This report tells the beginning of a project that creates a recumbent tricycle that can help the domestic civil person do their day-by-day work without sacrificing the planet and bother the traffic, and so creating a new genre of tricycles with better autonomy and comfort for us all. Thus this project is named ZEV (Zero Emission Vehicle).
A recumbent bicycle is a bicycle that places the rider in a laid-back reclining position. Most recumbent riders choose this type of design for ergonomic reasons; the rider's weight is distributed comfortably over a larger area, supported by back and buttocks. On a traditional upright bicycle, the body weight rests entirely on a small portion of the sitting bones, the feet, and the hands. Most recumbent models also have an aerodynamic advantage; the reclined, legs forward position of the rider’s body presents a smaller frontal profile.
We've drawn some sketches in the early stages of our Pre-IP presentation to make sure how we would the bike to be like. Then we researched the different variations of this kind of model to see which fit our purposes. The typical bigger rear wheel it’s the most significant choice, because it gives more comfort, stability and supports better the hub motor, thus approaching the requisites of the ZEV project.
The chassis was predetermined that a single tube with length variation was flawless because its, once again, simple, nice and can fit to any weight of anyone in general purposes. The only parts that go outbound the chassis tube and the drive train. Everything else is attached to the single tube chassis. Of course to achieve that it has to be machined to a curve state to accommodate all the parts in the bike:
seat, drivetrain.
