Suspension Unicycle pictures

That's a really nice piece of work, but unfortunately there still has
never been a production suspension unicycle. Several people have
handmade their own designs, if you use the search functino you will no
doubt find some threads with pictures of designs.

--
kington99

Dave

- what a thoroughly post-modern subversion of the cycling genre -
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With your disign the only thing that is being suspended is the seat, so
has no real advantage over a suspention seatpost. Most who ride really
knarly terrain preffer a fat 3" tire. Those who do use a suspention
seatpost usually just ride XC.

'There was a thread recently' (http://tinyurl.com/2m8mos) where a guy
made his own design of a full suspention uni (hub, frame).

'There was a thread hear a while ago '
(http://tinyurl.com/2wsra7)discussing all sorts of design
possibilities, all having various drawbacks. The biggest being drive
control, strength, excess weight, complexity and therefore cost.

--
skilewis74
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There weren't any suspension seatposts when I built this. Thinking back,
it was 1992 which would make it 15 years old now!! I added the air seat
a few years back. I believe this pre-dates the whole MUni trend?? Its
only 2 inches travel but that's more than most seatposts, and it does
have a hydraulic shock. I'm just surprised there's nothing better after
15 years.

There are lots of ideas and conceptual drawings, and even a few
attempts to adapt mountain bike forks with all kinds of flexibility
issues. I'm just looking for practical examples that have been built
and really worked.

I can't find, but have heard of another Amp fork and a cannondale
headshock adaptation. The Amp fork was and probably still is the
lightest mountain bike suspension fork. I still have a longer travel
Amp F4 BLT with 4 inches of travel, but that may be too much?

--
kayaker43
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I like your suspension

1) the torque of a quick turn i.e. rotation frin the hips is taken up
by some easily made links. 2) the links can be big!! 3) there are no
sliding fits which can woller out with use. I hope you don't mind if I
copy it!!! I think you've got somthing. I don't think most the replys
you have got are from people who have ridden a suspended uni. I've made
one but it's linkages are down by the wheel which makes the cranks
farther apart than normal although I've never noticed. You are right
they (suspended uni s) are great!!!. Don't listen to the nay sayers
unless they have actually made one and even then a grain of salt. I
like very much. It looks like it would be easier to make than mine and
you can use "normal" forks, seat post, etc. (yes you have to modify)
but no specialty welding (aluminum>>> TIG or a tractor feed on you wire
feed) like mine and no really special machining like special bearing
holders like mine. Like I say I hope you don't mind me copying.
COOOOL!!

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Qweld

Flats blow
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'This post' (http://tinyurl.com/2wu8ao) seems to me the design of a
working prototype made.

kayaker43 said:

I can't find, but have heard of another Amp fork and a cannondale
headshock adaptation. The Amp fork was and probably still is the
lightest mountain bike suspension fork. I still have a longer travel
Amp F4 BLT with 4 inches of travel, but that may be too much?

I think the big area of potential benefit would be downhill Muni, like
what KH and the Santa Barbara guys do.

skilewis74 said:

The biggest being drive control, strength, excess weight, complexity and
therefore cost

These drawbacks are what I think stoped any real development. and to
have the nessesary strength it'd weigh like 25 lbs, even if you figured
out the drive problems. The big challenge is the thousands of dollars
and time it would take to develop a prototype.

These are the designs w/ what I think have the most potential.
http://tinyurl.com/2zpd88
http://tinyurl.com/ywldw7
http://tinyurl.com/2rv446
(if the wind up problem can be fixed/made negligible as John Childs
said in post 151)
http://tinyurl.com/392w6m
http://tinyurl.com/2oddk2
http://tinyurl.com/2a8zhj
http://tinyurl.com/35z8mz
http://tinyurl.com/ys7hj2

Maybee one of the major uni manufacturers can team up w/ a MTB maker
who has the testing equipment, experience and resources to develop one.

--
skilewis74
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skilewis74 said:

I think the big area of potential benefit would be downhill Muni, like
what KH and the Santa Barbara guys do.

I don't think so. The problem is the seat goes up and down but your feet
don't. So your seat height is all over the place. There is some preload
when you sit on the seat as well, so that's a factor in the overall
picture. All you need to do is hit a big bump with your feet in the
dead spot (vertical cranks) and you'll bounce right off the seat. This
was my experience the first time I rode the Downieville Downhill, on my
suspension post MUni in 1999.

More likely, the best place for suspension is for road and XC riders,
where the terrain isn't so radical, but your time in the saddle is
long, and taking any edge off the bumps is a good thing. I think a
short-travel suspension would be great on my Coker!

Quoted message said:

The big challenge is the thousands of dollars and time it would take to
develop a prototype.

Yes. So far, I don't think I've seen any suspended-pedal designs that
everyone agrees would work. Most either only compress in certain
directions, or would have problems with windup, oscillation and other
issues. Plus the complexity of the designs would make them pretty
expensive even at the mass-production level.

Your frame (kayaker43) looks like an awesome design. Very compact! But
again it only suspends the seat while the feet still have to move with
the contours of the ground. Why go to such complexity when you can use
a suspension post? Of course if it's for the fun of designing that's a
fine purpose in itself. So is your design 10 years old or 15? You gave
conflicting ages.

Daniel Hopkins built a Rock Shox unicycle about 10 years ago. With a
gel seat it rode like a Rolls Royce. Later on he built one with a
Cannondale Head Shock. Unfortunately I haven't heard from him in years
so I think he's no longer into unicycling.

--
johnfoss

John Foss
Email: "jfoss" at "unicycling.com" -- www.unicycling.com
-----------------------------------------------

"pretty much every trail that we've done on the California or Moab Muni
weekends is an XC trail." -- Kris Holm, on XC from a North Shore point
of view
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This is not to rip on your work, which I think is excellent, but from
the perspective of a downhill, VERY technical muni rider (that's about
all I do), I will say that I would not buy a suspension frame for my
muni, nor would I use it were I given one. As John said, suspension for
technical muni simply moves the seat, which gets to be very hard on the
rider's knees, and technical muni is already bad enough in that area.
Furthermore, wheel placement and tire location are critical for
navigating rock gardens such as those found in Tahoe and Santa Barbara,
so any aspect of a frame that reduces the rigidty of the rider-wheel
interface is negative.

To top things off, the suspension would be of absolutely no use for
large drops, simply because if you are putting weight ont he seat,
something has gone seriously, seriously wrong.

All that negative [censored] said, I agree with John that for XC muni and
cokering, such a frame could be of great utility. I don't ride coker
muni, but I can see how such suspension would make fast, mildly bumpy
singletrack such as some of Santa Cruz infinitely more fun. Then again,
I think many offroad coker riders would put a wide flange spacing ISIS
hub as a higher priority. Still, improvements are improvements.

--
gerblefranklin

http://gallery.unicyclist.com/Trials-Muni

Nick's main man.

"I love freedom dearly, ideally, in theory, but in reality we're not
there yet--Not nearly."--Cold Duck Complex
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I am very rarely on the seat when landing from a jump or drop. I
consider anything under about 3" to 4" just a bump. My ankles, knees
and waist do all the bending and act as my suspension. I would be
terrified of loosing foot/pedal contact with a suspension seat. Loss of
Foot/Pedal contact is usually the number one reason for UPDs when
MUniing. There was once a computer generated picture of a MUni with
Suspension Spokes! now that is be a GREAT idea! I am wondering if
anyone could actually make it work. A flexible rim would be needed
though.

Unicorn

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accomplish great feats!
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I am very rarely on the seat when landing from a jump or drop. I
consider anything under about 3" to 4" just a bump. My ankles, knees
and waist do all the bending and act as my suspension. I would be
terrified of loosing foot/pedal contact with a suspension seat. Loss of
Foot/Pedal contact is usually the number one reason for UPDs when
MUniing. There was once a computer generated picture of a MUni with
Suspension Spokes! now that is be a GREAT idea! I am wondering if
anyone could actually make it work. A flexible rim would be needed
though.

Unicorn

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Unicorn

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accomplish great feats!
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wait... i think im getting something... its a link, a web link, its
called...

Gah no it slipped away!

--
Jack_C-B

ivan said:

*I'll just pretend I'm a ninja and disregard all potential pain.*

*See my profile here -
http://www.unicyclist.com/forums/member.php?u=15237

* -NO I did not lose my other wheel and NO I will not do a backflip for
you!-
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That is a very interesting suspension design for a unicycle. Probably
one of the most functional and practical designs for unicycling. The
linkage from the AMP forks is pretty stiff and strong. The linkages
could be larger and stronger if necessary.

The major problem with reliability for the telescopic suspension
seatposts is that they are not designed to take the rotational and
lifting forces that unicycling puts on them. They wear out very
quickly.

The Thudbuster suspension seatpost designs work better, but the
linkages and pivots are still not strong enough for muni use.
Eventually the linkage breaks.

Too bad that 'AMP Research'
(http://www.amp-research.com/build/bikes.asp) is no longer making
bicycles and suspension forks.

Your suspension unicycle looks like a very good adaptation of the AMP
suspension fork design. Nice.

But suspension like that isn't really something that is that important
for muni. Other advancements in the strength of the unicycles has been
much more important. It is much more important to address the strength
issue of the equipment problem first. Now we have strong splined
cranks and hubs. We have better frame designs and better seats.
Things are good. We can probably afford to daydream about suspension
designs now.

As for the usefulness of suspension like that. It is only going to be
most practical and useful for XC style riding where speed is the goal
on trails that favor speed (smoother XC style trails). A suspension
like that will allow you to stay seated more which means you can ride
faster. You can spin faster while seated than you can while hovering
over the seat or standing on the pedals. If you can spin faster you go
faster. That means more speed. Would be useful on XC racing 29ers and
for Cokers where the rider is tall enough.

--
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johnfoss said:

I don't think so. The problem is the seat goes up and down but your feet
don't. So your seat height is all over the place.

Sorry, I forgot to emphasize FULL suspention. All of the links I
posted are FULLY suspended and not just the seat.

As to your comments and others, w/ a suspention seatpost I fully
agree.

If someone had say, $50,000, the time, equipment, and expertise to
design, manufacture, and test the muni I think all the problems could
be worked out.

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Wow,.. it seemed like no one was interested and I check back a day later
and see all this!

Just to clarify things. This was a production mountain bike fork made
by Amp research. I didn't design the fork itself,.. I basicly made
everything you see painted blue, and added bearing clamps to the bottom
of the fork legs. It is extremely rigid with no slop and a nice
suspension feel. It weighs 11 lbs. as you see it with mtb wheel and no
fancy parts. I spared no expense on the custom air seat cover made from
an old sock.

I just checked and my last mountain bike trophy says 1992 and I built
this the last year I was racing,.. so it really is 15 yrs old. I did a
web search back then and there was zero information to work with. I had
no ideas what type of riding it could be used for because this was
before the whole MUni craze started. I suppose it would be best for XC
use because it sure is a nice ride across a bumpy lawn or trail. Off
road unicycling was just being talked about then and a radical design
was to just use a fatter tire.

I suppose a seatpost shock would do the same thing, but I doubt if it
could be as light, tight and durable. I bought this fork from a 230 lb
guy who could stand his MTB up on the front wheel and bounce up and
down in a parking lot. That means over 250 lbs of bike and rider were
hammering that poor fork which was at about a 30 degree angle to the
ground,... massive bending loads there. I was even more impressed
because it was the lightest susp fork made and probably still is.

Even now it seems like a practical and elegent suspension for a
unicycle that would sell well if produced today. I always meant to send
a picture to Amp, but never did. I wonder if they were bought up by
someone else? I also have a later version of this fork with 4 inches of
travel and dual shocks

I'm not claiming to be the first or to invent anything,... I just built
this because I had an old fork, it was easy to do and looked like fun..

--
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John - the 3" Thudbuster needs 144 mm of clearance to the "rails"
Now they also make a '1.3\"' (http://www.thudbuster.com/products.html)
which needs 98 mm of clearance to the "rails"

kayaker43 said:

I spared no expense on the custom air seat cover made from an old sock.

:p

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I'm glad your Amp fork has lasted well and stayed in good shape. I went
through several of those forks back in the mid-90s, each of which
suffered from terrible slop in the pivots. I had better luck with
'Girvin forks'
(http://gallery.dragonmodz.net/data/500/Crosslink_fork.jpg), which were
also pivot-based (rather than slider forks), and dreamed of building a
muni frame from one of those. Unfortunately, I had neither skills nor
equipment for modifying one!

--
pkittle

*==========================
Peter Kittle * Chico, CA
"The Revolution is just a t-shirt away."
--Billy Bragg
==========================*
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kayaker43 said:

Off road unicycling was just being talked about then and a radical
design was to just use a fatter tire.

I think the problem with all unicycle suspension designs so far though
is that they are either seatpost only like yours, so no real use for
offroad riding, or complex designs that are way less elegant and
efficient than a fat tyre, and probably add more weight. Using a fat
tyre is a great solution, a 3" tyre vs. a 2" tyre is a whole inch of
really high performance very responsive suspension.

Joe

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There's no law saying you can't have frame suspension and a fat tire?
They both help🙂

--
kayaker43
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