Velomobile Tour Amelinghausen

Today we did a little tour with five velomobiles to Amelinghausen to get some cake.

Four of us met in Harburg and on the way we picked-up Jörn with his DF

Olli’s Mango had some trouble with a few loose screws at the front suspension. Hence, we stopped and did a little roadside repair session.

While at it, we changed a worn tire. Quite amazing how many tools, tubes and spare tires five velomobile riders have between them. The new Fumpa pump came-in real handy

Jörn checked toe-in and since the wheels where misaligned ‘slightly’ (8mm toe-out!) it got corrected as well. No wonder poor Olli nearly killed himself by keeping-up with his Mango.

Flevo in Lübeck

Went to Lübeck today, to visit Flevo and buy a Velomobile cover made by Radical Design.
Radical also manufactures the very practical velomobile bags. Highly recommended!

I’ve heard before, that the Flevo shop is a bit hidden. No kidding!

You can only see the Flevo shop, if you stand right in front of it.

The little back yard, in the middle of these centuries old houses, is absolutely adorable.

On the way back, I came in a rain shower. Despite regularly using some anti-fog, the Milan visor fogged-up within minutes and I had to take a break at a farm shop.

The farm is quite famous around here, since they grow their red potatoes on trees

Anyway, while the Radical cover is actually custom made for the WAW velomobile, it just fits the Milan GT as well. Its a bit loose at the front of the nose, though.

The Milan is still shod with Marathon GT 365. While their grip on wet roads is absolutely stunning (I can break hard at any speed in rain), they are kind of slow.
The Milan consumed roughly 30% more energy on this trip (125km with a 40.3km/h average) than I’m used to (a whopping 9.9Wh/km instead of 6-7Wh/km*) and the battery ran dry two kilometers from home. Tomorrow the quicker Maxxis DTH go back on the front wheels and the GT 365 will be used for winter commuting.

*both figures include some city traffic. The stop-and-go between traffic lights easily doubles or even triples the overall consumption figures, compared to the actual consumption figures on flat, open country roads (3-4Wh/km).

Velomobileworld Alpha 7

Jan Wijnen from Velomobiel.Ro posted a really nice video about the Alpha 7 production.

More about the Alpha 7 velomobile at velomobileworld.com

Velomobile tires

So far, I’ve tried several tires with the Milan. As usual, I can’t say much about the rolling resistance of these tires (no power meter) and since there is a small hub motor in the Milan, I’m most concerned about … Continue reading →

Velomobile front axles with HeliCoil screwlock inserts

Since I’ve experienced a loose axle screw on the left front wheel of the Milan on my commute, I’ve drilled-out the M6 thread and put self-locking M6 HeliCoil screwlock inserts in. The screwlock insert is not really necessary for the right hand axle, though.

While others usually suggest medium-strength Locktite thread-locker for the axle bolts, I’m not fond of using Locktite on fasteners I have to unscrew regularly and think the HeliCoil screwlock thread inserts are the best solution in this case (I’ve got a wide range of Locktite products at hand, use them for decades at work and even got the proper training to use them in aviation or public transport maintenance).

Zeitfahren Hamburg-Berlin 2019

This gallery contains 24 photos.

Some impressions from the start of the Hamburg-Berlin Brevet 2019 in Curslack. The start of Hamburg-Berlin 2016

Geared hub motor – sun gear centering

Since the new Bafang CST was quite annoyingly noisy inside the Milan velomobile, I’ve opened it up and checked the alignment of the sun gear. The sun gear was more than 0,2mm out of true and obviously the culprit.

After centering, the sun gear is now only 0,02mm out of true, the motor is much quieter and the noise is way less annoying. I don’t mind a bit of humming from the geared hub motor in the velomobile. But the pulsing whining noise due to the unaligned sun gear was really annoying and got pretty loud at certain speeds.

Now I have to do the same with the other CST in the 584 rim. That motor is even louder than the first one.

The Shredda Evo 40-406 is finally gone

Today, Theo from Velomobiel.nl congratulated me for ordering the very last Shredda Evolution in 40-406 size from his stock.

Since Velomobiel.nl bought all remaining stock of the Shredda Evo in 40-406 size when Schwalbe discontinued the tire about three years ago, it seems the Shredda Evo just achieved unobtanium status.

Fridays for Future

Went to the Fridays for Future demonstration with the Milan yesterday. I’m rather proud of these kids.

While I’m well aware that a velomobile isn’t a viable option for the vast majority of people, some very few might find them interesting, if they know velomobiles even exist.

Official numbers by the police indicated, about 17,000 people demonstrated in Hamburg. The organizers even counted about 25,000 people.

Curious kid…

…the boy with the mobile phone was pretty fascinated about the velomobile and came back several times to ask questions. You could tell, he gave it a lot of though.

Looks like I got at least one of the 20,000 people hooked on getting a velomobile. 🙂

Spargeltour 2019

Last Saturday we met at Benno and Gaby’s place for the annual Spargeltour.

The yard was already filled with ten velomobiles and three recumbents when I arrived.

Martina had a seat in the Milan GT and later in Jens Milan SL.

We started together, but parted since the recumbents went for a little gravel tour…

…while the velomobiles headed for the small country roads

Velomobile stand-off

Open road

Our destination, Schloh’s Spargelhof. None of us actually ordered asparagus.

Quattrovelo and Milan SL in matching colours

Aside from the three Milan SL, two Milan GT, two Quest, two Mango, a Quattrovelo and a DF, there where two Wolf & Wolf ATL1 tourer and a Razzfazz carbon low racer