“Habits Equal Results”
“Persistence Pays Off”
“Sorry [GF], I can’t make any plans until next weekend”
These are all phrases, passed down through the ages by some very accomplished and intelligent people, that one keeps in mind while making steady progress towards a distant goal, especially when that progress comes in small pieces grabbed from whatever’s left of 24 hours in a day outside of a full day of contract work, the minutiae of daily life and beloved sleep.
Work on the velomobile has continued with some very satisfying results though at the expense of any progress toward rehabilitation of the MR2 and, for better or for worse, any blogging activity.
And so I present, for your viewing pleasure, RESULTS:
So much progress has been made that this picture is already obsolete: control bars have been bent up, the steering mechanism significantly modified, the whole machine dismantled and rebuilt several times as well as many lessons learned.
Most of the sheet metal parts, such as those that constrain the NuVinci, the upper control arms, and the swingarm shock mount have been found inadequate and led to redesigned parts. In the case of the front suspension, a significant review of what the hell I was thinking six months ago had to be undertaken as the suspension didn’t do a very good job of constraining the wheel while the NuVinci mounts, in a subtle effort to compensate, interfered with the sprocket mounted onto the machined flange of the NuVinci enough that a chain would not fit. Just as well then, since the NuVinci control box would, under certain conditions, get crunched by the upper control arm.
Some of this was due to the difficulty involved in machining the NuVinci as it frustrated nearly all efforts to fixture it well enough to machine the flange. What inititally was only supposed to take Nolan a few weeks and one sixpack of Guinness (in cans) ended up costing a month and a half, several conversations with a wizened old German machinist, several trials with both lathes and mills, handing it off to another friend with the appropriate CNC machining center and a comped dinner. In addition to the Guinness. Even then, the numbers on the drawing couldn’t be met and so a few mm here and there ultimately resulted in interference. I thought machining the flange would be easier than using an adapter to pick up the brake disc mounting holes and bridging the distance to the sprocket with an adapter but that now looks like an improvement to make in the next version.
While those parts are being made I will occupy myself with the cargo racks and the exoskeleton.
Suhas, thank you for the inspiration. Indeed, habits equal results. Keep up the good work. 🙂