Glad You're Not Riding 200 years Ago!

The modern bicycle: Minimal effort, maximum movement

One of the things which draws people to cycling is the sheer bang for buck that it delivers, the effort versus outcome which revolving your legs affords. On a modern lightweight bicycle, it's not difficult to achieve speeds far in excess of walking, or running, with minimal effort. In short, cycling is highly energy efficient.

However, it hasn't always been so. Travel back 200 years and walking and horse riding were the prime means of transport, and the only thing which loosely resembled a modern day cycle was to be found (maybe appropriately) in France. This was known as the celerifere, or wooden horse, and consisted of a set of heavy wooden wheels connected with a wooden apparatus, upon which the rider sat. No pedals, no chain, no brakes, the thing couldn't even be steered, and was propelled by the rider pushing his feet along the ground.  

Steering to Improvement

A German, Karl von Drais improved marginally this design in 1818 with the incorporation of a moveable handlebar which allowed some degree of steering. However, movement was still achieved by feet making direct contact with the ground. Speeds were low, and as they worked best on flat surfaces where pedestrians walked, accidents were common. They were also very much viewed as being the preserve of fops so it was no surprise they became known as 'hobby horses' or 'dandies'. Drais did however patent his machine in Paris rather than his German homeland, maybe a sign of an already fertile enthusiasm for all things two wheeled in the country which was to produce the world's most famous cycle race. 

Pedal Power

Macmillan's cycle

The first appearance of pedals was credited to a Scotsman, Kirkpatrick Macmillan who in 1838 produced a type of hobby horse which also had stirrup pedals, cranks and drive rods to turn the rear wheels. While there remains some dispute about the authenticity of this claim, what is clear is that there was still no chain and, like its predecessors, it proved heavy, with the power transfer mechanism clunky and inefficient.

Pedal the Big Wheel

It was back to France and 20 years later for the next major advance with the Michaux father and son team placing pedals directly on to the front wheel of the cycle. Alongside the replacement of wooden wheels and frames with those made of stronger, and lighter, iron and steel constructions, the new invention saw speeds increase and enthusiasm for cycling grow. As one revolution of the pedals resulted in a full turn of the front wheel, it shortly became apparent that the bigger the front wheel, the faster a rider could travel. It wasn't long therefore before front wheels measuring up to 5ft were being produced, the legendary penny farthings (so called because the front wheel resembled the scale of a 'penny' compared to the back wheel 'farthing') making their first appearance.  

Penny farthing v Safety Bike - Which one would you rather ride?

A Safer Alternative

While quicker than their predecessors, with the riders centre of gravity right above the front wheel, the penny farthings were difficult to ride and potentially dangerous, with many a young man thrown out of his seat and over the front wheel. It wasn't until the 1880s when factories in the Midlands in England began the production of what became know as the Safety bicycles i.e safer than the massive front wheeled beasts. These new machines bore many similarities to today's bikes - diamond shaped frame, wheels of equal dimensions, a chain to connect the pedals and large sprocket to a smaller sprocket attached to the rear wheel, and seat set back to even the spread of the rider's weight. These machines proved an immediate success, significantly increasing the range of riders and setting cycling on its mass participation course into the next century.

The Next 200 Years?

Casting eyes back over time like this makes one wonder what the future for the bicycle holds. If 200 years of development has seen the cycle develop from a lump of rolling wood to lightweight carbon creatures, where will the next 200 years take the two wheeled wonder? How much more efficient can these machines become, or we will reach a point where no extra speed or forward motion can be produced from the rider's energy? Will innovation grind to a halt? Given man's insatiable quest for improvement it's unlikely though that things will stand still and no doubt the cyclist of the future will look back on 2014 and wonder how cyclists managed.