would not miss it for any reason anyone else i know going? Aaron
Correction: The saftey equipment makes it possible for anyone to try it without dying.
I highly doubt that wearing safety equipment makes it any easier to ride a unicycle at that height. That is, considering the cables will be slack.
In order to do it you must first design your unicycle, build it, rent the cranes, etc. If Sem is successfull he can take his toy and go home, if someone wants to top his effort they’ll have to it themselves.
Now, if Sem were to allow someone else to ride this monster too the saftety equipment would allow them to try it and possibly do it without killing themselves.
But you already knew that.
Go Sem!
How about a live feed or web cam?
I see I was already beat to this point. Shoot.
Re: World’s Tallest Unicycle Record Attempt in January 2004!
On Thu, 22 Jan 2004 21:14:27 -0600, Sofa
<Sofa@NoEmail.Message.Poster.at.Unicyclist.com> wrote:
>Why 115 feet? why not 150, or 200?
It’s around a round 35 metres. 
>Not trying to take anything away from Sem, but the safety equipment
>really makes it possible for anyone to do it. Doesn’t it?
Like UniBrier said, designing and building the unicycle is one thing,
and a major task at that. Although if one want to break this record,
it has become a bit easier by Sem posting so many construction
details on the website.
But also riding is quite difficult, I reckon. Sem has a lot of
experience with high and ultra high giraffes. He held previous records
on 45 ft and 72 ft giraffes.
I would like to hear from Sem how he experiences and analyses the
difficulty of riding this thing. I would fantasise like this: If you
go out of balance for, say, one foot (I mean 12") you must make up for
that imbalance quickly or it will exponentially grow out of control.
But at that height, 1 foot of imbalance is hardly perceptable. The
elasticity in the chain will be a significant factor, it makes quick
corrections impossible and, once the wheel down there starts reacting,
it will easily lead to overshoot. The ‘rotational inertia’ of the
giraffe will be very large because it is so heavy, and the more so
because it is very long.
Klaas Bil - Newsgroup Addict
I have a feeling you might need two points of contact with the ground for such a thing to work? Or at least training wheels on the front and rear. - John Foss commenting on a picture of a one-wheeled vehicle he saw on RSU.
in climbing i quite often find myself sitting in a top-of-the-line harnass that i paid top-of-the-line bucks for, connected to a TOTL rope that i paid even more TOTL bucks for and despite the fact that i may only be 20m above the ground, i realise i’m going to have to shell out some more TOTL bucks for some new TOTL shorts
forget about the technical challenges, just functioning that high off the ground takes B E E G numbies
do we have a final date for this yet?
quote instead of edit
But this won’t actually be a world record ‘attempt’ as he can get back and up and do it as offen as he wants, all day long.
On another note, it sure would be cool if he was on a 115 version of his ‘giraffe walking machine’ from universe 2!
nutter! but a very brave nutter!
Good Luck Sem!
did u OD on some linguistics course or something?!
u’re beginning to sound like sendhair now
so, do u define ‘attempt’ as something that can only be done or tried once?
my friends over at dictionary.com don’t seem to agree
Well, technically it’s an attempt.
My mistake.
I’m still going to watch (but I know he will accomplish it…however long it takes, if neccessary…but judging from his riding I’ve seen, he’ll have it done the first try, maybe even 1 footed or backwards)
Should make for some awesome photos…and probably a big unicycling party
technically, this post is an attempt
can we have a party now?
I’m already there…can you make it over?
let me think about this no
but it is 16h00 on a friday afternoon
if u just started your friday and u’re not looking forward to it, relax, it’s a pretty awesome friday
enjoy
i’m still waiting to find out when this attempt will take place
does anyone have a date?
As previously stated: Jan 29
so what are u doing there allready?
r u expecting like a q or something?
Not expecting, tackling
Steve McPeak is his name. I’m not aware of any communications from Steve as to the authenticity of his ride. But I’m also not aware of any formal complaints or questions, to either Steve or the Guinness people, about the record. Just us unicyclists grumbling.
[b]
Everyone is invited. I’d love to be there. I’m sure pictures don’t adequately convey the scale of something that tall, human powered, with just one little wheel at the bottom.
Someone commented on how anyone could try that unicycle with a harness. Don’t know what the harness has to do with anything. You can “attempt” to ride it with or without. The harness won’t make it any easier. Psychologically it’s another story. I think with the harness I’d be able to sit up there without peeing my pants.
But riding something like that has got to be very far removed from riding any normal unicycle, including a giraffe in the 10-20’ range. I’ve ridden those. When you pedal those, you can feel the movement and keep track of your balance.
Keeping a 117’ unicycle under you is going to be different. This one should be a lot stiffer than Sem’s earlier giraffes, so he might actually consider it “easier” than they were. But over such a long distance, you will have some amount of delay in the drivetrain, plus the basic problem of not being able to “feel” your balance very well.
Watch the video clips on the site to get an idea of this. On the 72 footer, Sem pedaled and pedaled, but the top of the unicycle doesn’t appear to be doing much. The 45 footer just looks like a big piece of aluminum spaghetti. Sem told me that one was hard to control due to that, and due to the 2-dimensional setup of the crane. A little more side-to-side leeway probably would have helped.
By watching the McPeak video, you may or may not be able to make out the lack of actual balancing he is doing because it’s a pretty small picture. I remember watching the special when it was aired in 1980. The unicycle weighed something like 1400 pounds. The fact that Steve even pedaled it in a circle is very impressive. But he sure wasn’t balancing, or steering it.
i appreciate that
what i meant was an official, guest-of-honour kinda thing
Re: World’s Tallest Unicycle Record Attempt in January 2004!
UNI GUY wrote:
> HEMI VROOM VROOM?
No HEMI. The world’s tallest unicycle record attempt will be at the
DOME, the Silverdome in Pontiac, MI!
(: Where’s the HEMI?
/ H
| E |
| M |
| I |
±–+ The old hemisperical cylinder technology for our modern times!
Sincerely,
Ken Fuchs <kfuchs@winternet.com>
aka abc