Free mounting very tall (10 meter) giraffe unicycles

Tim Sheppard <tim@lilliput-p.win-uk.net> wrote:

[color=blue]>I think the most reasonable way of free-mounting a giraffe over say 6 foot[/color]
[color=blue]>tall, is the running mount. I'm not sure how tall the uni would have to be[/color]
[color=blue]>before this became impossible. Anyone tried this on a 3 metre uni?[/color]

Javier Ruiz can mount his three wheel unicycle by starting to hop with his feet
between the lower and middle wheel, his body facing the side of the unicycle. He
hops in this position for several seconds, then makes a big hop up, placing his
feet between the middle and upper wheel. Another big hop up and he's hopping on
the top wheel of his three wheeler. At this point he can do a 270 uni spin down
to the pedals or any other number of things!

Using this method of mounting, one could theoretically mount a taller
unicycle with more wheels. If the total weight the the unicycle could be kept
light enough, it is hard to say what the practical height limitation of this
mount would be.

This mount can be very slow because there is direct control (actually no
rotation movement of the wheels) of the drive wheel at all times. A similar
mount can be done with perhaps a 10 ft (3 meter) giraffe unicycle by
controlling the drive wheel first with the hands and finally with the feet
during a slow ascent.

Getting back to the more mundane quick mounts: Some taller than 8 ft. giraffe
unicycles are equipped with brakes activated by hinged steps up the frame. The
brake keeps the wheel from moving while the unicyclist scrambles up before
balance in any direction is lost in any substantial amount. No doubt unicycles
in excess of 12 ft. could be mounted by a unicyclist with either a very good
sense of balance and/or very fast arms and legs!

BTW, there's no reason not to use the hopping to slowly mount a giraffe with
step brakes as Javier mounts his three wheeler as described above. The
height limit on a step brake giraffe unicycle using a hopping mount would
probably be much higher than a multi-wheeler, since step brakes are much
lighter than wheels!

In consideration of hopping mounts, it just might be possible to free mount a 10
meter (32 ft.) step brake giraffe unicycle or even taller?

Also do give consideration riding/climbing mounts on a giraffe unicycle with
multiple crankarms going up its length rather than step brakes. Simply climb up
the frame with one's feet while controlling the drive wheel with one's arms on
the successive crankarms to the top!

Stay on Top, as you climb ever so slowly to the top of that

10 meter giraffe,

Ken Fuchs <kfuchs@winternet.com