Gotte

Well, I know there are a few wooden bikes, but why no serious use of wood in frame making. I don;t know, but I assume there must be some woods that are light, rigid and strong enough to be used, and probably a lot easier to handle. They used to make airgraft out of wood, and still do in some places, I suppose. Why not bikes?

East Hill

There are many instances of bikes made out of bamboo (I know, technically a grass). Any true wood being used for cycles would be laminated. There's actually an interesting discussion in the BMX forum about this ("What would you do...?).

East Hill

Gotte

Thanks for that. I'll pop over and check it out.

East Hill

It's a fairly old thread, it might be back a page or two now...

East Hill

rha600

I would guess the weight of such a bike would be bad.

Gotte

I always assumed the oposite, but then again, thinking about it, you have to use solid wood, not tubing. Unless of course you use bamboo.
I saw a bamboo frame on the internet somewhere which was a work of art.
I was also talking to the chap in my LBS, who told me a man once brought in a bamboo wheel, which they used to make during the wheel.
That would have been something to see.

Nicodemus

-cost
-weight
-consistency

oneredstar

Most wooden bicycles would probably too heavy in order to make them strong enough. But Calfee makes an awesome bamboo bicycle. I have only seen one once, apparently the only one in Canada, and it was a work of art. https://www.calfeedesign.com/bamboo.htm

BryE

FWIW, I'm planning on making a recumbent from wood in a few weeks. As far as the weight of the frame goes, I'm not concerned because the biggest hills around my house are the man-made ones that go up over the highway. Regardless, I'll use a nice, lightweight wood like spruce instead of the common 2x4 lumber used for framing.

You can see another guy who built one from the same plans here.

Gotte

Oneredstar, thanks for the link. Wow, those bikes are beauties.
BryE, didn;t they use spruce a lot in aircraft building? I believe the spars were spruce.

Dr.Deltron

Craig Calfee of Calfee Designs will make you a frame out of BAMBOO!

Or maybe you went to NAHBS and saw one in person. COOL BIKES!

GreenGrasshoppr

You might want to check out this other frame building philosophy
https://www.blids.nl/gallery/PlywoodR...ngworkshop2003

BryE

You're right, they do use spruce for small aircraft. However, aircraft-grade spruce is way out of my price range, so I'll use a lesser grade. Fir and some varieties of pine would also work well - depends on what I can find locally at a reasonable quality and price.

That site helped me decide that a wooden recumbent was a feasible project. Some of those bikes are just awesome-looking. I believe they're using baltic birch plywood, which I haven't been able to find locally, however.

Dewbert

'cause then this wouldn't work

Turboem1

Theres actually quite a few

https://www.xylonbikes.com/models.html



https://www.planenco.com.br/gota/indexe.htm



https://www.peterhans.nu/woodenbike.htm




https://www.woodenbikes.com/

GreenGrasshoppr

If I made a plywood/foam composite bent, I would put a little more internal structure than they did, to stiffen the frame more.

NoReg

Wood has some tremendous properties for structures. Of course it has largely been superceeded in industry, but that often has a lot to do with availability in quantity rather than raw properties. It's hard to use in a bikes because it works best when larger elements can be used as in boats or planes. If you need to sit around it then something stronger for the smaller sections comes into it's own. That's one reason why its often used on recumbents. I wouldn't want a regular frame with a 2.5" top tube either, but it works for a recumbent. It's also hard to finish, harder to attach point loads/ mechanicals to, and harder waterproof. I love working with it and making tools or sports gear that seemingly it is not suited for, so far no bikes.

Black spruce (good old northern 2x lumber) is similar to sitka spruce if yo can find it. It can often be found in big box stores with very nice grain in the wider pieces, you have to saw around the pyth, but it's quite nice stuff.

Those Xylon bikes are new to me. Cool. They mention the Hughes Flying boat. Of course Hughes didn't want to make it of wood, he just couldn't shoehorn the strategic materials out of those with the control, so he forged ahead on the "Spruce Goose" in birch ply, etc... since it was available.

apclassic9

and why not plastic?

East Hill

I would guess that Gotte was inquiring about renewable materials...but that is just a guess. Bamboo in particular is renewable.

East Hill

well biked

Think carbon fiber-reinforced plastic. Sheldon Brown, in fact, often refers to carbon fiber frames and parts as simply "plastic."

wahoonc

Another reason you probably don't see too many wooden bikes is that wood does not lend itself well to mass production methods and therefore would be cost prohibitive. From the various pictures and links there are obviously some people making them on a semi custom/custom basis.

Aaron