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September 3, 2009

Closing Bell: Bamboo Bikes

Red Hook's Bamboo Bike Studio has been popping up in the media recently, as in a recent piece by NY1, and so we thought we'd check it out. The studio holds weekend classes for the public, where you can design and build your own bicycle from bamboo harvested in the tri-state area. The studio is part of a larger collaboration with the Columbia University Earth Institute-based Bamboo Bike Project and the Millennium Cities Initiative to establish bamboo bike factories in South America and Africa, to provide transportation and promote sustainable entrepreneurship and light-industry development. Bikes and activism—who could ask for anything more? GMAP
Photos by Joe Zorilla




Posted by jscheff at 4:00 PM | Comments (17)
Categories: Bicycling, Closing Bell

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Comments

What's the price tag on the weekend class/bicycle kit? Anyone know? It didn't say on their website. Is it very expensive?

Posted by: tybur6 at September 3, 2009 4:19 PM

Sorry... I just clicked on the NY1 link, and it said $1250 per bike. Yowzers. Out of my price range, but I guess they are taking a lot of the money for the bigger purpose of Africa, not white guys commuting to work in Brooklyn.

Posted by: tybur6 at September 3, 2009 4:21 PM

i hope the bikes are better than their crappy website, which just crashed my computer. i wonder how they do the welds. honestly, the pic on my computer before it crashed looked like clear packing tape. walking sounds like a better option than getting impaled while riding some bamboo poles at high speed.

Posted by: CG_ups at September 3, 2009 4:24 PM

All it takes is two strokes of a handsaw to jack one of these things. Neat concept, but zero practicality here in NYC. Sorry.

Posted by: bowl of dicks at September 3, 2009 4:25 PM

"i wonder how they do the welds" my guess is a paper mache technique

Posted by: bowl of dicks at September 3, 2009 4:27 PM

The use cloth and resin.

And two strokes from a hacksaw means the bike is dead... though, I would have to say that a steel frame is equally as easy to cut through. Is that how you think folks steal bikes? By cutting the frame in half?!

Posted by: tybur6 at September 3, 2009 4:54 PM

cg ups stated my #1 thought when reading this. i wonder how long before the first rider is skewered by a breaking frame.

as for stealing by sawing through the frame, tyburg, this is logical if it's the components youre after. though i'd think it douchey to deck this out in campagnolo super record gear.

Posted by: goldie at September 3, 2009 5:28 PM

No that's not how I think folks steel bikes, but anyone could steal this one not just lock pickers and snippers. besides who cares about the frame, its the metal parts that are worth $$ in this case.

Posted by: bowl of dicks at September 3, 2009 5:30 PM

This seems like to much of a niche business for anywhere. Im am just thinking of questions people would ask if I bought that.
You bought that where?
why?
why bamboo?
huh?
$1250!! (they are thinking.....crazy......)

Posted by: Molly at September 3, 2009 5:31 PM

From their website:

A great bicycle frame must be rigid enough to optimize the power you put into each pedal stroke, yet flexible enough to absorb the bumps, divots and vibrations of the road. Inside every bamboo plant, stronger-than-steel “power fibers” run through a matrix of flexible, foamy tissue.

Stronger than steel? Really? I doubt it would be up against a hacksaw. But would it split up and impale someone?

Posted by: HmmWhichNeighborhood at September 3, 2009 5:40 PM

"to establish bamboo bike factories in South America and Africa, to provide transportation and promote sustainable entrepreneurship and light-industry development. Bikes and activism—who could ask for anything more?"

Great. One more thing we can't make here.

I think by 'stronger than steel' they mean 'pound for pound stronger than steel'. But since it's for a good cause, no need to mind the details, right?

Posted by: denton at September 3, 2009 5:54 PM

I am curious to know how much of the $1250 actually goes towards the cause. Just by looking at the pics on their website, the hardware/rims can't possibly cost more than a few hundred bucks and we're talking about fixed gear bikes here.

Posted by: bowl of dicks at September 3, 2009 6:17 PM

Bamboo is actually quite strong. You go to Asia, they use it all over the place for scaffolding in the same way we use steel.

Posted by: davfgreene at September 3, 2009 11:03 PM

Here's a pic of bamboo scaffolding for an office building in Hong Kong:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BambooConstructionHongKong.jpg

Posted by: davfgreene at September 3, 2009 11:05 PM

Here's a pic of bamboo scaffolding for an office building in Hong Kong:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:BambooConstructionHongKong.jpg

Posted by: davfgreene at September 3, 2009 11:05 PM

That bike has brakes, which means we are talking about single gear, not fixed gear.

Posted by: mshook at September 4, 2009 10:07 AM

What a bunch of negative morons you all are. Every idea you parasite off on a daily basis, including the tech you use for this blog, had to go up against people like you. It always amazes me for some reason, though I should get used to it by now, I've seen this attitude around me so often. For every thinking person out there, there's a thousand not just uninformed and inflexible people, but down right negative and destructive ones.

Thanks for the info on this. I'll be curious to see the effects of ideas like this in the coming years.

Happy labor day. hope you get bed bugs in your critic's couches.

Posted by: iz at September 4, 2009 1:28 PM

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