inventor

Yeah, new guy here.

I’ve either invented or re-invented something I call the „upright-rowing bike“ (URB). Since I don’t have the resources to actually build it, I’ve decided to upload a description (see the two attached PDFs – I hope the upload works; if not, I'll try again) in hopes that someone else will. If you find the concept interesting, feel free to build a URB or spread the word so maybe someone else will. I’d especially like to see URBs made available commercially so I could buy one someday. All I ask of anyone who does build a URB is that he tell me about it (by the way, I might be able to help you there – I’ve given URBs a lot of thought in the last few years).

Also, if anyone has evidence that the drive system the URB is based on has already been invented by someone else, I’d appreciate it if he’d upload evidence of that – or post a link.

ThermionicScott 

Well, a good inventor does their research to see if it's already been done.

Ashrita Furman converted an old ergometer for his. He set a few Guinness records with it:


There was a commercial product called the "RowBike" but I don't know what it's status is currently.

BlazingPedals

There's rowbikes,



and there's irish mails.

Yendor72

I occasionally see the Rowbikes company vehicle(s) around near where I live, I think I have only seen them on the road a couple times though. All I can say is that they are not for me.

CliffordK

I'm a bit confused. Is the goal to be standing up like on a skateboard or scooter?

That would certainly cause more wind resistance than sitting, and would seem to have a lot more energy loses as one would tend to move the body when pulling/pushing rather than moving the bike.

You could do a vertical pull, but that might be largely using the arms, unless designed to do a "squat".

inventor

I think the first part of my paper on URBs ("URB 1.pdf"), which is the essential part, didn't get uploaded (that would explain the responses). Here it is. (The only reason I divided the paper in half in the first place is that when I tried to upload it as a single PDF I got an error message saying it was too big.)

catgita

If you were pumping up and down, in line with your feet, like a bicycle pump or an old time pump rail car, I could see generating power. But standing bolt upright and pushing forward and back with your arms would do little more than lean your body back and forth, like doing push-ups against a wall. Movement of the platform would be incidental.

inventor

That would only apply in cases where an excessively high gear were used, not in general; otherwise, Venetian gondoliers wouldn't be able to propel their gondolas; instead they'd find themselves doing push-ups, as you put it – not against a wall but against their oars.

Marcus_Ti

I've seen one on the MUT around here...it was worse than any inline skater at holding a line...

corrado33

I agree with this post. You'd never be able to keep your body stiff enough to move the platform by pushing and pulling against the handlebars. Your back would hurt really bad after a few minutes. If you don't believe me, go stand on ice and push/pull against something. Yes, your feet will move, but not very easily.

You would have to lower the gear far too much to make this work. You wouldn't end up going anywhere! The statement about the gondolas is completely incorrect. The gondoliers often bend over to increase the angle that they push against the "oars" as you put it. So yes, in effect they're using the friction of their feet to propel the boat, but they're also angling their body to allow this to happen much easier. Something you're not allowing to happen. What would happen for someone using this bike is this. They'd bend forward to push the platform backward, then bend backward to push the platform forward. It's actually quite amusing imagining someone using this "bike" as they'd be... thrusting... the entire time. Sure, you could probably use your core to get a few pushes out of it, but no one's core is strong enough to use this thing for any decent amount of time.

ThermionicScott 

I finally read through the PDF, and I have to agree -- pushing your whole body back and forth from the handlebars while standing perfectly upright is gonna be awkward and inefficient. Not to mention that "upright rowing" is already a term, so it's confusing. Come to think of it, even that would be a more stable and effective way to power the thing:



I can think of something worse. There's a guy in my area who has one of those "Trikke" things. Literally powered by weaving all over the place:

inventor

I'd ask anyone considering building a URB or spreading the word about it not to be put off by corrado33's statements. He's speculating when he says that "you'd never be able to keep your body stiff enough to move the platform by pushing and pulling against the handlebars," that "you would have to lower the gear far too much to make this work," that "no one's core is strong enough to use this thing for any decent amount of time" and that "your back would hurt really bad after a few minutes."

Actually, I've rigged my rowing machine in such a way that I can use it to emulate the URB stroke, and I've been doing so for up to an hour at a stretch several times a week for several years now. It's true that the first time I did this I only lasted thirty seconds at low resistance because it was very tiring, but I was up to an hour and increasing the resistance within a few weeks. Regarding back pain, I've never experienced the slightest twinge of back pain as a result of upright rowing (as opposed to seated rowing, where lower-back pain is always in the offing) even though in upright rowing I use a higher resistance level (it's precisely the risk of back pain that limits the resistance seated rowers can pull against).

Minor point: corrado33 says that "gondoliers often bend over to increase the angle that they push against the 'oars' as you put it. So yes, in effect they're using the friction of their feet to propel the boat, but they're also angling their body to allow this to happen much easier. Something you're not allowing to happen." Note the last sentence. In Section 2.3 of the URB paper I explicitly state that "the posture one would naturally adopt on a URB would be a slight forward lean with one foot placed forward."

ThermionicScott 

Per my other post, consider creating a new term for what you're imagining -- perhaps "standing rowing"?

inventor

- One wouldn't be "standing perfectly upright," one would be leaning forward (see my last post).

- As explained in the PDF, one wouldn't "push one's whole body back and forth"; since the URB rider's mass would be greater than that of the URB, his speed would remain constant while the road speed of the URB would vary slightly throughout the stroke. (The same principle applies to racing shells, where the rower's speed remains constant while the boat speed varies throughout the stroke.)

- Upright rowing is what Venetian gondoliers do; does that seem like an awkward movement to you? I've always considered it particularly elegant, like all rowing.

- The efficiency of URBs as compared to standard bikes is dealt with in a dedicated section of the PDF; I invite everyone to read it and draw his or her own conclusions. Note that ThermionicScott neither quantifies nor defines what s/he means by "inefficient," nor does s/he substantiate this claim or compare the theoretical efficiency of URBs to that of other types of bicycle.

- Personally I found the term "upright rowing" not confusing at all, but it can always be changed if the concept of URBs ever goes beyond this thread.

Okay, I gotta go. I'll probably be back again on Monday.

ThermionicScott 

Awkward and slow, yes. But it has a specific charm in that context.

Don't take these criticisms personally -- until a full prototype happens, it's going to be hard for people to imagine it working. So you'll need a thick skin and some humility.

Darth Lefty 

Gondoliers and paddle boarders for that matter are using the leverage between their arms and twisting to use their arm, back, core, and leg muscles, and using the traction of their feet to counter the twist and put the power into the vehicle. Try standing up against a wall and pushing, then standing by a doorway and pulling on the jamb, to see the difference in the strength you can apply.

inventor

Neither your first sentence nor your second makes or substantiates any point that would be relevant to URBs.

Marcus_Ti

I've seen those Trikke things locally too.

Nice thing about fad-weight-loss-contraptions...they quickly cease being used and get stored in the garage never to see light again.

Darth Lefty 

Not true! They're both relevant to why it's not going to work very well. Good luck to you.

CliffordK

I'd like to see a race between a Venetian Gondola and a seated Scull racer.

An upright bike may well work. It would seem as if it would be quite awkward, and with low efficiency. Working more as a hand cycle than a leg powered machine. It might be helpful if one had limited leg flexion. However, one might do ok on the flats, but likely would have difficulties with a significant hill.

corrado33

I don't see how this solves the problem (pointed out in the PDF) that seated rowers can't "generate significant force when pushing." What you've done is taken away the use of the strongest muscles in the body from a seated rower. While standing you can't directly use your quads or hamstrings to their full extent, something almost every other mode of transportation/exercise (walking, running, biking, rowing) does well. Try this. Go to a chainlink fence and push against it in whatever way you're supposed to stand on this contraption. Now, try sitting with your heels against the bottom of the fence. Bend over and grab it with your hands. Schooch your butt up and now push against the fence. (Like a seated rower.) You get a hell of a lot more power in that position. Sure, you want a "full body workout," I understand that, but what you've thought up is going to be a slow, boring, complicated way to exercise. What that means is no one will ever use it. Biking is great because you go fast. Running is great for it's simplicity. Rowing is great because you're on the water. What is this thing great for?

If somebody can't jump on this thing and use it with no instruction without getting hurt, then it'll never work. I'm sure someone COULD jump on it, but without proper instruction will probably end up hurting themselves. (Like most rowing machines in general.) Even the stupid weaving things from above are intuitive. Anyone can jump on it and in 5-10 minutes figure out, by themselves, how to move forward.

If you want to emulate a gondolier, why not simply make a device that allows you to pull on a stick like object pointing behind you. That stick like object could be a wrapped chain that wraps around the bike and drives pulleys, which then drive the wheels. Steer with your feet or by tilting the upper pulley (that the chain would have to run through) one way or another. (It makes sense in my mind and I'm too lazy to make a drawing.)

With that, I'll stop raining on your parade. Good luck in your endeavours. It's certainly something that I'd like to try once, but I think after that I'd much rather run/bike/row.

inventor

Okay, here they are again: "Gondoliers and paddle boarders for that matter are using the leverage between their arms and twisting to use their arm, back, core, and leg muscles, and using the traction of their feet to counter the twist and put the power into the vehicle. Try standing up against a wall and pushing, then standing by a doorway and pulling on the jamb, to see the difference in the strength you can apply."

Let's take the first sentence first. It brings up certain aspects of how gondoliers and paddle boarders propel their vehicles. As far as I can see, there are two ways you could go on from there to refute the viablity of URBs. You could either (1) refute the viability of gondolas and paddle boards and then go on to state that, since URBs would be propelled in a similar fashion, URBs wouldn't be viable either or (2) demonstrate that propelling a URB is similar enough to propelling a gondola or a paddle board that it makes sense to compare the different techniques and then go on to demonstrate that the URB techique is so much less efficient than the others that URBs would be frustratiingly inefficient machines. Both options would require you to take into account the far greater speeds achievable by human-powered land vehicles than human-powered displacement vessels. But you don't attempt either one.

The point of the second sentence seems to be that, when standing, a human being can push against something with greater strength than he can pull on it. If you want to use that as a basis for refuting the viability of URBs, you'd have to go on to demonstrate that the pulling strength of a standing human being is so low that URBs would be frustratingly inefficient machines. You don't do that, either.

inventor

- That word "awkward" again. Unfortunately, it's so vague I can't refute it. Is an experienced Venetian gondolier performing an "awkward" movement? If you think so, then yes, propelling a URB would be awkward . As stated above, I've set up a rowing machine so I can emulate the technique that one would use on a URB, and it doesn't feel awkward to me at all. But then cycling, kayaking, rowing (i.e. normal, seated rowing) and running don't feel awkward to me either; maybe they do to others.

- You do have leg flexion -- and it's not as limited as you might think (just as an aside, the leg flexion, i.e. the range of motion of the knees and hips, employed in standard cycling is more limited than most people think).

- "Okay in the flats, but not on a hill" -- what you're talking about, ultimately, is efficiency (yet again), which comes down to two things as far as human-powered vehicles are concerned. One, is the vehicle itself efficient? The answer, in the case of URBs, is that it's efficient enough to be considered a viable alternative to standard bikes -- see the Section on "Efficiency" in the PDF for details. And two, does the technique that the vehicle forces the rider to use allow him to productively employ a large enough proportion of his skeletal muscles so his performance is limited by his cardiovascular system rather than by the strength of this or that muscle group, or is the proportion of muscles that can be productively employed smaller than that, so that his performance is limited by the strength of a certain muscle group, leaving much of his cardiovascular capacity untapped (in the case of the handcycles you mention, it's the arms muscles are the limiting factor). In the case of URBs, the former applies, i.e. the proportion of skeletal musculature that can (in fact must) be employed on a URB is huge -- greater than in seated rowing, cycling, kayaking, running and cross-country skiing (see the PDF's section on "Health Benefits" for details). Of course, precisely because so many muscles are used, some of them would have to be brought up to speed when first using a URB (best achieved by using it), but that's also true of, say, conventional seated rowing.

fietsbob

Page 23 shows something that does not exist , Left hand freewheeling cassette drivers on a dual ended Hub .

Wise to hire a Patent Attorney ahead of time or you will have to hire a Lawyer later to defend a Patent infringement suit.

Doug5150

Didn't read the whole thread....

It is very very difficult to build a "new" kind of bicycle; people have been cutting them apart and welding the pieces back together for 150+ years now, in countries all over the world. That is not to say your idea isn't new, but it may very well not be.

Did you know:
1--you can build bike frames youreself by cutting up steel frames and welding them back together with a $150 MIG welder that runs off wall current. (go look up a website named "atomic zombie bicycles", and look at the limited tools that guy uses to build the bikes he builds...)

2--for more complex mechanical parts, there are CNC service online where you send them a proper CAD file and they make the part for you and mail it back.

This doesn't make it quick and easy, but it removes a lot of the barrier. If all you need is plastic parts, the 3D printing services are killing each other trying to run the lowest rates.

Nobody can ride a paper dragon. The best proof you could have that it works well, is to have one and ride it around a lot.

Good luck.