Some BioMed engineering students class project?

Or over the top
Earn/Gift a bike?
Bored unemployed NASA engineers looking for a summer fun?

HackerSpaces?

I've welding in class
but this
is ironically
closer to why I went
to those certifications earning class series.

Welding is not Brazing
And other things learned.
(Like I'm not AWS certifiable
and frankly suck at
5G 6" pipe)

On Thu, Jul 4, 2024, 17:53 cyclista--- via TheThinkTank <thethinktank@lists.bikecollectives.org> wrote:

To support 700lbs, you're going to need solid, not pneumatic tires. The
wheels would also need to be small, 16" max, with thicker spokes, or instead,
solid cast; shorter spokes, if thick enough, will have less flex but greater
strength. It would have to be four wheeled, and the frame would need to
be made of industrial tubing, not bicycle tubing, similar to Workman's industrial
bikes. It would be a low-speed, heavy machine.

It's also of note that at 700lbs, the rider will not have the ability to
fit through a standard doorway.

The gearing would need large cogs front and rear for maximum tooth/chain
engagement. If geared correctly, it could still meet or surpass avarage
walking speed.

A clever and commited bike hacker could craft something for this person,
but in order not to be merely a whimsical attempt and actually be useful
long term, it would have be a massive undertaking with multiple iterations.
That's a great deal of committment.

There are mobility equipment businesses out there who already manufacture
walkers and bicycle-like scooters. It really seems like the first major
engineering task should be researching the players in that market and securing
the interest of one of them who could actually build it.

If we were a league of CAD engineers we maybe could crowdsource this project
among our geographically-dispersed group and share iterations of CAD files
amongst ourselves over the internet until we had something we felt strongly
enough about that we could hand it off to a fabricator. But unfortunately,
we don't really work like that. This person's need sounds rather immediate
and dire, so the question should be whether something safe to use and at
least approximately useful can be built within the next six months. I feel
that getting the design team of a mobility company interested in prototyping
this is the better track.
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