonstrate irrefutably the aerodynamic advantage... I can only point to a theoretical extrapolation.

I hope to share my knowledge and experience with a younger generation of experimenters, who unfortunately do not have Industrial Arts in high school. And while bicyclists are more intelligent than motorists (as we all know...) there remains the fact that only <1% of high school students get into aeronautical or aerospace engineering.
So I’m making templates, which will work with Coroplast, and probably acrylic. Better results could be obtained with a molded composite fairing, but we run into an unforeseen obstacle, the fact that today there are thousands of models of bicycles, each only produced in small production runs. We grew up with only a few dozen makes and models of bikes, but each model was often produced in mass produced numbers, the tens of thousands of Schwinn Varsities is a good example.
Todays market would force the builder of the Fairings to also produce the complete frames.

I am aware that I could make a smaller product, but I choose the largest size in order that I may test, cargo capacity, aerodynamic speed & stability, weather protection, solar power, instrumentation, and USB powered accessories. I may yet turn a profit if I produce a few hundred specialty e-bike’s, or e-bike accessories.

indyfabz

If there were a market for your hideous looking and impractical contraptions you have allegedly made you already would have. And I guess this is all one big advertisement.

Time to update the iggy list.

hotbike

Not at all, I’m inviting others to attempt building their own Fairing/Pannier System.

I can’t stop anyone from copying my designs.

By all means, feel free to make an aerodynamic fairing for your own handlebars, in such a style as you find æsthetically pleasing.

indyfabz

Ugliness aside, I don't want one. Get off the MUP and do some riding in a 40 mph Wyoming crosswind on one of your contraptions and report back. Until them, welcome to my iggy list.

badger1

I've always thought it apposite that the abbreviation HPV has two distinct meanings, one in 'cycling' and one in medicine. We only have a vaccine for the latter, unfortunately.

Happy Feet

As someone who also likes to tinker in the shop I always appreciate your inventions, rudamentary as they are. I get that they are "proof of concept" designs more than a finished product. Sadly, general cycling is not a friendly place for individual thought with its inherent cynicism.

You also point out two problems with replicating them both commercially or by the individual. The first is trying to make a standard design that fits all bikes. The second is the same one you face. Trying to jump from using easy to mold basic products into using the more exotic materials that will give the weight savings (such as carbon fiber). That usually requires fabrication skills beyond the backyard mechanic so the design phase seems to stay at proof of concept. The same thing happens in backyard boat building where coated plywood design is common and molded hulls are not.

I think you should take at least one of your designs to the next level.

Here's a link to people still experimenting with upright aerodynamic design in motorcycles
https://www.inputmag.com/tech/e-moto...e-fastest-ever

hotbike

Thanks for the ... input!

About the molds, actually it would cost me less to make a carbon fiber fairing, using two part A/B epoxy , than what it would cost to have injection molds made. (Unless I have the molds made in Asia). I could actually make the frame of the bike out of the same carbon fiber as the fairing, saving the money I’d need to buy a TIG welder.
My daughter designed the fiberglass ladies bicycle pictured above, and the fairing and most of the frame were one piece of fiberglass, a “monocoque”.

I wasn’t born rich, but I did grow up in a neighborhood of wealthy snobs. They don’t want to put a down payment on the materials needed is the main problem. So I’m trying another approach, publishing the DIY guide, sending out construction photos, sharing tips and know-how.

I knew Coroplast corrugated polypropylene existed before I started, but I had no idea what it was called. “Coroplast ™️ “ is a trademark. Corrugated polypropylene is what it is.
I went through a very laborious process of making fiberglass molds and fiberglass fairings, ventured into Kevlar, spent almost a thousand dollars on raw Kevlar , not including the resin.
Went back to fiberglass on my daughters advice. My daughter learned fiberglass from her maternal grandfather who worked for Grumman aircraft during world war 2, and he knew fiberglass...

I now use corrugated polypropylene. And now that the fairings are done, I turn my attention to the panniers (the rear of the bike) . Then it occurred to me, I could make the sides higher, so we don’t need to choose between a box on the rack top vs panniers on each side, they both go together as a unit.

terrymorse 

For good reason. Streamlining is about producing as low a drag as possible, and no streamlined upright bike will ever have a lower drag than a recumbent.

Some examples of upright streamlining:

hotbike

Thank you, those are great photos. Can you give credit to the original photographer?
I think I know some of those people...

RChung

Have you measured the aerodynamic drag of any of your designs? How much do they help?

terrymorse 

Sorry, I pulled those from a simple google search. No credits were listed.

RChung

I believe the top photo was of Mike Mowett in his stretchy fabric enclosure. I don't know who took the photo.

Road Fan

One recent technology in this arena (in case you are not already familiar with it), is the pair of wheel fairings by https://nullwinds.com/pages/aerodefender. Your daughter's picture shows upper wheel fairings which are similar, at least in concept.

Two really good points, at least in my opinion:

> They have a design and have published some of their technical work to develop and test the designs - I can learn something from that!
> When I worked to develop similarly new ideas in an automotive corporate environment, I was to show a competitive analysis including at least a personal patent search if not a downtown job done by a consultant. Food for thought.