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Whilst cycling across fife with a stiff wind blowing in off the North sea today, I mused upon the measurement of bicycle speed. Most bike computers measure the speed over the ground, by counting wheel rotations; some also use GPS magick and also are able to measure altitude and therefore amount and rate
of climb - a much more significant factor in bicycling action. But wind is a huge factor in bycycling, and so it would I suggest be more useful to know one's airspeed than one's groundspeed.
So, a long pole is mounted on the handlebars, with a pitot tube at the end, connected to an air speed indicator. The pitot might also be pivoted with a little vane, so that the relative wind direction is also indicated. To allow for post-ride analysis and pub boasting, a clockwork pen-trace can record direction and airspeed on a little reel of paper.
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If you're arguing that a headwind makes cycling harder (which it does) and that therefore you should record a wind-adjusted speed, it is logical that you should also adjust the speed for other factors which make cycling easier or harder, such as incline and road smoothness. |
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There are now hubs that measure power, which corresponds to adjusted-for-everything speed, in a sense. |
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Must be airspeeed is like airspeed, only going really really faaaaast. |
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// factors which make cycling easier // |
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// cycling across fife // |
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No doubt your environment alone would be a considerable spur
to greater efforts. Leaving Fife by the most expeditious means is
well known and documented social phenomenon. It is an
undeniable fact that several of the most ambitious civil
engineering projects in the last 150 of your years, including
bridges over the Forth and Tay, were initiated with the noble
intent of assisting people to leave Fife more rapidly. |
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At the low air velocities involved, a pair of rotary anemometers
mounted at right angles in a horizontal plane might well give
more useful and accurate data than a pitot, and would be more
resistant to effects caused by environmental factors, such as
icing (Prevalent in Fife throughout the year), and wasps building a
nest in the ports. Special nasty yellow-and-black tartan wasp,
with a real attitude problem. Yuk. |
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Whilst the pitot tube is a good idea I was thinking perhaps some magnets, a coil of wire and a nicad battery would be absolutely essential to, err....to measure the distance, of course. |
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//At the low air velocities involved// You have never cycled across Fife, have you? |
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Thankfully, no. But we are conversant with the details of the
psychiatric reports and in many cases autopsy findings of many
who have tried. |
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For the purposes of generating a generally applicable
specification it may be advantageous to exclude some more
extreme cycling environments from the data set, includin polar
regions, the surface of your moon, and Fife - which is notable for
being the predominant bias factor; a bleak, windswept hostile
wasteland, inhabited by surly incomprehensible drunks created
specifically to reinforce the stereotypes found in Ian Rankin's
novels. |
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Fife is like Hell, but with the addition of compulsory haggis, and a
less welcoming attitude to newcomers. |
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