Sell your car, buy bamboo bikes for your family - Knowledge Share 3

• "Posted by a.v.koshy on March 19, 2010 at 10:30pm

This article was written by my student and I have her permission to post it here.

Bambike – A Bamboo Bicycle

Bruce Sterling’s short story The Interoperation , featured in the Technology Review published by MIT, (Massachusett’s Institute of Technology) can be briefly summarized as a tale of a future where robots build and tear down buildings based on pre-set programs and a future where people ride bamboo bicycles.

In present times, this story is not too far from the truth. Well, at least, the latter. Today I had the opportunity to talk to Vijay Sharma – creator of Bambike- India’s first bicycle made of Bamboo. After accidently being enrolled at the Center for Environmental Planning and Technology, Ahmedabad, Vijay’s foray into manufacturing bamboo bicycles began nearly two years ago, when his wife Niyatee bought herself a cycle to commute to work. Currently located in Bangalore, He began researching cycles online and came across the trike design. A trike (abbreviation for tricycle) is a three-wheeled vehicle, different from our very own cycle rickshaws in its placement of two wheels in the front and one at the back. While tricycles are often associated with the small three-wheeled vehicles used by pre-school children, adults also use them for a variety of purposes. In Asia and Africa, tricycles are used primarily for commercial transportation, either of passengers in pedicabs or of freight and deliveries.

The idea of trikes were far too irresistible for Vijay and soon he began to design his own. After a brief stint at a furniture design company, since he always wanted to have a workshop of his own, Vijay began his own workshop called ‘6mm Designs and Furniture’ along with two friends. It was in a rundown garage in a small alley of one of the crowded areas in Bangalore. Slowly they expanded and reached out to a bigger clientele, mass-producing furniture for them. The workshop provided Vijay with the space to continue his experiments with bicycles. The trike took 6 months to come to life – from the drawing board to execution. Last year, a friend suggested he design a bicycle using bamboo. Armed with months of research, and with a few ideas of his own, Vijay made his very first Bambike in 3 days. The first prototype was made with raw bamboo with metal sleeves on junctions. This resulted in a little fishtail wobbliness at high speeds. The second prototype was made using thicker bamboo sections and this time with a jig to hold all members and important junctions like bottom brackets, rear drop out, head tube and seat tube. Here the parts were glued together without metal sleeves and using hemp fiber. A more streamlined and ergonomically superior one followed. After making the first prototype of the Bambike, Vijay met Arun Katiyar. Arun is involved with the Ride-A-Cycle Foundation that promotes biking and going green – a small way to give back to the environment. He was instrumental in encouraging Vijay to develop his bamboo bike further. While Vijay made more prototypes, Arun tested them out and gave him relevant feedback to improvise on the designs.

Bambike then went on to associate itself with TFN – Tour of the Nilgiris. The TFN is a challenging mountain bike event and would be a great avenue to test out the endurance of the bamboo bicycles as well as get it more endorsements. Vijay decided to create a bambike for the event, that would be awarded to the most sporting participant of the 8-day 900km cycling rally.

At 12 kgs, it weighs 3 kgs less than the first prototype and does not compromise on features, functionality or aesthetics. Bamboo serves as an apt material given its tensile strength and tubular structure. The fact that it is eco friendly doesn’t hurt one bit. Using Bamboo also cuts down the energy consumption as compared to steel, aluminum, titanium and carbon fiber. Bamboo has better shock- absorbing power for rough roads, and Vijay is working on a stiffer version for smooth roads.

Given the story so far, one would think that Bambike would have more buyers. This query led us to a discussion about the notion that most people have about Bamboo being a poor man’s timber. This notion tends to result in an expectation that given the material replacement, the cost of the bicycle should be tremendously cheaper. However what people seem to forget is the amount of effort that goes into the creation of a single handcrafted Bambike. While the idea of the bamboo bicycle has gained popularity in the country, it has had very few buyers. This doesn’t seem to deter Vijay’s spirit. He believes that he has achieved what he set out to, when he decided to design and create Bambike. While an increase in the sales of Bambike would definitely be a plus, he hopes for more people to start cycling for its health benefits and as an attempt by people to reduce their carbon footprints. It’s a hope for more environmental consciousness in an age of mass consumption.

by Ria Rajan.

http://www.designwala.org/2010/03/bambike-a-bamboo-bicycle/

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