bike circuits
June 26th, 2007 by Lawrence David
i saw a terrific bike today on mass ave. in cambridge, right by city hall.
what set this bicycle apart was its electronic wiring. it had 2 headlights and 2 tail lights. each was homemade: the designer had taken some translucent salt and pepper shakers and studded their ends with LEDs from radioshack. i followed the leads from the shaker lights down to the front wheel hub — there was a generator enclosed within the oversized hub. nifty!
but, what was really rad was how the whole circuit was completed. i could only find one lead from each light to the hub-generator. the negative leads from each light were either just soldered to the bike’s frame or to it’s metal mesh basket. and then it hit me: the entire bike was the ground!! sure enough, there was a lead soldered from the bike fork to the hub’s ground lead.
how cool is that?!
seeing that bike made me want a camera phone for about the 3rd time in my life. (first two times involve “thoth,” the g-string-wearing, viola-playing, opera-singer/yodeler who used to show up in grand central station during my morning commute to high school.) everything happens for a reason my mother tells me; maybe this episode is an sign that i should buy an iphone?
