Wouldn’t you get sick of only turning to the one side all the time though? I’ve never ridden in a velodrome on a bike or a uni so I don’t know what it’s like.
It depends on the design but the point is that you don’t turn. If you get the speed and angles right all the side forces cancel out. The only difference is that you will be slightly ‘heavier’.
Riding on a proper velodrome is horrid as they are designed for higher speeds so you have to keep turning up the hill.
The overall size is unimportant. You need to match the radius and banking angle to the speed you want to do
The boredom of only turning one way, and the slight problem of being heavier could be compensated for by making the velodrome in the form of a Mobius strip, twisted into a figure 8. This would give a range of right and left turns and a range of ‘inside’ (heavier) and ‘outside’ (lighter) turns.
The rider could allow for the unlikely angles involved by wearing Cavorite coated garments.
I think it would need to be quite a bit smaller than that. Is your half based on half the speed of the bikes? I don’t think we go that fast either.
The problem with velodromes is that they’re so expensive to build. I think it would be way fun to ride on though, but once built, it’s stuck where it is (unless you spend even more and build it to be portable).
If you approach it in terms of a long, skinny oval, it might be easier to handle. The track is flat on the straights, and tilts up to the U-turn at each end. Then you can experiment with different sizes and angles in the U. It should only take three or four tries to get it where you want it…
Then the hard part will be finding enough riders, who go at about the same speed, to race with. Until then…
Even better than a velodrom would be a Wall Of Death It’s smaller than a velodrome and can be made modular and portable. Quite a bit more impressive than a velodrom too. Just got to find a unicycle that can go fast enough. Maybe one of the motorized monowheels or motorized unicycles
Ok, then, how about the Globe of Death. The Ringling folks get 6 of them motorbikes in theirs. I know it says 5 on the website, but believe me, they slip in an extra one at the end. Shhh. Don’t tell anyone else.
>Perhaps a clever system of pistons and levers would allow the track
>slopes to be changed for different users…
Couldn’t that be solved easier by having a non-constant banking angle.
I.e. the higher you go up, the more the banking. Imagine this in a
fixed-pitch font such as courier:
…x
…x
…x
…x.
…x.
…x…
…x…
…x…
…xx…
xxx…
Cool Link! I saw the WoD many times as a kid in the 70s as part of the midway shows at the New York State Fair. Might even be this same structure (different riders obviously), since it says that one was built in the 40s. It’s a great show to see…
