Inventing a bicycle. Electronic plug

My last post about electronic gadgets on a bicycle was met with surprisingly warmth and I promised to continue. Today, a post about a new one-legged bicycle fork with electronic control. What it looks like:



And what it looks like on the diagram:



Meet: a completely secret until recently, the project Simon .

The presentation of this product and held Cannondale in his laboratory "Area

88 ".

Simon is a programmable electronic plug based on the well-known

one-legged Lefti.



All this electronic filling consists of:

- joystick for control

- central computer

- LCD display

- lithium-ion-cobalt battery, which also has brains

- electrohydraulic servo valve

- optical position sensor

- acceleration sensor.

All of the above components are united by a data network.



The main idea of ​​this whole construction, I think, is already clear to everyone. On the steering wheel you have

5-way joystick. On the steering tube - the display in the camputer - smart brains,

that control the servo valve and, therefore, according to your desires,

and also according to the readings of the sensors they set the optimum for the given context

mode of operation of the plug.

There are five main modes of operation of the system: Cross-Country, All-Mountain, Downhill, Travel Management and Lockout. With lockout, everything is clear. But the modes Cross-Country, All-Mountain, Downhill are pre-set modes that can be changed manually, you can customize the combination of the characteristics of the plug to ride 10,000 different tracks. Here are screenshots of the user interface:

Here it is, the brain of the system (assembly from the display, processor module and battery,

all of this is inserted into the pin of the fork fork):

The servo valve actually does a fairly simple job: it adjusts the fork's damping speed — separately when working in compression and in rebound. That's all. The use of sensors adds many new features. For example, using data from a position sensor, a processor with a servo valve can mimic the operation of a stable platform when, under the action of a pedal racer, the plug does not burn out, but works out bumps. Suspension operation with progressive characteristics, etc., can be simulated. And here is a high-speed stepper drive that controls the servo valve and that should be enough for 30 million valve movement cycles: The weight of a fork with a 130 mm stroke along with all the bells and whistles is 1800 grams. Here is a photo of the slide from the Cannondale presentation:



There is such an English term - car-priced bicycle, that is, a bicycle for the price of a car. No matter how the term car-priced fork appears in the near future.