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I built this recumbent partly as a test-platform for some ideas I had about recumbent design and partly just to see if I could during my senior year of college. Since my school is in the mountains, I wanted the bike to have somewhat higher ground-clearance than some other recumbent bikes that I've seen. I also built it with fat tires in mind, since some of the fastest routes across campus aren't paved the whole way.
The frame is MIG welded together from a pair of donor bikes and a length of 1 1/2" 14-gauge square steel tubing, which was overkill, but it was the best that I could get from the local metal supplier. In its current configuration, I'm running it as a 3x7 using salvaged Shimano Acera components and a seven-speed megadrive freewheel which gives me 24x34 in my lowest gear, giving me the range to tackle anything that the Appalachians can throw at me.
The seat is still a work-in-progress, and what you see in the pictures is a temporary solution until I have the time and resources to build a new one.
The frame is MIG welded together from a pair of donor bikes and a length of 1 1/2" 14-gauge square steel tubing, which was overkill, but it was the best that I could get from the local metal supplier. In its current configuration, I'm running it as a 3x7 using salvaged Shimano Acera components and a seven-speed megadrive freewheel which gives me 24x34 in my lowest gear, giving me the range to tackle anything that the Appalachians can throw at me.
The seat is still a work-in-progress, and what you see in the pictures is a temporary solution until I have the time and resources to build a new one.
I am currently building my own recumbent bike from an old tandem and I wanted some pointers on how you set up the gears, some details about the seat, and also about setting up the steering. I appreciated your tip on chain length and I know each bike is different but if you had some other pointers or advice...
I was thinking that mounting the seat on a crane type thing would be great so I could change the seat distance, but I'm kinda scared of the complexity involved.
For the seetring under the seat, is that better than having them in front ? since its under don't you have a smaller turning radius?
A recumbent is great once you are rolling but needs more work for initial speed, I think. how did you set up the gears?
thanks a bunch
As far as the gearing, I set my recumbent up with a pretty wide range of ratios, but I focused on the low end first because my college campus is very steep in places, and recumbents put you at a disadvantage on hills.
Where steering is concerned, if you're building anything with a long wheelbase, and tandems are just as long as my recumbent, your turning radius is going to suffer somewhat (get larger). Under-seat vs. over-seat steering is really just a matter of preference as far as I'm concerned, and if you're going with a remote steering rig like I have (where the handlebars actuate a rod that's connected to the front fork), you're always going to have a slightly larger theoretical turning radius because you can't turn the front wheel totally perpendicular to the back wheel, but in real riding situations, this never comes up unless you've made a big mistake, and then you've got more pressing things on your mind, like the effect that gravity will shortly have on your body.
An equivalently-geared recumbent on flat ground might require slightly more work to get up to speed when compared to a normal bike, but that's pretty much just the first two seconds, when you're getting rolling. After you're moving, there shouldn't be a noticeable difference as long as you're not going uphill. Uphill, because you're not sitting over the pedals like you would be on a regular bike, you don't get the same sort of power, but downhill and on flat ground, a recumbent creates less drag and has the potential to go quite a bit faster.
I hope this helps.