On Tue, 19 Feb 2008 10:54:52 +0100, "Marcin J." <
[email protected]>
wrote:
>Is this the first full suspension bike ever? Anyway it's older than
>http://patentpending.blogs.com/patent_pending_blog/2005/03/the_first_full_.html
Dear Marcin,
The question of "first" can be tricky.
First to be imagined?
I wouldn't be surprised if the bike in my link existed only in the
inventor's fevered imagination. That looks like a 75 mm crank, which
is not exactly practical.
First to be built, even as a commercial failure?
Here's the first safety bicycle, the 1879 Lawson:
http://www.scienceandsociety.co.uk/results.asp?image=10466605&wwwflag=2&imagepos=39
Commercially, it was a flop.
So nephew John Starley's Rover gets the credit a few years later
(1884/5)as the first _successful_ safety bicycle:
http://tinyurl.com/2mct4m
Anyway, some early suspension . . .
Rear suspension, 1885 Whippet safety, same year as Rover:
http://www.scienceandsociety.co.uk/results.asp?image=10217772&wwwflag=2&imagepos=112
A better view of the same model, ~1887, in Pryor Dodge's "Bicycle," a
Whippet spring-frame dwarf safety Linley & Biggs roadster with rear
suspension:
http://i25.tinypic.com/vn1her.jpg
A Victor front-suspension patent application, filed in 1886--page down
because the fork is more complicated than the first drawing suggests:
http://www.google.com/patents?id=gTFKAAAAEBAJ&pg=PA1&dq=398533&source=gbs_selected_pages&cad=0_1
Ad for the 1888 improved Victor front suspension, the famous
half-heart spring:
http://i32.tinypic.com/2q07mfs.jpg
Full-suspension 1889 production bicycle, the Don No. 2 of 1889:
http://www.localhistory.scit.wlv.ac.uk/Museum/Transport/bicycles/Don.gif
"The Don Spring-Frame No.2 Dwarf Safety Roadster. We have here a
practicable spring frame without complication in design or working. On
the top of the rear forks there is a double link, connecting them with
the top of the seat pillar, which receives the saddle-pin. The lower
forks are horizontal, and are taken forward beyond the bracket; and
between the end and lower frame tube there is a strong coil spring.
The bracket, where the seat-pillar and front tube unite, is hinged, to
permit of a downward motion which is checked by the action of the
spring. This produces a very easy motion for the rider, and, so to
speak, smoothes the road, reducing concussion and vibration to a low
point. The front forks are double, and not continuous. The straight
ones run to within 3in. of the axle, and are connected by a spring
with the pilot wheel forks, to which they are pivoted in the centre;
this also helps to take the strain off the forks when the brake is
applied. The machine is a very good one, and with balls all parts,
etc., the price is £18."
http://www.localhistory.scit.wlv.ac.uk/Museum/Transport/bicycles/Devey.htm
Cheers,
Carl Fogel