An all-automatic CVT based bicycle?

It's quite a while since I've seen such a concentration of opinionated
wrongheadedness even on RBT as this post:

On Jun 5, 5:29*pm, Werehatrack wrote:
Until a bike can be fitted with at least an applied-effort guage to
provide input to the shift control system, and until the rider can
override control of the automatic shifting, no autoshift arrangement
will be worth a damn for the average rider. *

Shimano's Cyber Nexus does better than merely measure applied effort:
it permits the rider to choose his level of effort and adapts to his
choice.

Of course the Cyber Nexus system allows manual overrides of both the
gearbox and the electronic suspension.

All current 'automatic'
bike gear shift systems rely entirely on the assumption that there is
a fixed upper limit for pedalling rpm which can be universally applied
as the proper shift point...which, for most people, is dead wrong.

Crap. I've explained several times already that the Cyber Nexus system
allows you to choose how fast you want to pedal.

They typically enforce a far higher cadence than the average rider
wants to use...and no matter what the engineers, professionals,
designers, ergonomicists, and other self-appointed authorities may
want to believe, THE RIDER is the ONLY one who should be making this
decision. *

In the Cyber Nexus system the rider already makes this decision He
has 8 power expenditure choices, and can operate each according to
three different "ramping" maps instantly available under his thumb.
You haven't read the thread, Werehatrack; you're talking through the
back of your neck.

Automotive automatic transmissions use several inputs to determine
shift points; they analog engine output by sensing both engine RPM and
throttle position (and/or, in older units, manifold vacuum), and they
they sense vehicle speed. *All of these factors (apparent engine
output, throttle position, speed) are used to modulate both the shift
point and the shift severity. *Bike 'automatic' shifters simply
upshift at a fixed speed and assume it's always right...even though,
for most users, that's seldom (if ever) the case.

Crap. Once more, the Cyber Nexus system offers 8 choices of power
input, and 3 further choices of how fast the gears change and from
where gear changes start.

I've now had the chance to ride two different bikes with automatic
shift setups. *

You should name them.


Both had exactly the failing described; they wanted to
force me to pedal at a cadence that was unnaturally high. *I got the
same response from others who tried them; while the way in which it
was articulated was different, the result was the same. *Each rider
wanted a bike that didn't make them pedal "so hard" or "so fast" or
"so much". *One complained that the bikes were "too slow" because she
never got the pedalling rate up to the point where the bike would
shift. *

These must be pretty crude "automatic" gearboxes.

Since trying to measure rider effort is a nontrivial task from an
expense and complexity standpoint, I predict that we will continue to
fail to get useful autoshift systems on bikes. *

Yawn. We've had useful systems from Shimano for getting on for two
decades now, first the Auto-D fourspeed system and then the 8sp Cyber
Nexus/Di2 system.

This will remain true
regardless of whether the bike employs a gearhub, a derailleur, or a
CVT. *

It hasn't been true for years, so it cannot be true into the future.

--
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Words processed in a facility that contains nuts.

I hope you enjoyed your rant, Werehatrack.

The facts, if you are interested in facts at all, are he
http://members.lycos.co.uk/fiultra/B...%20Smover.html

Andre Jute
http://members.lycos.co.uk/fiultra/B...20CYCLING.html

"Andre Jute" wrote in message
...
On Jun 5, 4:00 am, "Tom Kunich" cyclintom@yahoo. com wrote:
"Andre Jute" wrote in message

...

On Jun 4, 9:32 pm, "Tom Kunich" cyclintom@yahoo. com wrote:
Do you suppose you gain anything by having an automatic transmission
on a
device that can usually be powered through a single gear?

What a curmudgeonly old luddite you are, Tom. Let the young man have
his dreams of making something, or making something better, or even
reinventing the wheel. Who knows, if we encourage him he might invent
something to make even you seem, by magic, as fast on your bike as a
young man.

Andre, one of the problems is that too many people think "improvement" is
"speed".

Quite. I've said so many times before. But the problem is that many
cyclists, and many on this conference, do think that improvement and
speed are synonymous to the exclusion of any other equivalence, and
say so, or imply it by constant emphasis on weight. When I arrived on
RBT some posters showed the poor judgement of sneering at me as a
"recreational cyclist", for instance -- and what is opposed to a
recreational cyclist but one who is speedier? Bullies generally
believe that they act with the support and on behalf of the majority,
in short that their opinion is the lowest common denominator.

I don't want to discourage someone from inventing anything they
want. But can't a good bicycle remain a good bicycle?

I agree with you. No one should shackle up a thoroughbred to a cart
hauling corpses to the cemetery.

But that isn't what this thread is about. This thread is about making
a comfort-bike even more comfortable. I, for one, define "improvement"
not as speed (though speed may come into it as a result of other
factors) but as greater comfort, greater ease of operation, more time
to enjoy being out in the open rather than paying attention to
shifting gears or keeping up cadence or proving something by taking
the lead on the steepest hills. You're throwing a bunch of apples --
very well bred apples, true -- into a basket in which this young man,
and I, and Joseph and others, have placed only oranges. I mean, who in
his right mind will put a NuVinci CVT on these bikes:

Look KG241
Time VX Elite
Colnago C40
Eddy Merckx EX Pro
Basso Loto
Raleigh CX
Atala CX converted to a touring bike.

It's a point I made to the OP already, when I discussed the
miscomprehension of their potential market by the designers of the
NuVinci -- they're in comfort bikes, not sports bikes, but they
demonstrate that they do not understand this by providing fittings for
a disc brake, for all the world as if they believe they're competing
against Rohloff...

Andre Jute
http://members.lycos.co.uk/fiultra/B...%20HUMOUR.html

And, in any event, how many of us aren't "recreational cyclists." I can
think of professional racers, couriers and the odd rickshaw........for the
rest of us it is basically for enjoyment (....even if I pretend the morning
commute is about "efficiency/environment/time"......I'm sure that if I
didn't enjoy it I'd soon be back in the car.)
Hugh Fenton