Built a foot bike/scooter

[Snax]

Well the bike the rear wheel came off of used to have them. We do have some ribbon laying around . . . er, no.

[MetroMPG]

Looks like there's a magnet on the front wheel for a bike computer.

What's your max speed so far?

[Bill in Houston]

Looks like fun. I like riding my kids scooters, but the handling is pretty twitchy. The foot bike should be a little more stable, as well as smoother-riding...

[Snax]

A scooter like this is just as stable as any bicycle, and by making the head tube angle more laid back, more trail* can be built in to make it even more stable. Those damn Razor scooters and the like have less than 1/2 of it one way, none if you flip the bars backwards. Way too twitchy for me. But if you can ride a bicycle, a scooter like mine has a learning curve of virtually nil.

It's pretty amazing to ride. I can corner far harder on it than I would think about trying on my bicycle because instead of low-siding, I can just throw my foot (or both feet) down to catch a slide. Plus I think the standing position allows better shock absorbtion for better grip overall.

And no, I don't have a computer on it. The magnet came with the wheel, but I don't really want to know how slow I'm going.

*The distance the contact center with the ground follows the pivot axis.


And are you happy now Bill? (See pic.)

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by Snax

A scooter like this is just as stable as any bicycle, and by making the head tube angle more laid back, more trail* can be built in to make it even more stable.

Unless you add so much that you get "chopper flop"!

(EDIT: which you obviously didn't.)

Only suggestion: you gotta spray that rear tire black!

[Snax]

I need to get a new rear tire for it. It's the oddest thing I've ever seen. If I inflate it to anything over the 40 psi rating on the sidewall, it leaks. But once it's down to 40, it stops! It has held air for 5 days at that pressure now. I'm having trouble finding a good narrow 12" tire that is not an all-terrain tread though.

The front tire is holding up impressively well considering how scary the sidewalls look. For what have to be at least 15 year old tires, they grip pretty well too.

[Bill in Houston]

Originally Posted by Snax

And are you happy now Bill? (See pic.)

Oh, now it's pretty. :-)

With the stabilty built in, I was wondering if you could ride without hands... Definitely a bad idea.

[Snax]

Seems a question worth exploring by encouraging my children to try it.

[Bill in Houston]

I always like to throw something like that out to my kids, and then say, "oh, that's probably not a good idea" and then leaving so that they can try it out. :-)

[usedgeo]

I always knew someday I would regret not having kids. I didn't think it would come so soon .

By the way that is a nice scooter.

Originally Posted by Bill in Houston

I always like to throw something like that out to my kids, and then say, "oh, that's probably not a good idea" and then leaving so that they can try it out. :-)