Things we need not invented yet

[NATURAL ANKLING]

Hi,

Yeh there would need to be a range say 90-95 rpm

What are you doing..............time trials?

[shobo]

Perhaps thats what i like, Natural. Im a twiddler.

[Brucey]

electric shifting which can automatically maintain a user-specified cadence

Hmmm, involuntary, unpredictable gear changes when you are out of the saddle on a 20% gradient? No thanks!

yep that is about it. Various schemes have been tried and (whether they aim to sense speed or torque) they have all had signficant drawbacks of various kinds. In fact they have all been rubbish, really.

cheers

[reohn2]

I agree perhaps switch it off on steep hills but generally i would value cadence control on rolling hills if gears were closely spaced

The beauty of cycling is in the learning and the consequential knowledge of that learning and knowing what works for the individual.
Whilst the bike is a machine,it's a 'direct machine' in the sense that the rider is the engine and so knows his/her capability and power range.
That knowing of when and where for the rider can't be read by an intermediate machine such as a computer,if it could it would rob the rider of the beauty of cycling.

Yeh there would need to be a range say 90-95 rpm

That's waaayyyy too narrow a parameter both in range and where in the cadence range.
The human engine isn't a mechanical engine in that sense,the individual has much more elasticity of range and cadence than any on board computer can predict.

In short,we don't need that technology

[shobo]

Thanks for your opinions guys.
My opinion is to look forward to the day.
Early attempts at cadence maintaining, and i know about them, were poorly engineered and incompatible.
A big manufacturer needs to get hold of the concept but atm even simple electric changing hasnt taken off.
Its in the same category as hydro disc brakes. All the spurious guff that was talked about disc brakes, yet now they are commonplace, and i for one thought they were fantastic at the outset ( though cable operated ones difficult to set up).

[reohn2]

Thanks for your opinions guys.
My opinion is to look forward to the day.
Early attempts at cadence maintaining, and i know about them, were poorly engineered and incompatible.
A big manufacturer needs to get hold of the concept but atm even simple electric changing hasnt taken off.
Its in the same category as hydro disc brakes. All the spurious guff that was talked about disc brakes, yet now they are commonplace, and i for one thought they were fantastic at the outset ( though cable operated ones difficult to set up).

There are some things that are needed badly and some that are needless,cycling has a wide spectrum,not everyone would welcome such a system even if it did work which I doubt it ever could.

[pwa]

So far as cadence is concerned, I like to vary mine. I'm not a metronome, I'm a human being and over the course of a couple of miles my cadence will vary between zero and, well, quite a lot. In rolling country I sometimes power down a hill to get some momentum for the next rise, but if that momentum is going to get me close to the top of the next rise I sometimes stay in a high gear, reducing the cadence as my speed slows and I don't put any effort in. So that as I go over the top I am going a bit slower, not pushing hard, legs going round slowly, then build up speed on the next descent. Why? I don't know really. It feels right at that moment, but on the next hill I might do it different. Because I want to. Because I like to play with the way I do things. I'm not a time triallist so science doesn't enter into it. I had a cadence feature on a cyclo computer many years ago, and paid attention to it for a week or two.

[shobo]

Its not such a thing to get all hot over. Cadence maintenance would be a simple thing for a manufacturer to add to electric shifting, and there are many times when I'm ghosting along and would value keeping my cadence automatically in a range, rather than monitoring it by eye on computer, which as someone said, one gives up on. And damn disc brakes, they are so wrong !!

[Audax67]

I have mentioned this elsewhere but can't remember where any more, so apolologies if I'm [doting] repeating myself.

I would like to see Atrial Fibrillation detectors built into HRMs. The Megafruit Corp of Cupertino (thx Mr. L.) have done it with their trendy watch, but they only have one permanent electrode so you have to put your finger on a button to provide the other (ECGs need at least two contacts), but HRMs have two electrodes in permanent contact. It would not be all that hard a hack to put a function into e.g. a Garmin Oregon.

The only drawbacks I can see are that (1) HRM electrodes are not all that far apart, so the signal might not be all that great and (b) false positives when you're not quite sweaty enough. (A) can be overcome by judicious programming, (b) by awareness.

Garmin hackers to the white courtesy telephone, please.

[st599_uk]

I fitted a Dutch Bike Lock
Its simple, you can lock the bike in seconds and you cant lose the key so easily.

You just change the opportunities for losing the key.

Because the key is in the lock whilst you are riding, it can't be on your keyring with the house door key.
When you get somewhere, the key can often end up in a random pocket that didn't register in your brain because you were thinking of other things. OK, usually a thorough pocket search will find it, but there's also the possibility that it's (for example) been left on the pub bar because it was still in your hand when you ordered.

ah just seen this.
(somewhere in the back of my addled brain I think I wondered about this).

Knowing me and my frantic pocket searching, you have just unsold me andrew.

Thank you.

Something else I don't have to buy.

I have a small karabiner on my frame lock key. Then when bike is locked, clip to house keys.

[LuckyLuke]

I would like cars to have black boxes / supercomputers, like in the sci fi film The Fifth Element. (Bruce Willis' taxi early on). Traffic offences are automatically recorded & punished, & drivers receive points & bans there and then.
Similarly, motor vehicles to have sensors that detect pedestrians & bikes, and override the manual driver control if driving is too reckless. Like Google's driverless cars, but a working version.

Bike wise, I was daydreaming the other day about a dynamo powered invisible 'fairing'. Above a certain speed an electrically generated 'forcefield' envelops the rider & functions like an aero fairing. Dragons I'm offering a 100% share for £1,000,000...

[Mike Sales]

I would like cars to have black boxes / supercomputers, like in the sci fi film The Fifth Element. (Bruce Willis' taxi early on). Traffic offences are automatically recorded & punished, & drivers receive points & bans there and then.

I'm not too sure about the automatic judgement and punishment, but a black box recording speed, acceleration, braking, steering etc. would be invaluable after an incident.

[Bmblbzzz]

That's a thing we need that's already in use!

[mattsccm]

I agree with the car thing but would go further and have them automatically speed restricted.

[Mike Sales]

That's a thing we need that's already in use!

Really? Why have I never heard of black box evidence being used in prosecutions?