tinworm-wheels: Steampunk and monowheels

Sunday 30 August 2009

Steampunk and monowheels

A year or two ago I got interested in Steampunk after reading an article about this aestheic cult in Rolling Stone. I spotted this steampunk concept cartoon today on Google when looking for monocycles, after seeing a Scrapyard Challenge repeat on TV this afternoon. I want one. The trickiest thing about making one has to be the bending of steel into a perfect circle; not a job for an amateur working in his shed! Then I discovered the blog of someone, Dr Southall, who has done just that...or rather he built one in his shed, but employed a tube bending company to do the tricky bit. So that is the solution!

The resident expert on the Scrapyard Challenge was an American, Kerry Mclean, who builds monocycles and rides them very expertly....inspiring stuff! He proves that in can be done.

Funnily enough, I designed a hubless wheeled trolley in 1992, when I was doing my degree, and that was inspired by black and white films of this 1932 contraption, which is more like a hamster wheel than a monowheel.

I really like the simplicity of Southall's Ring of Fire. It is superbly uncomplicated...and SMALL. And I like the look of the machine which appears to have inspired it,

the Bressen of 1969

I really must one day have a go at designing and making a monowheel.
They look such fun!

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Tinworm's Other Wheels

Here are some links to some of my other vehicles. My Lamb Chop (Lambretta Chopper), a re-modelled LI frame with 150cc SX engine rebored to 175cc, with stage two tuning and custom seat made from a laminated office chair by yours truly. The pic is the sweetheart photo I keep in my wallet. I prefer to think that I wouldn't do something like this to a scooter but I suppose the fact that I enjoy someone else's handywork makes me a bit of a hyporite. It won best scooter at the Bristol Bike Show 1999, before I rode it to the Isle of Wight for the annual rally. I got a heat seizure on the way back but got the clutch in quicky enough to save the engine.

Here is a slideshow of a bike I have put on a back-burner until the 101 is finished. The restored engine is in my livingroom but the rest of it is stored in the airing cupboard, etc. It is a Francis Barnett Fulmar, 1962. I won it in a pub bet when I was 16. Later, I gave up all worldly belongings to join an ascetic religious order, returning the bike to its previous owner. Years later (now apostate), I found him again and did a deal to get it back.

This is my Ford Prefect, which is on the road and starts every time. Last winter a mate came round and we sat in it with the heater on because it is warmer than my house! Since taking these pictures, I have had the number changed. For some reason when the original number was sold DVLA gave it the wrong period plate, an A reg. They corrected the error for free. It now has authentic black and silver plates.

I restored my Cyclemaster in 1994 and found a 1954 Tax disc under a 1980s one. The bike is a 1940s one and when petrol was rationed and motorbikes, let alone cars, were prohibitively expensive, autocyles (early dedicated mopeds) and cyclemotors (engines for bicycles) were the popular solution here. You just replaced the bicycle wheel with one of these with a 32cc engine in it (made in the early 1950s) and could run for a couple of hundred miles or more on a gallon. I loved riding mine until I dropped it downstairs. I am in the process of replacing the buckled front forks and sorting out the coaster hub which is locked-on. I am hoping to ride it in a forthcoming NACC rally. (the close-up pic is of someone else's engine. Mine has a cover-plate over the carb)