matus1976

[matus1976]

Things are progressing nicely. After a busy day in the shop - the front end is welded up. I meticulously re-assembled everything with the frame jig and so many c-clamps, tack welded, then stitch welded. It's about 60% of the way to final welding, but plenty good for a rolling chassis. The rest of the welding will be done after I add the rotisserie to the frame jig. Next is the rear end, then the new rolling chassis with all major components installed will be put together!

[matus1976]

Rolling Chassis Welding Commences

Welding has started for Rolling Chassis v2 assembly! This will mostly be a tack weld, except for some critical more difficult to reach areas that will get obstructed by later frame parts, like the steering column and the central vertex of the frame, which will get final welds. This is an exciting and momentous step as we do a full rolling chassis assembly and test fit, and get a new round of great pics. This will not yet be a running bike as after this rolling chassis test the bike will get disassembled and put back up on the frame jig for final welding, and construction of the rotisserie (which makes final welding those difficult to reach places possible) Here we see the steering column getting it's final weld, I did quite a bit of beveling and meticulously lining up before the welding, and it came out pretty good!

[matus1976]

Leak testing / repair / test cycles continue. Each time there are fewer leaks. Now I have 3 very slow leaks left in the cold water static pressure test. I had to wait >30 minutes for any tiny drops to appear. I'll be doing hot water and pressurized tests as well, a heated test too (simulating a full tank sitting out in a hot sun for multiple hours) I'm getting noticeably better with each weld repair cycle too, makes me tempted to remake the entire thing since my welds would all be at least 50% better. But I'll resist that temptation...

[matus1976]

The recumbent motorcycle platform prototype I'm building and example variations AI has helped imagine. Where comfort meets speed. A vehicle designed for the human body, not just the road.

[matus1976]

Weekend update! I went through a few designs for the seat latching mechanism, looking for something like a cam lever that pulls the seat tight backwards against the rubber mounts. After deciding on a design I had the parts laser cut and during assembly I found there is a discrepancy between my as-built bike and the model that impacts the clearance between the seat frame and the head rest frame. So I went through some redesigns and settled on something simple, just an angle iron plate, bolted to the aluminum frame, with a 1/2"-13 nut welded onto it. Then on the frame side, just a 1/2" bolt. Ok nothing fancy, no locking or over-center mechanisms but I'll sort that out in Phase II as dimensions are finalized. For now this is good enough. The angle is mounted with a little bit of rubber to give the flexibility needed as the seat is pulled into the bolt.

The head rest frame also needed to be modified so the gas tank could actually be installed, I opted to cut the two main long back spars and have them removable, so it's easy in and out for the tank.

That as built discrepancy relates to the base hinge point of the seat, so I remade that seat base hinge mount to be more adjustable. Once the position is finalized, it will be welded in place. But now everything is fitting together perfectly, the gas tank, the seat latch, the seat frame and hinge... Very nice

[matus1976]

This is looking amazing. What will you think when you see this race by you?

[matus1976]

[matus1976]

Gas tank fabrication started today! I eagerly awaited the send cut send delivery today, I jumped right on fabrication the second it came in! Some minor hickups along the way but for the most part everything is working out as planned! The internal ribbing pictured here was mostly completed, tomorrow I'll work on all the external plates.

[matus1976]

Good day in the shop today. My recumbent motorcycle is coming along nicely

[matus1976]

Showing off the seat. Fast and comfortable! I didn't compensate enough on the inward lean of the cushions resulting in the middle ones getting compressed and having slack / ripples. Contemplating getting those middle pieces remade, but I may just call this good enough for the phase i prototype.

[matus1976]

This pales in comparison the rocket launches the last two days, but in my corner of the world I got the seat cushions back from upholster and they came out awesome. The backrest and seat for my recumbent motorcycle project. The guy who made these was 91 years old and has been doing upholstery work for literally 71 years. His whole family is in the business but he thought this project was fascinating and handled it himself. He's done thousands of custom motorcycle seats. Quite a character and still going strong.

[matus1976]

Update to my Akira Bike / recumbent motorcycle project: After a couple of tries, the bending turned out quite successful!

I first cut out two test pieces with some amazon bought HDPE and incrementally increased the temperature. Each piece at every tested temperature easily bent to the desired shape in my bending jig, but the cooler the part the more the spring back. The final run was about 20% longer and hotter than the first and I left it pressed in the jigs and added additional clamps to help. It still sprung back, but it's normal elastic flex was enough to still clamp it down. I call that good enough!

Before production, I'll redesign this jig to add additional bend to compensate for the spring back. You need to bend the part further than your desired angle and when the stress is released it returns to the desired angle. This is well known in metals but I did not anticipate such a significant spring back in HDPE.

Now off to get the upholstery done!

[matus1976]

Next up on my Akira Bike Project After glassing 3 layers on the other side of the seat base, I then added the aesthetic hybrid Kevlar carbon fiber layer. It's actually yellow and black with a red pigment to get that rich Akira red. The regular red & black hybrid fabric gets far too dark after wetting. I also used a different layup technique that produced a nice tight wrap over the edge with no fabric distortion. Looks great to me. What do you think? Last will be the clear glossy layer. The underside is the completely covered side and will be mostly visible. The edges will be the most visible part, the upper section will have the cushion bases and will be mostly covered.

[matus1976]

Seat Upholstery Style: Well I think I settled on the upholstery design for the seat. A relatively simple but elegant accentuation of the angular segmented cushions with rid piping, I will perhaps add some pleating and a logo later, but I'm happy with this for the phase 1 prototype.

[matus1976]

With the coosa board panels cut, I combined them to form the whole seat, and joined them together with a mixed slurry of chopped matt fiberglass and glass bead. After that cured, I then covered it 3 layers of glass on the top. Came out awesome! Next up I'll flip it over and do the other side. Building a fully functional high performance recumbent motorcycle for manufacture inspired by Kaneda's ride from "Akira" but designed from the ground up to take full advantage of the recumbent platform's potential. Iterating innovating features in multiple stages while building jigs and fixtures along the way for volume production. It will support multiple power platforms including various popular motors (starting with the cx500) as well as electric and hybrid versions! Subscribe to follow the build at youtube.com/matus1976 and become a patron at patreon.com/matus1976

[matus1976]

Progress marches on - those curved aluminum fingers in the previous post are the frame for the seat base, which I'm cutting here on my cnc router. Cut out of coosa board and then fit tested in my recumbent motorcycle project. I heated and pressed some T-nuts in as well to bolt to the aluminum frame. Next up, wrapping it in fiberglass!

[matus1976]

For my Akira Bike Project seat - next up I made some jigs for the seat base frame, as it will need it's own aluminum frame. The jig is a quick simple piece laser cut and using clamps to hold the aluminum frame in place, forming a long finger ready for welding.