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Neat thread idea. Here is my favorite concept bike of all time, the Yamaha Sakura. Its lines are perfect. I love the color. It's just exactly what a motorcycle should be.  Someone already posted the Moto 6.5, which I also think has near-perfect lines, so here is the mockup of what would have been the next in the series, the X-Ray:  1980 BMW Futuro, ft. Ace and Gary:  It's hard to beat the BMW R7 (1934) for pure class in a Dick Tracy sort of way:  I've never been a huge Gold Wing fan, but 1999's X-Wing is the absolute highest-proof distillation of THE MILLENNIUM into a motorcycle and I would absolutely own it, wearing a silver racing suit: 
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Jul 15, 2021 03:09
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| # ¿ May 14, 2024 18:44 |
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Funny you should say that! Today I have been taking it apart to fix some broken parts and make upgrades. The temperature gauge was bugging me a lot. The Hawk's stock sensor is one of those dumb single-wire ones that grounds through the frame, meaning the reading was extraordinarily noisy, and it would fluctuate as the bike's system voltage went up and down. Super annoying. Also, because of the characteristics of that sensor, it lost a lot of resolution at the top end when read digitally, which is a problem because that's exactly where you want a precise reading. So anyway I found a new proper 2-wire sensor that fits the Hawk, which means I can isolate it from the bike's electrical system and get much smoother data. However, it is still an analog device and thus must be calibrated before use. So here I am boiling it on my stove while it's connected to the dashboard and taped to a reasonably accurate digital probe.  I started the pot with ice-cold water, and took about 20 readings comparing the analog sensor and the digital one as the water heated up. Plotted those points and did a couple of different regressions to find the sensor's response curve. I'm still fine-tuning the lookup table, but so far it is much more accurate and hits 100 degrees precisely as the water reaches a rolling boil, which gives me confidence. As for continued development of the thing: the main issue is that the OLED display, although it looks fantastic at night, is not really readable in full sun. I haven't done a whole lot of work on it over the last two years, but the big stumbling block has been trying to find an appropriate alternate display. It's nearly impossible to find something that has the right look, with the right performance in all lighting conditions, that is suitable for automotive use, and which isn't some industrial display that costs a million dollars. Display technology changes every year, though, so there's stuff that's available now that simply didn't exist when I started the project. I recently found a couple of parts that I'm pretty stoked about. A little on the expensive side, but they meet about 90% of my ideal requirements, and have some major benefits that will cut the cost and size down in other areas and open up additional options. So now it's just dealing with the COVID-related total logjam of all electronic parts planetwide, ugh. But stay tuned... 
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Jan 9, 2022 01:26
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It occurs that I've never posted what it looks like on the inside: This is part of why I haven't offered to make more of this one to sell, lol. That's probably 50 hours of point-to-point wiring work. The next version will definitely have a proper custom circuit board, at least for a bunch of the stuff. (one big advantage of the alternate displays I'm looking at is vastly simplified wiring) Sagebrush fucked around with this message at 05:00 on Jan 9, 2022 |
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Jan 9, 2022 04:52
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Frazzbo posted:Nice work! Re: your earlier comment about the OLED screen not being readable in sunlight, would a Kindle-type electronic paper screen work better? Suggestion offered as a true non-expert, by the way 😕 Yeah, as LimaBiker says, e-ink is definitely very readable in sunlight, but it refreshes extremely slowly. Best case it takes a second or so, and the more rugged displays (like the ones used for those electronic tags in stores) can take 30 seconds or more to fully cycle. Great for mostly static displays that you want to draw zero power when not changing. Not usable for a responsive instrument system. OLEDs are great because they have instant response and the black is truly black, so at night you just have perfect glowing grid lines without LCD panel glow. Unfortunately, they are still very dim. The technology is getting better, but currently the brightest displays emit around 500 cd/m^2, which is about half the 1000 that is needed to be considered viewable in full, direct sunlight. Most motorcycle digital dashboards are transflective LCDs, like a digital watch. These are highly readable in sunlight and can be backlit at night. They're monochrome, but that isn't a huge disadvantage for me given the design I'm going for. The problem is that they have a lot of light leakage and glow around the pixels, so you don't get a very crisp image; they get really sluggish in cold temperature and darker in the heat, and so require a temperature compensation circuit; and graphic ones with a pixel grid (vs. pre-segmented ones like most motorcycle gauges) are ridiculously expensive these days for what they are, since no one is using them anymore. I am currently looking at an aviation-grade IPS TFT, with about 1200 cd/m^2 brightness, high contrast, and a fully variable backlight that goes right down to zero. This should be better in every way than any of the other solutions except for the nighttime panel background glow, but with a variable backlight I should be able to knock the glow down to an extremely minimal level, or do some other clever optical tricks to make it not as obvious.
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Jan 14, 2022 18:08
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yep. yep Slavvy posted:It's always funny when people try to do some kind of avant garde stuff but they're not nerds (at least not the right kind) so they can't see the hideously pedestrian wheels and suspension that jump out at you like dogs balls. tri-wing wheels are objectively the best kind of wheels other than spoked wheels, but i agree that the spindly econobike forks and teeny solid rotors are a bit of a lol
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Jan 27, 2022 20:54
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Looks dumb as poo poo imo. And probably unrideable.
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Jan 10, 2023 19:17
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Fuell is the stupidest name for a motorcycle that doesn't use any. But it wouldn't be a Buell production if it didn't have some batshit stupid decisions involved. It isn't the prettiest bike I've ever seen, but it is dang close to my requirements to get an electric bike (150 miles, 1-hour charge, <$10,000). Hmmm e: after reading the site I suspect that none of the specs are available at that price, lol. They have a 10 kWh battery, which might just barely squeak out 150 miles, but they also advertise two different motors (one being a pathetic 15 horsepower) and three different chargers, the fastest of which is 6.6 kW. I bet $12k is the strippo model and to get the advertised specs it'll be 20k or more Sagebrush fucked around with this message at 07:46 on Feb 26, 2023 |
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Feb 26, 2023 07:39
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Nidhg00670000 posted:I mean, it's not like doing it on a "normal" bike, but it took us about 45 minutes, having never done it before and following a guide off of the interwebs. It's not like replacing the clutch on an older BMW K-bike or something. Pro tip: on most bikes it's four bolts for the cover, two for the sprocket, slide the wheel forwards to loosen the chain and you're done. Sometimes you don't even have to take the shift lever off (2 more bolts)
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Jul 28, 2023 21:55
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yeah i love that. post the video whenever he gets it on the road. i bet you could run it on old motor oil or canola oil or literally anything. it'd be a fun (noisy, smelly) way to commute to work
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Sep 23, 2023 18:49
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Slavvy posted:If only it didn't look like 1970's hospital equipment I think it's gorgeous.  I bet you don't even like the Moto 6.5 or the R1150R.
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Jan 12, 2024 23:27
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| # ¿ May 14, 2024 18:44 |
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super disappointed it doesn't have the capsule sticker
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Jan 21, 2024 08:23
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