On Mon, 24 Dec 2018 16:15:26 -0600, Doug Cimperman
wrote:

On 12/22/2018 11:55 PM, John B. Slocomb wrote:
On Sat, 22 Dec 2018 20:14:19 -0800 (PST), Frank Krygowski
wrote:

On Saturday, December 22, 2018 at 6:36:19 PM UTC-5, John B. Slocomb wrote:
Re the current crop of power calculations, I've always wondered why
fairing's were never a popular item for bicycles. With today's
composite materials weight could be minimal and even the crudest drag
calculations show that wind resistance is the most critical factor in
bicycle speed.
See: https://www.racebikemart.com/adverts...1540463758.php
or action pictures at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UpBRkphIwTo

Granted that fairing's would not be legal equipment for racing but the
majority of bike sales are not for racing.

https://www.zzipper.com/

I had one for quite a few years. It just wasn't worth the trouble for
me.

- Frank Krygowski

I remember reading, some time ago, about a bloke in England that
commuted a fairly long distance to work each day. It turned out that
he "rode" a completely enclosed and streamlined recumbent bike and,
the article said, he was averaging 30 mph.

cheers,

John B.



Some years back (I guess in the 1980's) there was still a couple IHPVA
teams competing with fully-faired upright bicycles. I recall the old
photos but don't know the names. Despite a several-years-long attempt,
they generally were not competitive. This would be back around the
Versatron Vector days.

This link shows an older example, but one that has the same general shape:
http://www.ihpva.org/HParchive/PDF/38-v11n3-1994.pdf (the image on page
7 of the pdf)
--except the modern ones were ribbed like an airplane rudder and covered
with clear plastic to improve rider visibility. Often the only two
modifications to the underlying bicycles was chopped and narrowed drop
bars and a BIG chainring (80T or so).

-Of course--unlike most other sanctioned competitions--the IHPVA does
not tell you what kind of bicycle you can bring.

----

The general opinion even among velomobile riders is that using any
fully-faired, two-wheel bicycle on the street is still a very daring
feat. The Battle Mountain bikes are totally impractical due to very poor
outward visibility (if they have a windshield at all, that is) and they
require assistance getting in and out, and starting and stopping.

Velomobiles (trikes) are common but so far I have heard of only one
company/person building fully-faired, 2-wheel recumbents that were
intended for street use. Speedbikes.ch used to offer the
Peregrin-on-Birk model for around $35K (USD) but they don't list it now.

https://www.google.com/search?q=peregrin+on+birk

Also in just the last few years there was a guy on recumbents.com who
was toying around for some time with a faired upright bicycle:
http://www.recumbents.com/forums/top...?TOPIC_ID=3029

What I was thinking about when I made the original post was a fairing
somewhat similar to the Yamaha TD-1 that I posted the reference to.

cheers,

John B.