CFRP drawbacks

"Tom "Johnny Sunset" Sherman" <[email hidden]> wrote in message
news:[email hidden]...

Quoted message said:

Hypothesis: Based on writing style, "jim beam" and "Jambo" are the same
person.

You think this is a "Fight Club" scenario? You'd be mistaken.....

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

[snip]

Quoted message said:

...this certainly makes the strong case that bicycle ownership was
limited by its sheer unaffordability. Same as cars, though to a lesser
degree. But in either case, did bikes stop selling because everyone who
could afford one had one? I was under the impression that cycling lost
much of its daredevil reputation once the safety took over.

> For all but the wealthiest, cars were simply fantasies. Again, when
> the bicycle boom was imploding in 1900, there were more ocean liners
> in the harbors than there were automobiles in the entire U.S.

-snip-

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Ryan Cousineau said:

I started researching horse usage in WW II. Instead, I ended up with
this:
http://www.45thdivision.org/Photo_Gallery/gallery_Hall.htm

[snip]

Quoted message said:

From the free NYT archive for February 7, 1897, at the high point of
bicycle sales:

"Six or seven years ago it was believed that the bicycle had reached
the height of its popularity, and the numerous places where they were
in use at the rate of one to every hundred inhabitants was pointed to
as proof of the correctness of the assumption [], but the number has
steadly increased since that time , and to-day it would be difficult
to find a town where the proportion is not greater than this, and in
many cities it is claimed that there is one wheel to every ten
inhabitants."
http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9E00E3D81F31E132A25754C0A9649C94669ED7CF

So the claim was that one person out of ten could bicycle in 1897. The
other nine walked, rode the trolley, took a train, rode a horse, or

-snip-

Quoted message said:

For example, Conan Doyle wrote the bulk of the Sherlock Holmes stories
during the rise of the safety bicycle and the bike boom and collapse,
from 1887 to 1904. (There was more of Holmes, but only after a
decade-long hiatus.)

But Holmes never rides a bicycle anywhere. He takes hansom cabs or
trains and orders "four-wheelers" when it's too far to walk. Holmes
probably couldn't ride a bicycle any more than Watson could solve a
mystery. Doyle wasn't aware of hordes of Englishmen bicycling because
his keen powers of observation revealed that there weren't any hordes,
just a group of enthusiasts who wildly overestimated how appealing
bicycles are.

The only bicycles that I recall in the Holmes canon are the famous
ones in the "The Adventure of the Priory School", about which Holmes
makes all sorts of outlandish deductions--he can identify forty-two
kinds of bicycle tires from their tracks*, can spot the mark left by a
patch on a tire track, and can easily tell that the rider is standing
to sprint and weaving. Holmes knows that the "hind" wheel bears more
weight and therefore makes a deeper impression and claims to be able
to tell which way the tracks were heading, and so on.

Most of this bicycle expertise is implausible nonsense, of course,
like so much of Holmes's observation and deduction, flowing from
Doyle's pen rather than any local bike shop.

And Holmes obviously screws up the main point of the bicycle case.

As Frank Krygowski explains in his monograph "Thick-Headed Holmes and
the Dangerous Bicycle: A Plea for Mandatory Helmet Laws in
Literature," there's an obvious deduction to be drawn from the
following passage, and it ain't murder:

"Our search was not a very long one. The tracks of the tyre began to
curve fantastically upon the wet and shining path. Suddenly, as I
looked ahead, the gleam of metal caught my eye from amid the thick
gorse bushes. Out of them we dragged a bicycle, Palmer-tyred, one
pedal bent, and the whole front of it horribly smeared and slobbered
with blood. On the other side of the bushes a shoe was projecting. We
ran round, and there lay the unfortunate rider. He was a tall man,
full bearded, with spectacles, one glass of which had been knocked
out. The cause of his death was a frightful blow upon the head, which
had crushed in part of his skull."

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_the_Priory_School

Like the dog that did not bark in the night, the word "helmet" does
not appear in the story about bicycles.

Quoted message said:

* And Jobst wonders why bicycle manufacturers insist on tread
patterns! If they were all smooth, how could Holmes tell them apart?

IIRC, the last time the Holmes' deduction of a bike's direction of
travel across the moor was discussed, we decided that Conan-Doyle
assumed a front and rear tire tread were different and distinctive.
--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

A Muzi said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> ...this certainly makes the strong case that bicycle ownership
> was limited by its sheer unaffordability. Same as cars, though
> to a lesser degree. But in either case, did bikes stop selling
> because everyone who could afford one had one? I was under the
> impression that cycling lost much of its daredevil reputation
> once the safety took over.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>> For all but the wealthiest, cars were simply fantasies. Again,
>> when the bicycle boom was imploding in 1900, there were more
>> ocean liners in the harbors than there were automobiles in the
>> entire U.S.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> I started researching horse usage in WW II. Instead, I ended up
> with this:

http://www.45thdivision.org/Photo_Gallery/gallery_Hall.htm

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

From the free NYT archive for February 7, 1897, at the high point
of bicycle sales:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

"Six or seven years ago it was believed that the bicycle had
reached the height of its popularity, and the numerous places where
they were in use at the rate of one to every hundred inhabitants
was pointed to as proof of the correctness of the assumption [],
but the number has steadily increased since that time , and to-day
it would be difficult to find a town where the proportion is not
greater than this, and in many cities it is claimed that there is
one wheel to every ten inhabitants."

http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9E00E3D81F31E132A25754C0A9649C94669ED7CF

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

So the claim was that one person out of ten could bicycle in 1897.
The other nine walked, rode the trolley, took a train, rode a
horse, or

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

For example, Conan Doyle wrote the bulk of the Sherlock Holmes
stories during the rise of the safety bicycle and the bike boom and
collapse, from 1887 to 1904. (There was more of Holmes, but only
after a decade-long hiatus.)

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

But Holmes never rides a bicycle anywhere. He takes hansom cabs or
trains and orders "four-wheelers" when it's too far to walk.
Holmes probably couldn't ride a bicycle any more than Watson could
solve a mystery. Doyle wasn't aware of hordes of Englishmen
bicycling because his keen powers of observation revealed that
there weren't any hordes, just a group of enthusiasts who wildly
overestimated how appealing bicycles are.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

The only bicycles that I recall in the Holmes canon are the famous
ones in the "The Adventure of the Priory School", about which
Holmes makes all sorts of outlandish deductions--he can identify
forty-two kinds of bicycle tires from their tracks*, can spot the
mark left by a patch on a tire track, and can easily tell that the
rider is standing to sprint and weaving. Holmes knows that the
"hind" wheel bears more weight and therefore makes a deeper
impression and claims to be able to tell which way the tracks were
heading, and so on.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Most of this bicycle expertise is implausible nonsense, of course,
like so much of Holmes's observation and deduction, flowing from
Doyle's pen rather than any local bike shop.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

And Holmes obviously screws up the main point of the bicycle case.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

As Frank Krygowski explains in his monograph "Thick-Headed Holmes
and the Dangerous Bicycle: A Plea for Mandatory Helmet Laws in
Literature," there's an obvious deduction to be drawn from the
following passage, and it ain't murder:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

"Our search was not a very long one. The tracks of the tyre began
to curve fantastically upon the wet and shining path. Suddenly, as
I looked ahead, the gleam of metal caught my eye from amid the
thick gorse bushes. Out of them we dragged a bicycle,
Palmer-tyred, one pedal bent, and the whole front of it horribly
smeared and slobbered with blood. On the other side of the bushes
a shoe was projecting. We ran round, and there lay the unfortunate
rider. He was a tall man, full bearded, with spectacles, one glass
of which had been knocked out. The cause of his death was a
frightful blow upon the head, which had crushed in part of his
skull."

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_the_Priory_School

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Like the dog that did not bark in the night, the word "helmet" does
not appear in the story about bicycles.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

* And Jobst wonders why bicycle manufacturers insist on tread
patterns! If they were all smooth, how could Holmes tell them
apart?

Quoted message said:

IIRC, the last time the Holmes' deduction of a bike's direction of
travel across the moor was discussed, we decided that Conan-Doyle
assumed a front and rear tire tread were different and distinctive.

With a high wheeler, that is more questionable than with today's
conventional bicycles.

Direction of travel is undetectable, even if the front and rear tread
is different unless the rear wheel was slipping. Rear wheel tracks
ride over front wheel tracks in either direction and look the same in
both events. Only on steeper grades can one tell that the rider was
coasting downhill if the tracks are straight or riding uphill if the
tracks weave a bit.

Braking skids of the rear wheel look different from traction slip
where the appearance of debris from slips can reveal direction of
travel on steeper dirt roads .

Jobst Brandt

Andrew Muzi said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> ...this certainly makes the strong case that bicycle ownership
> was limited by its sheer unaffordability. Same as cars, though
> to a lesser degree. But in either case, did bikes stop selling
> because everyone who could afford one had one? I was under the
> impression that cycling lost much of its daredevil reputation
> once the safety took over.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

>> For all but the wealthiest, cars were simply fantasies. Again,
>> when the bicycle boom was imploding in 1900, there were more
>> ocean liners in the harbors than there were automobiles in the
>> entire U.S.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> I started researching horse usage in WW II. Instead, I ended up
> with this:

http://www.45thdivision.org/Photo_Gallery/gallery_Hall.htm

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

From the free NYT archive for February 7, 1897, at the high point
of bicycle sales:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

"Six or seven years ago it was believed that the bicycle had
reached the height of its popularity, and the numerous places where
they were in use at the rate of one to every hundred inhabitants
was pointed to as proof of the correctness of the assumption [],
but the number has steadily increased since that time , and to-day
it would be difficult to find a town where the proportion is not
greater than this, and in many cities it is claimed that there is
one wheel to every ten inhabitants."

http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?res=9E00E3D81F31E132A25754C0A9649C94669ED7CF

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

So the claim was that one person out of ten could bicycle in 1897.
The other nine walked, rode the trolley, took a train, rode a
horse, or

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

For example, Conan Doyle wrote the bulk of the Sherlock Holmes
stories during the rise of the safety bicycle and the bike boom and
collapse, from 1887 to 1904. (There was more of Holmes, but only
after a decade-long hiatus.)

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

But Holmes never rides a bicycle anywhere. He takes hansom cabs or
trains and orders "four-wheelers" when it's too far to walk.
Holmes probably couldn't ride a bicycle any more than Watson could
solve a mystery. Doyle wasn't aware of hordes of Englishmen
bicycling because his keen powers of observation revealed that
there weren't any hordes, just a group of enthusiasts who wildly
overestimated how appealing bicycles are.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

The only bicycles that I recall in the Holmes canon are the famous
ones in the "The Adventure of the Priory School", about which
Holmes makes all sorts of outlandish deductions--he can identify
forty-two kinds of bicycle tires from their tracks*, can spot the
mark left by a patch on a tire track, and can easily tell that the
rider is standing to sprint and weaving. Holmes knows that the
"hind" wheel bears more weight and therefore makes a deeper
impression and claims to be able to tell which way the tracks were
heading, and so on.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Most of this bicycle expertise is implausible nonsense, of course,
like so much of Holmes's observation and deduction, flowing from
Doyle's pen rather than any local bike shop.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

And Holmes obviously screws up the main point of the bicycle case.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

As Frank Krygowski explains in his monograph "Thick-Headed Holmes
and the Dangerous Bicycle: A Plea for Mandatory Helmet Laws in
Literature," there's an obvious deduction to be drawn from the
following passage, and it ain't murder:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

"Our search was not a very long one. The tracks of the tyre began
to curve fantastically upon the wet and shining path. Suddenly, as
I looked ahead, the gleam of metal caught my eye from amid the
thick gorse bushes. Out of them we dragged a bicycle,
Palmer-tyred, one pedal bent, and the whole front of it horribly
smeared and slobbered with blood. On the other side of the bushes
a shoe was projecting. We ran round, and there lay the unfortunate
rider. He was a tall man, full bearded, with spectacles, one glass
of which had been knocked out. The cause of his death was a
frightful blow upon the head, which had crushed in part of his
skull."

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_the_Priory_School

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Like the dog that did not bark in the night, the word "helmet" does
not appear in the story about bicycles.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

* And Jobst wonders why bicycle manufacturers insist on tread
patterns! If they were all smooth, how could Holmes tell them
apart?

Quoted message said:

IIRC, the last time the Holmes' deduction of a bike's direction of
travel across the moor was discussed, we decided that Conan-Doyle
assumed a front and rear tire tread were different and distinctive.

With a high wheeler, that is more questionable than with today's
conventional bicycles.

Direction of travel is undetectable, even if the front and rear tread
is different unless the rear wheel was slipping. Rear wheel tracks
ride over front wheel tracks in either direction and look the same in
both events. Only on steeper grades can one tell that the rider was
coasting downhill if the tracks are straight or riding uphill if the
tracks weave a bit.

Braking skids of the rear wheel look different from traction slip
where the appearance of debris from slips can reveal direction of
travel on steeper dirt roads .

Jobst Brandt

Mike Jacoubowsky said:

Quoted message said:

I doubt that CALTRANS ever built bridges and elevated roadways with plain
concrete columns. Most likely they had vertical bars near the perimeter,
with smaller diameter hoop bar ties. Newer columns would have a
continuous helical tie, for greater resistance to seismic loads.

For those of us who aren't engineers, could you explain what "vertical bars"
and "hoop bar ties" are? Are we talking about the difference between just
pouring concrete into a column vs reinforcing with what is commonly called
"rebar?" Or something more sophisticated than that?

Looking at the column in plan (top view), the main reinforcement
(typically #8 to #18 [1] deformed steel bars) are arranged in a circle
that is typically about 6 inches smaller in diameter than the column (to
allow for minimum concrete coverage of the reinforcing steel). These
bars serve primarily to carry tensile loads when the column is loaded in
bending or uplift, but also add to the compressive strength of the
column. In a "standard" column, there are circular ties of smaller bars
(typically spaced at 1 foot vertical intervals) that wrap around the
vertical bars. Example at
<http://www.metcad911.org/MDICE/Photo_Album/images/South_tower_002s.JPG>.

For greater integrity to resist seismic or blast loads, the hoop ties
are replaced by helical ties.

[1] The number of a rebar is nominally 1/8 inch, so a #3 rebar is
approximately 3/8 inch in diameter.

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia
Beer - It's not just for breakfast anymore!

Ryan Cousineau said:

...
I'm not going to pretend I want to pursue this deeply enough to get to
the bottom of the question of whether bicycles were too expensive to
expand to a wider audience or not. I do stubbornly suspect that the
question is a bit like asking whether the Mercedes S-Class would sell
better if it was the same price as a Honda Civic, and thus affordable to
almost any person likely to consider themselves middle class....

butbutbut, I would rather drive a Honda Civic. Much easier to race
around in without attracting attention.

In some markets, prestige is more important, and a lower price would be
a detriment? Even wonder why high-end Japanese sport cars have not sold
as well as their more expensive (and less reliable) European
equivalents? (Hint: its the same reason some prefer Mavic rims to Sun
and Alex rims.

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia
Beer - It's not just for breakfast anymore!.)

aka Carl Fogel said:

...
As far as I can tell, West Point never had bicycling classes.

However, the Swiss Army used to have bicycles. I recall that Andrew Muzi
had one in the shop (Yellow Jersey) for sale ca. 1999, when I stopped in
to purchase a Saris Bones.

--
Tom Sherman - Holstein-Friesland Bovinia
Beer - It's not just for breakfast anymore!

Quoted message said:

Andrew Muzi writes:

[snip]

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_the_Priory_School

[snip]

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

IIRC, the last time the Holmes' deduction of a bike's direction of
travel across the moor was discussed, we decided that Conan-Doyle
assumed a front and rear tire tread were different and distinctive.

With a high wheeler, that is more questionable than with today's
conventional bicycles.

[snip]

Dear Jobst,

Lest there be any confusion, the bicycles in "The Adventure of the
Priory School" are modern small-wheeled safety bicycles, not
high-wheeler penny-farthings.

***

A highwheeler puts most of its weight on the huge front wheel, but
Holmes claims that he can read the tracks clearly:

"No, no, my dear Watson. The more deeply sunk impression is, of
course, the hind wheel, upon which the weight rests."

So this one is a safety bicycle, with our modern rear-wheel weight
bias, not a high-wheeler.

If you use the vertical lines in the background to draw a line down
from where the rider will be seated, this picture shows the huge
forward weight bias that made high-wheelers so prone to face-plants:

http://i2.tinypic.com/4tz3tp0.jpg

This picture shows the same forward weight bias:

http://i18.tinypic.com/4lf9qiv.jpg

***

Holmes also claims to be able to distinguish the two bicycles by their
tread marks, one being equipped with Dunlop tires, the other with
Palmer tires:

"'I am familiar with forty-two different impressions left by tyres.
This, as you perceive, is a Dunlop, with a patch upon the outer cover.
Heidegger's tyres were Palmer's, leaving longitudinal stripes.'"

Dunlop tires were, of course, inflatable--Dunlop invented the
inflatable tire and put it on his son's safety bicycle. Only
inflatable tires are patched.

The Palmer tires were ribbed lengthwise, with tread patterns being
another mark of an inflatable tire.

In contrast, high wheelers used smooth solid rubber tires that varied
only in width and color (red was supposedly the best kind of tire
rubber).

The smooth solid tires had no tread pattern, any more than wagon
wheels did. Basically, if you worried about traction, you wouldn't be
riding up high on what's basically a giant unicycle with a trailing
training wheel. If you slip or skid on a safety bike, you have some
hopes of recovering by planting a foot. If you slip or skid on a
high-wheeler, you crash.

Indeed, if the bikes had been high-wheelers, Holmes would have spotted
not the mark left by a patch on a safety bike's inflatable tire, but
the mark left by the joint the ends of the solid tire were joined.

For details of mounting a solid rubber tire with a wire core:

http://www.bikeroute.com/HiWheelers/HowMountTire.php

You cut a length of tire, wrap it around the rim, push the rubber back
with a clever tool to expose the wire ends, hook or braze the ends
together, release the tool, and let the rubber ends expand back to
form a tight joint.

Or Holmes might have spotted the marks where the rubber tire was
simply wired onto the rim in a crude fashion on some high-wheelers,
much like the marks of snow chains:

http://www.tampere.fi/kuvat/5mv0TWCr7/velomania_isop_det.jpg

***

Dates strongly suggest that no high-wheelers appear in the story.

Holmes says that the Duke has been "Lord Lieutenant of Hallamshire
since 1900."

The story was published in 1904.

But high-wheelers were practically extinct by 1890, wiped out by
safety bicycles just five years after the Starley Rover appeared. My
lists of high-wheeler pictures shows nothing dated after 1889--they
were no longer being manufactured.

Just how quickly high-wheelers vanished is shown by Sharp's 1896
"Bicycles and Tricycles." The cover illustration of the Dover reprint
is misleading because it shows a high-wheeler from the text, but
high-wheelers appear on only 5 pages of the 536-page book.

In other words, by 1896 high-wheelers were barely worth mentioning in
an enormously detailed book about bicycles that must have taken quite
a while to write.

(Incidentally, you can see the bias-belt construction of a "Palmer"
tire in chapter 29 of Sharp's book--it's a tubular tire.)

Two people might still have been riding obsolete high-wheelers in
1904, but it's unlikely.

Cheers,

Carl Fogel

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Andrew Muzi writes:

[snip]

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

> http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_the_Priory_School

[snip]

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

IIRC, the last time the Holmes' deduction of a bike's direction of
travel across the moor was discussed, we decided that Conan-Doyle
assumed a front and rear tire tread were different and distinctive.

With a high wheeler, that is more questionable than with today's
conventional bicycles.

[snip]

The original illustrations are a dead giveaway too! 😉

--
/Marten

info(apestaartje)m-gineering(punt)nl

Quoted message said:

aka Carl Fogel said:

...
As far as I can tell, West Point never had bicycling classes.

Tom Sherman said:

However, the Swiss Army used to have bicycles. I recall that Andrew Muzi
had one in the shop (Yellow Jersey) for sale ca. 1999, when I stopped in
to purchase a Saris Bones.

If you can find the excellent but out of print "Bicycles in War", nearly
all nations, including USA, used bicycles militarily from the bicycle's
inception through mechanized warfare in the 1940s. After that, only
isolated cases remained. Notably, communist forces in Indochina used
bicycles effectively as we tried to interrupt mythical truck convoys.
Other great stories abound. The Swiss, who still have a Roman style
military service system, efficiently patrolled by bike until the program
was discontinued recently.
--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

Carl Fogel writes:

http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Adventure_of_the_Priory_School

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

IIRC, the last time the Holmes' deduction of a bike's direction of
travel across the moor was discussed, we decided that Conan-Doyle
assumed a front and rear tire tread were different and distinctive.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

With a high wheeler, that is more questionable than with today's
conventional bicycles.

I mentioned that because such a bicycle was shown in one of the
responses.

Quoted message said:

Lest there be any confusion, the bicycles in "The Adventure of the
Priory School" are modern small-wheeled safety bicycles, not
high-wheeler penny-farthings.

Quoted message said:

***

Quoted message said:

A high wheeler puts most of its weight on the huge front wheel, but
Holmes claims that he can read the tracks clearly:

Quoted message said:

"No, no, my dear Watson. The more deeply sunk impression is, of
course, the hind wheel, upon which the weight rests."

So? He is still off base. How does he know which direction the track
he observes was made? As I said, on dirt roads I can only tell when
there is a gradient and downhill tracks are straighter than uphill
tracks.

Quoted message said:

So this one is a safety bicycle, with our modern rear-wheel weight
bias, not a high-wheeler.

The weight on the wheels has no bearing on the problem. The rear wheel
rolls over the track of the front wheel in either direction.

Quoted message said:

If you use the vertical lines in the background to draw a line down
from where the rider will be seated, this picture shows the huge
forward weight bias that made high-wheelers so prone to face-plants:

http://i2.tinypic.com/4tz3tp0.jpg

Quoted message said:

This picture shows the same forward weight bias:

http://i18.tinypic.com/4lf9qiv.jpg

Quoted message said:

Holmes also claims to be able to distinguish the two bicycles by
their tread marks, one being equipped with Dunlop tires, the other
with Palmer tires:

Quoted message said:

"'I am familiar with forty-two different impressions left by tyres.
This, as you perceive, is a Dunlop, with a patch upon the outer
cover. Heidegger's tyres were Palmer's, leaving longitudinal
stripes.'"

I'm nor certain but early bicycle tires were mostly smooth. I get the
feeling that Doyle armchair invented much of his "logic" and over did
it in the bicycle realm.

Quoted message said:

Dunlop tires were, of course, inflatable--Dunlop invented the
inflatable tire and put it on his son's safety bicycle. Only
inflatable tires are patched.

Quoted message said:

The Palmer tires were ribbed lengthwise, with tread patterns being
another mark of an inflatable tire.

I would like to see some dates when mini auto tread patterns first
appeared on bicycle tires. Many tubulars that I rode still had smooth
tread before mini diamond dimples and mini ribbed tread came along.

Quoted message said:

In contrast, high wheelers used smooth solid rubber tires that
varied only in width and color (red was supposedly the best kind of
tire rubber).

Quoted message said:

The smooth solid tires had no tread pattern, any more than wagon
wheels did. Basically, if you worried about traction, you wouldn't
be riding up high on what's basically a giant unicycle with a
trailing training wheel. If you slip or skid on a safety bike, you
have some hopes of recovering by planting a foot. If you slip or
skid on a high-wheeler, you crash.

Quoted message said:

Indeed, if the bikes had been high-wheelers, Holmes would have
spotted not the mark left by a patch on a safety bike's inflatable
tire, but the mark left by the joint the ends of the solid tire were
joined.

Not so. The seam of a well mounted solid tire is not discernible and
I assume, in the days of such wheels, there were plenty of experts in
that task.

Quoted message said:

For details of mounting a solid rubber tire with a wire core:

Quoted message said:

http://www.bikeroute.com/HiWheelers/HowMountTire.php

Quoted message said:

You cut a length of tire, wrap it around the rim, push the rubber
back with a clever tool to expose the wire ends, hook or braze the
ends together, release the tool, and let the rubber ends expand back
to form a tight joint.

I have a high wheeler rider in my neighborhood who can tell you all
about it. His tires are red and fit soundly without perceptible seam.

Quoted message said:

Or Holmes might have spotted the marks where the rubber tire was
simply wired onto the rim in a crude fashion on some high-wheelers,
much like the marks of snow chains:

http://www.tampere.fi/kuvat/5mv0TWCr7/velomania_isop_det.jpg

Quoted message said:

Dates strongly suggest that no high-wheelers appear in the story.

Quoted message said:

Holmes says that the Duke has been "Lord Lieutenant of Hallamshire
since 1900."

Quoted message said:

The story was published in 1904.

Quoted message said:

But high-wheelers were practically extinct by 1890, wiped out by
safety bicycles just five years after the Starley Rover appeared.
My lists of high-wheeler pictures shows nothing dated after
1889--they were no longer being manufactured.

Quoted message said:

Just how quickly high-wheelers vanished is shown by Sharp's 1896
"Bicycles and Tricycles." The cover illustration of the Dover
reprint is misleading because it shows a high-wheeler from the text,
but high-wheelers appear on only 5 pages of the 536-page book.

Quoted message said:

In other words, by 1896 high-wheelers were barely worth mentioning in
an enormously detailed book about bicycles that must have taken quite
a while to write.

Quoted message said:

(Incidentally, you can see the bias-belt construction of a "Palmer"
tire in chapter 29 of Sharp's book--it's a tubular tire.)

Quoted message said:

Two people might still have been riding obsolete high-wheelers in
1904, but it's unlikely.

All this has no bearing on Doyle's suggestion that the direction of a
passing bicycle can be assessed from the track it leaves on a dirt
road.

Jobst Brandt

On Thu, 18 Oct 2007 11:13:08 -0500, A Muzi <[email hidden]>

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

aka Carl Fogel said:

...
As far as I can tell, West Point never had bicycling classes.

Tom Sherman said:

However, the Swiss Army used to have bicycles. I recall that Andrew Muzi
had one in the shop (Yellow Jersey) for sale ca. 1999, when I stopped in
to purchase a Saris Bones.

If you can find the excellent but out of print "Bicycles in War", nearly
all nations, including USA, used bicycles militarily from the bicycle's
inception through mechanized warfare in the 1940s. After that, only
isolated cases remained. Notably, communist forces in Indochina used
bicycles effectively as we tried to interrupt mythical truck convoys.
Other great stories abound. The Swiss, who still have a Roman style
military service system, efficiently patrolled by bike until the program
was discontinued recently.

Dear Andrew,

Curse you, another $15 down the drain on out of print bicycle books!

And curse www.bookfinder.com for making it so easy!

And ditto for Martin Caidin, who wrote it, and whose books I like.

Cheers,

Carl Fogel

On 18 Oct 2007 17:35:56 GMT, [email hidden] wrote:

[snip]

Quoted message said:

All this has no bearing on Doyle's suggestion that the direction of a
passing bicycle can be assessed from the track it leaves on a dirt
road.

Jobst Brandt

Dear Jobst,

Whoosh!

Cheers,

Carl Fogel

Quoted message said:

All this has no bearing on Doyle's suggestion that the direction of a
passing bicycle can be assessed from the track it leaves on a dirt
road.

It should certainly be possible. The rear track follows a curve of
pursuit of the front track. The relation between the two curves
depends on the direction. It's easy enough to figure out which is the
front wheel, start with the front wheel on the given front wheel track,
the rear on the other track, and see if they continue to match as you
trace the front wheel track. Then try it going the other direction.

I just tried this using the water trails left by wet tires. It
does appear to work, however, it happens to be a sunny day here, so
I had to work quickly. More testing later...

--
Joe Riel

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

[email hidden] aka Carl Fogel wrote:
> ...
> As far as I can tell, West Point never had bicycling classes.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

Tom Sherman said:

However, the Swiss Army used to have bicycles. I recall that Andrew Muzi
had one in the shop (Yellow Jersey) for sale ca. 1999, when I stopped in
to purchase a Saris Bones.

Quoted message said:

A Muzi said:

If you can find the excellent but out of print "Bicycles in War", nearly
all nations, including USA, used bicycles militarily from the bicycle's
inception through mechanized warfare in the 1940s. After that, only
isolated cases remained. Notably, communist forces in Indochina used
bicycles effectively as we tried to interrupt mythical truck convoys.
Other great stories abound. The Swiss, who still have a Roman style
military service system, efficiently patrolled by bike until the program
was discontinued recently.

Quoted message said:

Curse you, another $15 down the drain on out of print bicycle books!
And curse www.bookfinder.com for making it so easy!
And ditto for Martin Caidin, who wrote it, and whose books I like.

You'll love the center all-too-brief photo section. Ain't the net grand?
--
Andrew Muzi
www.yellowjersey.org
Open every day since 1 April, 1971

Joe Riel said:

Quoted message said:

All this has no bearing on Doyle's suggestion that the direction of a
passing bicycle can be assessed from the track it leaves on a dirt
road.

It should certainly be possible. The rear track follows a curve of
pursuit of the front track. The relation between the two curves
depends on the direction. It's easy enough to figure out which is the
front wheel, start with the front wheel on the given front wheel track,
the rear on the other track, and see if they continue to match as you
trace the front wheel track. Then try it going the other direction.

I just tried this using the water trails left by wet tires. It
does appear to work, however, it happens to be a sunny day here, so
I had to work quickly. More testing later...

With dirt it is easy to see which track passes over which. I'm sure in
the sequel Holmes will encounter a trick rider who rides a fixie
backwards 😉

--
/Marten

info(apestaartje)m-gineering(punt)nl

Joe Riel said:

Quoted message said:

All this has no bearing on Doyle's suggestion that the direction of
a passing bicycle can be assessed from the track it leaves on a
dirt road.

Quoted message said:

It should certainly be possible. The rear track follows a curve of
pursuit of the front track. The relation between the two curves
depends on the direction. It's easy enough to figure out which is
the front wheel, start with the front wheel on the given front wheel
track, the rear on the other track, and see if they continue to
match as you trace the front wheel track. Then try it going the
other direction.

Quoted message said:

I just tried this using the water trails left by wet tires. It does
appear to work, however, it happens to be a sunny day here, so I had
to work quickly. More testing later...

You'll need to explain that in more detail. When I ride a curve, the
front wheel always takes a greater radius than the rear. That the
front wheel proceeded the rear wheel in time and space is also clear.
What is unclear is how the direction of this tracking occurred. If
you can point out the physical trace that reveals in which direction
the two tracks were made, I could better understand it.

Jobst Brandt

Joe Riel said:

Quoted message said:

All this has no bearing on Doyle's suggestion that the direction of
a passing bicycle can be assessed from the track it leaves on a
dirt road.

Quoted message said:

It should certainly be possible. The rear track follows a curve of
pursuit of the front track. The relation between the two curves
depends on the direction. It's easy enough to figure out which is
the front wheel, start with the front wheel on the given front wheel
track, the rear on the other track, and see if they continue to
match as you trace the front wheel track. Then try it going the
other direction.

Quoted message said:

I just tried this using the water trails left by wet tires. It does
appear to work, however, it happens to be a sunny day here, so I had
to work quickly. More testing later...

You'll need to explain that in more detail. When I ride a curve, the
front wheel always takes a greater radius than the rear. That the
front wheel proceeded the rear wheel in time and space is also clear.
What is unclear is how the direction of this tracking occurred. If
you can point out the physical trace that reveals in which direction
the two tracks were made, I could better understand it.

Jobst Brandt

Marten who? said:

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

All this has no bearing on Doyle's suggestion that the direction
of a passing bicycle can be assessed from the track it leaves on a
dirt road.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

It should certainly be possible. The rear track follows a curve of
pursuit of the front track. The relation between the two curves
depends on the direction. It's easy enough to figure out which is
the front wheel, start with the front wheel on the given front
wheel track, the rear on the other track, and see if they continue
to match as you trace the front wheel track. Then try it going the
other direction.

Quoted message said:

Quoted message said:

I just tried this using the water trails left by wet tires. It
does appear to work, however, it happens to be a sunny day here, so
I had to work quickly. More testing later...

Quoted message said:

With dirt it is easy to see which track passes over which. I'm sure
in the sequel Holmes will encounter a trick rider who rides a fixie
backward 😉

The rear tire always passes over the front track regardless of which
way the bicycle traveled.

Jobst Brandt

Quoted message said:

Joe Riel said:

Quoted message said:

All this has no bearing on Doyle's suggestion that the direction of
a passing bicycle can be assessed from the track it leaves on a
dirt road.

Quoted message said:

It should certainly be possible. The rear track follows a curve of
pursuit of the front track. The relation between the two curves
depends on the direction. It's easy enough to figure out which is
the front wheel, start with the front wheel on the given front wheel
track, the rear on the other track, and see if they continue to
match as you trace the front wheel track. Then try it going the
other direction.

Quoted message said:

I just tried this using the water trails left by wet tires. It does
appear to work, however, it happens to be a sunny day here, so I had
to work quickly. More testing later...

You'll need to explain that in more detail. When I ride a curve, the
front wheel always takes a greater radius than the rear. That the
front wheel proceeded the rear wheel in time and space is also clear.
What is unclear is how the direction of this tracking occurred. If
you can point out the physical trace that reveals in which direction
the two tracks were made, I could better understand it.

One way to imagine it is to assume that the front wheel follows a
perfect sinewave. The rear wheel will then (eventually) also follow a
sine wave (actually, not quite, but close enough) with the same
wavelength, but a smaller amplitude. If the wavelength is greater than
(about) the wheel separation, the sinewave generated by the rear wheel
should have a small lead with respect to the front wheel. So the
direction of the bike must be such that the phase of rear track leads
that of the front track. That is:

front track = A*sin(x/L)
rear track ~ B*sin(x/L+phi) with 0 <= phi <= Pi and B < A.

If you are looking at this backward (x -> -x) then the
phase difference would be negative (i.e. phase lag).

A practical way to deduce the direction with just a yardstick (which
is a good approximation of the wheel separation of a standard bike) is
to lie the stick so that one end is on the front wheel track, the
other end on the rear wheel track, then make the front edge of the
stick follow the front wheel track. If the other end follows the rear
track, you're moving the stick in the proper direction. I will test
this on my walk tonight (part of the walk is along a dirt path with
bike tracks).

--
Joe Riel