Electric Motorcycle Is Awesome, Goes 54 Mph

May 26, 2012 by Brian Benchoff 40 Comments

The folks over at the Cincinnati hackerspace Hive13 were wowed last week by an electric motorcycle built by one of their own.

[Rick]’s new ride is built from a 1989 Honda VTR 250. After removing the 24 HP motor, the frame was loaded up with four deep cycle batteries and a DC golf cart motor. Even with the addition of the four heavy batteries, the new electric bike only weighs about 70 pounds more than the stock Honda, allowing all that power to be translated into speed. Right now, [Rick]’s build can reach 54 mph; comparable to an earlier ebike we saw, but [Rick] can also go ~~100~~ about 20 miles on a single charge.

After the break you can see a short time lapse of [Rick] tearing down his bike, the first ride though the Cincinnati hackerspace, and a very nice road test showing off the speed of [Rick]’s new ride. There’s also a great Flickr slideshow with some really great pics of the build in progress. Very nice work, [Rick].

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Classic VW Bug Stereo Gets Bluetooth

May 25, 2012 by Caleb Kraft 23 Comments

If any of you deal with older car fanatics, you’ll know that the original dash stereo is a coveted piece of equipment. If they haven’t been removed and replaced with something more modern over the years, they’re usually non functional. [Hadrien] has gone through some trouble to retain his original stereo in his 69 Volkswagen Beetle. First, he did a common hack we see even in modern cars. He added an auxiliary input.

This satiated his desire for modern audio for a while, but he really found the necessity for a cable attachment annoying. He decided he was going to add bluetooth (google translated from french). To do this, he took a pair of bluetooth headphones and tore them apart. Using an old cassette tape as the case, he rebuilt them as something that could be wired directly to his dash stereo. He even kept the mic just in case he wanted to use this as a hands free device.

Being build in 1969, his car stereo doesn’t use a cassette, so he just keeps it in the glove box. This isn’t optimal, but as he says, at least he doesn’t have to plug in his phone.

Arduino Tells You How Rough Your Last Mountain Bike Ride Was

May 24, 2012 by Mike Szczys 16 Comments

If you want to see what kind of abuse you’re causing your body when out on those single-track rides this system is just the thing. It’s an Arduino data logger that [Wdm006] takes along on the rides with him. When he gets back home, a Python scripts captures the data dump and graphs it. It may sound like a neat trick, but he’s got something planned for that information.

The enclosure mounts to the stem of his bike. It houses an Arduino board with a data logging shield of his own design. That shield holds an SD card for storage, and breaks the other pins out as screw terminals. Right now there’s an accelerometer on the front fork, and some method of recording wheel speed. This is the research phase of an anti-lock brake system (ABS) he plans to build for mountain biking. No word on what hardware he’ll use for that, but we can’t wait to see how it comes out.

Building A Travel Trailer From The Ground Up

May 24, 2012 by Brian Benchoff 23 Comments

While it may only be [ioan]’s first ‘real build’, we’re loving his DIY teardrop travel trailer built from the ground up.

The trailer started its life as a Super Duty Harbor Freight utility trailer that [ioan] managed to put together in a day. After mounting a wooden frame on the utility trailer, [ioan] fabricated the body of the trailer out of 1/2 inch plywood for the exterior, hard foam as insulation, and gorgeous 5mm plywood for the interior. To finish off his build, [ioan] cemented aluminum sheets to the exterior for a wonderful Airstream aesthetic.

[ioan] even went so far as to install a small kitchen in the back of his trailer that includes a small propane stove and (a limited supply of) running water. It’s an excellent build that really shows off his craftsmanship, and something we wouldn’t mind spending a weekend in.

[ioan] put up an Instructable of his build that showcases the construction including all the electrical work of wiring up his trailer with LED lights and 12 volt power jacks.

Gyroscopically Stabilized Car/motorcycle Thing

May 22, 2012 by Mike Szczys 41 Comments

So yeah, this thing exists. Well, at least some pretty interesting looking prototypes of it do. It’s the C-1 from Lit Motors (anyone else think that’s a reference which belongs in /r/trees?). The idea here is that the small form-factor of a motorcycle is very efficient and easily maneuverable. But the cage protecting the passenger from harm, and the canopy keeping the elements out give it some of the desirable traits of a car.

Design aside, check out the video after the break. The prototype uses two horizontally positioned gyroscopes placed beneath the passenger seat, just in front of the rear wheel. The builders take it out on a hockey rink and give it a few kicks and slide a few tires into it. Sure, it reacts to the impact but it doesn’t fall over.

Want to see some fast-motion welding of the C-1? Right now there’s a one-minute clip up on the company’s main page.

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Volt Teardown Shows More Than Just What’s Under The Hood

May 22, 2012 by Mike Szczys 31 Comments

The Chevrolet Volt is one of the top contenders in mass-market electric vehicles. Now you can get a look at the components that make up the electrical system with this Chevy Volt teardown article.

The adventure starts with a look at the 288 cell battery. It forms a T shape and takes up the space that forms the hump down the center of the interior of a vehicle. Theses have a liquid cooling system build into the enclosure to make sure things don’t get too hot during use or charging. The sights are then set on the control and monitoring hardware, and there’s a lot of it. In fact, the image above is an overview of the eighteen modules that pull the new plug-in EV technology together. If you’re brave enough to void the warranty on one of these, this should be a helpful road map to get you started.

Has anyone seen a teardown of the home charging station for one of these?

Man, Stranded In The Desert, Makes A Motorcycle From His Broken Car

May 21, 2012 by Caleb Kraft 190 Comments

The original story is in French, and the Google translate is very rough. Please forgive us if we don’t get this completely accurate.

While traveling through the desert somewhere in north west Africa in his Citroen 2CV , [Emile] is stopped, and told not to go any further due to some military conflicts in the area. Not wanting to actually listen to this advice, he decides to loop around, through the desert, to circumvent this roadblock.

After a while of treading off the beaten path, [Emile] manages to snap a swing arm on his vehicle, leaving him stranded. He decided that the best course of action was to disassemble his vehicle and construct a motorcycle from the parts. This feat would be impressive on its own, but remember, he’s still in the desert and un-prepared. If we’re reading this correctly, he managed to drill holes by bending metal and sawing at it, then un-bending it to be flat again.

It takes him twelve days to construct this thing. There are more pictures on the site, you simply have to go look at it. Feel free to translate the labels and post them in the comments.

Update: From [Semicolo] in the comments

You got the translation right, but there’s not just a swing arm that’s broken, there’s a frame beam broken too (not sure about the exact term, one of the 2 girder of the chassis).
He’s not far away but he has a lot of tools and other hardware that could be stolen if he leaves them unattended.

[via Reddit]