BikeOn Makes Electric Conversion A Snap

June 7, 2019 by Tom Nardi 66 Comments

If you’re in a relatively urban area and your destination is within a reasonable distance, it’s hard to argue against riding your bike rather than taking a car. It’s a positive for the environment, and great way to exercise and keep active. But some of us, say folks who write for the Internet full-time, might appreciate a little electromechanical advantage when the going gets tough.

In an effort to make electrifying your bike as easy as possible, [Shushanik] and [Aram] are working on a product they call BikeOn which they’ve recently entered into the 2019 Hackaday Prize. Thanks to some very clever engineering, this small unit can clamp onto the frame of a standard bicycle and transfer the energy from its 350 watt motor directly into the rear wheel; all without any tools or permanent modifications.

In the video after the break, [Aram] demonstrates how the user can install the BikeOn motor assembly in literally just a few seconds. Naturally there’s a beefy battery that needs to get attached to the frame as well, but even that has been made modular enough that it can attach where many bikes have their water bottle holder.

The attentive reader will likely notice that there’s no obvious control mechanism for BikeOn. Instead of having to fumble around with it manually, BikeOn uses a combination of torque sensor, accelerometer, and gyroscope to intelligently determine when the rider could use a boost.

BikeOn nabbed Editor’s Choice award at Maker Faire 2019, and now that it’s in the running for the Hackaday Prize, we’re excited to see more information on the product as it moves towards commercial release.

Continue reading “BikeOn Makes Electric Conversion A Snap” →

StrollerController Free Parents From Menial Labor

June 7, 2019 by Roger Cheng 10 Comments

Raising young children is hard work, and parents need all the help they can get. There’s a whole industry catering to parents who are willing to pay to make their lives a little easier. Then, we have hacker minded parents like [Sam Pearce] who build his own solutions like joystick-controlled motorized strollers. His kids have fun taking their first steps into independent autonomy, dad has freed up his hands from pushing strollers, and everyone wins!

We were impressed when we saw [Sam] and his StrollerController zipping along at Maker Faire Bay Area 2019. Normally the only way young children get to control their own vehicle is in a field of bumper cars or a constrained track like Autopia. These lucky kids can drive around without being constrained by pen or track. This will give them a great early start on their driver’s license test, assuming autonomous vehicles haven’t taken over by the time they grow up.

The StrollerController we saw is a two part affair, each capable of independent operation:

StrollerController v1 is a stroller enhanced with motor gearbox from cordless drills driving rear wheels. Its top speed can be constrained by a limiter depending on the child pilot’s driving proficiency. It also has a bright red emergency stop button on top, plus a remote controlled kill switch held by a supervising adult.

StrollerController v2 is a pusher module equipped with much faster wheelchair motors under an grownup-sized standing platform. Welded to the front is a pair of brackets to dock with either a regular non-motorized stroller or StrollerController v1. The linked system delivers expedient travel for both parent and child.

For such a display of inventive ingenuity and resourcefulness, this project won a well-deserved Editor’s Choice ribbon from Maker Faire. We hope such recognition and enthusiasm from other Maker Faire attendees helped motivate [Sam] as he continues to improve StrollerController.

Strapped a crate to the top of the #StrollerController and the kids drove themselves to the park while I drank my tea pic.twitter.com/Ilo2Pf9O3i

— Sam Pearce (@ScarceSam) May 27, 2019

A Stylish Solution For Bike Navigation

May 29, 2019 by Tom Nardi 7 Comments

[André Biagioni] is developing an open hardware bicycle navigation device called Aurora that’s so gorgeous it just might be enough to get you pedaling your way to work. This slick frame-mounted device relays information to the user through a circular array of SK6812 RGB LEDs, allowing you to find out what you need to know with just a quick glance down. No screen to squint at or buttons to press.

The hardware has already gone through several revisions, which is exactly what we’d expect to see for an entry into the 2019 Hackaday Prize. The proof of concept that [André] zip-tied to the front of his bike might have worked, but it wasn’t exactly the epitome of industrial design. It was enough to let him see that the idea had merit, and from there he’s been working on miniaturizing the design.

So how does it work? The nRF52832-powered Aurora connects to your phone over Bluetooth, and relays turn-by-turn navigation information to you via the circular LED array. This prevents you from having to fumble with your phone, which [André] hopes will improve safety. When you’re not heading anywhere specific, Aurora can also function as a futuristic magnetic compass.

With what appears to be at least three revisions of the Aurora hardware already completed by the time [André] put the project up on Hackaday.io, we’re very interested in seeing where it goes from here. The theme for this year’s Hackaday Prize is moving past the one-off prototype stage and designing something that’s suitable for production, and so far we’d say the Aurora project is definitely rising to the challenge.

Continue reading “A Stylish Solution For Bike Navigation” →

Custom Electric Motorcycle Packs 6 KW

May 26, 2019 by Bryan Cockfield 19 Comments

If you only need to travel at around 25 mph around town or to get a short distance to work, an electric bicycle might just be the best thing you can ride. It’s cheap, quick, and fun, and sometimes a great way to get some exercise too. If you want to dial up the amount of excitement, though, you’re going to want something with a little more power and speed. Something like an old dirt bike converted to a 6 kW electric motorcycle.

This is the latest build from [Boom Electric Cycles] and uses the frame from an early-90s Suzuki dirt bike as the foundation. From there it’s all new, though, as the engine was removed and replaced with 3 kW hub motors in each of the wheels. A 72-volt custom battery with 240 18650 cells pushed the amps through the motors, making this bike able to keep up anywhere except the fastest highways (if it’s street legal at all…).

Having about eight times more power than is found in a typical electric bicycle is sure to be a blast, but this build isn’t quite finished yet. Some of the trim panels need to be finished and the suspension needs to be adjusted, but it looks like it’ll be out and about any day now. Until then you’ll have to be satisfied with other projects that managed to cram in 3 kW per wheel.

Who Really Has The Largest Aircraft?

May 21, 2019 by Jenny List 33 Comments

We were all glued to our screens for a moment a few weeks ago, watching the Scaled Composites Stratolaunch dual-fuselage space launch platform aircraft make its first flight. The six-engined aircraft represents an impressive technical feat by any standard, and with a wingspan of 385 ft (117 m) and payload weight of 550,000 lb (250 t), is touted as the largest ever flown.

Our own Brian Benchoff took a look at the possibility of hauling more mundane cargo as an alternative (and possibly more popular) use of its lifting capabilities. And in doing so mentioned that “by most measure that matter” this is the largest aircraft ever built. There are several contenders for the title of largest aircraft that depend upon different statistics, so which one really is the largest? Sometimes it’s not as clear as you’d think, but finding out leads us into a fascinating review of some unusual aeronautical engineering.

Continue reading “Who Really Has The Largest Aircraft?” →

Wing Opens The Skies For Drones With UTM

May 20, 2019 by Maya Posch 7 Comments

Yesterday Alphabet (formerly known as Google) announced that their Wing project is launching delivery services per drone in Finland, specifically in a part of Helsinki. This comes more than a month after starting a similar pilot program in North Canberra, Australia. The drone design Wing has opted for consists not of the traditional quadcopter design, but a hybrid plane/helicopter design, with two big propellers for forward motion, along with a dozen small propellers on the top of the dual body design, presumably to give it maximum range while still allowing the craft to hover.

With a weight of 5 kg and a wingspan of about a meter, Wing’s drones are capable of lifting and carrying a payload of about 1.5 kg. This puts it into a category of drones far beyond of what hobbyists tend to fly on a regular basis, and worse, it involves Beyond Visual Line Of Sight (BVLOS for short) flying, which is frowned upon by the FAA and similar regulatory bodies. What Google/Alphabet figures that can enable them to make this kind of service a commercial reality is called Unmanned aircraft system Traffic Management (UTM).

UTM is essentially complementary to the existing air traffic control systems, allowing drones to integrate into these flows of manned airplanes without endangering either. Over the past years, it’s been part of NASA’s duty to develop the systems and infrastructure that would be required to make UTM a reality. Working together with the FAA and companies such as Amazon and Alphabet, the hope is that before long it’ll be as normal to send a drone into the skies for deliveries and more as it is today to have passenger and cargo planes with human pilots take to the skies.

Battle Tested Current Limiter For Cheap DC Motor Controllers

May 11, 2019 by Jenny List 1 Comment

Running a brushed motor in muddy or dusty environments takes a toll on controllers, with both heavy back EMF and high stall currents. This explains one of the challenge in Europe’s Hacky Racer series, which is decidedly more off-road than America’s Power Racing Series.

In pushing these little electric vehicles to the limits, many builders use brushless Chinese scooter motors since they’re both available and inexpensive. Others take the brushed DC route if they’re lucky enough to score a motor — and then the challenge becomes getting the most performance without burning up your controller. To fix this, [MechanicalCat] has come up with a current limiter for cheap DC motor controllers.

The full write-up is in the included PDF file, and describes the set-up of an Arduino Nano sitting between throttle and controller, and taking feedback from a current sensor. The controller in question is a 4QD Porter 10 so an extra component is a DC-to-DC converter to provide a floating ground for the Arduino. However, there is also the intriguing possibility of the same set-up being used with absurdly cheap Chinese motor controllers. There is also advice on fitting flyback diodes, something which might have saved one controller in the Hackaday pits last year.

It’s yet to be seen what effect this will have on Hacky Racer competitiveness, however its applications go far beyond that field into anywhere a reliable small DC motor drive on the cheap is required. Meanwhile, if you’re unsure where this Hacky Racer stuff came from, you could start here.