It may well be the world’s most awesome pedal car. The name of the car also tips those that speak German to its true nature, because Fahrradi means bicycle. The giant pedal car has gull wing doors that flap as the car drives down the street. According to the designers, the flapping motion of the doors helps lift the car slightly off the ground and helps to ventilate the inside.

The car has two seats inside and in Austria, it can be driven on the streets. I’m not sure if driven a ridden is more accurate. The vehicle has external lights for nighttime use composed of 200 ultra bright LEDs. The pedal car is currently on exhibition in Linz, Austria at the Lentos Museum of Art until July 4. The pedal car is part of the exhibit called “Car Culture: The Car As Sculpture”.

[via DigitalTrends]

Zagster, previously known as CityRyde, is aiming its service at people who are commuting longer distances one way. There are competing services already in some markets for shorter two-way trips. Interestingly, the bicycles that are loaned to users by Zagster are free to the end user. The company hopes to be an amenity used by apartment complexes and businesses to lure in workers and residents.

Zagster would charge the business or apartment complex a monthly fee for bicycles, maintenance, and a distribution center. The fee is $100 per month for each bike, and the user would reserve the bikes online and then unlock the bike from the distribution center on the property using a smartphone. The company thinks that its service should be an amenity just like a pool or gym. Would this sort of service make you want to live or work somewhere it was offered over somewhere similar without free bikes?

[via Gigaom]

The concept bike uses a neuron helmet that the rider would wear allowing them to shift gears using their mind. Apparently, you can even change the direction of the bike by thinking left or right. The thought control gadgets for smartphones I have tested have been difficult to use at times. I would hate to be riding a thought control bicycle and not be able to get it to shift gears when needed.

The bike seems to interface with the special iPhone app and the iPhone is mounted to the handlebars. It looks as if you can also change gears by touching buttons on the iPhone. The bike builders say that the iPhone app allows you to show all kinds of information about the bicycle presumably including speed, gear, cadence, and a lot of other things that help improve your ride. This technology is very cool but I’m not sure many people want this with the tech just yet.

The first product of Gotham Bicycle Defense has been crowd-funded by KickStarter and has garnered $24,915 of their $18,000 goal – with 57 days left to go! That’s 359 backers for a project that will soon be shipping this lamp with its hardcore features galore. What you’re getting here isn’t just a secure bike light, it’s a wholly unique piece of hardware that only YOU will be able to attach and detach.

When the project began, the team was using a Torx security screw to attach it to your bike – this making the number of people able to steal one extremely low. What they’re doing now is having a completely custom-made security screw created specifically for this lamp – that’s secure! The lamp’s 6 high-powered ultrabright LED bulbs are powered by three AA batteries, these batteries giving the lap 100 hours of life. The back of the lamp is the battery cover, the cover also secured with a tiny allen key so not just anyone can access it.

One of the best things about this whole unique key situation is the groups willingness to send you a new one – if you lose your key, you’re fine! The lamp is also waterproof and made with three tightly sealed silicone gaskets so you’ll have no problem leaving it on your bike outdoors all year long! This beast will allow you to attach it to 22 to 32 mm handlebars and it has a 30 degree spread and 80 degree periphery hotspot. You can also set your lights to run steadily or flash as you’re biking – the light controlled with the center button between the bulbs.

Head to KickStarter to donate and get in on the party early or wait until full production goes into effect soon!

The graphics are 8-bit and look like video games from back in the day. There are different things that it can make on your spokes and the graphics are made in color. You can choose from 15 different light designs and my favorite is the space invader graphics. Available graphics include things like fireballs, skulls, hearts, saw blade, robots, and there is a bunch more patterns.

The cool Mini monkey Light will help keep people that ride at night safe and if you pre-order on Kickstarter you get to help choose the final patterns the device will show. The only downside to this is that the device requires a 20-inch or larger wheel. It’s waterproof and will run on a charge for up to 40 hours. The Mini Monkey Light is on Kickstarter and will fund October 29 since it has already raised more than it needed to make the light with delivery of orders expected in December.

[via The Awesomer]

I would imagine that in a large city bicyclist ridging at night would have the same issue with drivers not really being able to see them. This is where this interesting helmet comes in that also happens to be more than a little bit geeky. The device is a concept called the Blink Bike Helmet. The goal of the helmet is to protect your noodle as any helmet would in the event of an accident and to help reduce the chances of those accidents by putting a red LED light on the back and turn signals on each side of the helmet that a rider can tap to activate.

On the right and left side are LED lights that look like an on/off switch to me. The rider trust taps the signals with their fingers and it will flash to show the drivers around you which way you are turning. The helmet also has a front LED light to make the rider more visible to oncoming traffic too. The concept was designed by Italian Giovanni Doci. This seems like an idea that would work well for people that ride bicycles a lot in traffic.

[via Gajitz]

A new concept bike rack has surfaced called the Bike Hanger. The Bike Hanger is a concept that puts the bike rack on the side of the building allow it to hold more bikes and there are few ways better to thwart a thief than to put your bike 30 feet in the air. Manifesto Architecture designed the Bike Hanger.

The rack has more in common with the zipper at your local carnival than the bike racks out in front of my local elementary school. When the person is ready to go it appears that someone would work the Hangar to bring their bike back down. The designers don’t say if the retrieval of the bike would be automated or if the user would do it themselves.

[via FastCo Design]

What these bicyclists need is one of these new inner tubes that Michelin has developed. These tubes have a special design that helps prevent the tubes from twisting inside the tires and the design that allows the air pressure inside the tube to seal itself by compressing the puncture rather than allowing it to expand. The tubes also have some sort of sealant gunk inside that finishes the sealing process.

The little round things remind me of the Kraken’s arms. The tubes are called Protek Max, these things are surprisingly cheap at about $9, and they can be had in two sizes. I would use these if I rode a bike to prevent having to walk home or fix a flat on the side of the road.

[via Gizmodo]

The tiny turbine is pressed against the side of the front wheel and as the wheel spins it generates power that is sent to your phone. Nokia’s charger is available in Europe, Asia, India, Africa, and Europe. There was no information on when or if the charger will make its way to North America. The charger starts charging when the rider reaches six kilometers per hour and Nokia says that it’s just as effective as a standard wall charger if a rider gets to 12 kilometers per hour. Using the charger for 20 minutes at 10 kilometers per hour can power up a Nokia 1202 for one hour of talk time or 74 hours of standby time.

This isn’t a novel idea as two students from the University of Kenya came up with a bicycle powered charger four years ago and filed patents under Kenyan law. The two unfortunately didn’t have the money or backing to effectively promote their product. Motorola is also rumored to be developing their own bicycle powered charger. The Nokia bicycle phone charger costs around $33.

[via TreeHugger]

As anyone who rides a bike around their town or city knows, you’re told to always keep your hands on the bike’s handlebars for safety, but at the same time you’re forced to use your hands to signal which direction you want to turn, if you find yourself near vehicles. Thanks to Kim, you may be able to do that in the future without having to take your hands off the handlebars. Using controls on the bars themselves, you can signal when you’re turning left or right, and the bike even features a brake light.

As for the iPhone dock, it sits right in the middle, and integrates with the bike, so you can not only use your GPS for navigation while you’re riding around, but also play your music, as well as take phone calls. Integration like that means that the price of the bike, if it were to ever leave the concept stage, would probably be pretty high, but for people who use their bikes for work, or long distance travel, it may be worth the cash.

[via Yanko Design]

The concept, designed by Marcus Madia, features an integrated carbon fiber briefcase, along with the rest of the carbon fiber frame. The briefcase isn’t just a place to hold your things — it’s also meant to add a rigid structure, making sure the bike just doesn’t fold and become unusable.

The bike doesn’t seem to feature the traditional chain, either — so at least you won’t get your suit all messed up with oil and grease. Madia’s Bikoff concept was a finalist in the recent Seoul Cycle Design competition, but as many of these concepts go, it’s still just a concept. Hopefully a company out there is looking for a way to revolutionize the bike, because this would certainly take care of that.

[via Core 77]

Video demo after the cut

There’s also a ski blade on the side, which can be interchanged with the front wheel just in case you get some heavy snow.

Of course, they don’t intend to actually offer the bike commercially; it’s just an eye-catching promotion to get you to think about bike insurance.  The BOND name apparently stands for “Built of Notorious Deterrents” but is an obvious nod to 007.

[via OhGizmo!]

The bikes that are made for racers like Lance Armstrong weigh in at less than 15 pounds. The downside to the awesome exposed carbon fiber frame and the lightweight hardware is the cost. The bike sells for $45,000.

The bike has front and rear brakes, 10-speed rear gears and a two-gear chainset. The wheels on the bike are AX Lightness carbon fiber rims with titanium spokes. You can’t actually buy the bike yet, but the maker has already logged 20,000 miles on the lightweight racer. That is a lot of bike riding.

Not that a normal bicycle is bad for the environment, but you get the idea. Who wants to just pedal around forever, right? Having a 180 watt motor underneath you isn’t that bad of a deal, at all. While it can only power you along at a top speed of 12mph, that’s better than nothing, right? And when you get to where you want to go, you can fold the bike up to a small 18″. It will fold up compact enough that you’ll actually be able to fit it into something with the comparable size of a guitar case. Though, we don’t recommend trying to shove it into your guitar’s holder — probably won’t work out. Just doesn’t have the shape.

But, let’s get down into what gives the VeloMini some juice, shall we? While that motor will be pushing you along, it will draw its power from the 24v, 6AH lithium ion battery. If you drain the battery, it will only take about three hours to fully charge, when it’s plugged into a power source directly. Which isn’t bad at all. Of course, it still is a bike, so if you’re not into getting powered along for whatever reason, at any time, you can turn off the engine and just use the pedals. Or you can do both, if you want that little extra burst of speed. Now, for the price. At $995, it may be too steep for some folks out there to pull the trigger on. But, it does have that obviously metal frame, and it can fold up to fit into a space that you need it to. Still, dropping $1,000 to get this may just be too steep. What do you think?

[via GizMag]

Night Bright Tyre has officially unveiled their Cyglo tires. They’re your every day normal tire, but the company has managed to find a way to embed LEDs right into the rubber of the tire, which means that as you’re rolling around the night, you’ll be emitting a constant glow of color from your bike. The point behind the bikes may just be for aesthetic reasons at the tip of the iceberg, but as you dig deeper the safety elements for riding your bike at night are pretty obvious. Just look at the image. How could someone not see you?

At this point, though, we’re all still pretty curious as to how the company managed to embed LEDs right into the tire, and managed to keep the integrity of the tire. We know the LEDs are powered by the cyclic motion of the tires themselves, which is a nice energy-efficient touch, but we’re still scratching our heads. Hopefully Night Bright Tyre comes forward and tells everyone how they did it, so that folks around the world can get in on the Do It Yourself action. Then again, if they want to keep this a custom job, we can imagine that when they do come forward with a price, it won’t be cheap.

[via Gizmag]

The basic concept is a normalish looking bike that you can ride around town with a chain and disc brakes. Once you get to the store rather than chain your bike to a post or bike rack, you simply fold it down into your own shopping card.

The cart has a push handle and a pair of baskets for your purchases. Once back outside you unfold the bike again and ride away. The only downside I see is that the baskets are a bit small. You won’t be buying many groceries at once.

I’m fortunate enough to live in a more suburban part of Los Angeles, so the only reason why I’d consider these would be rainy days (which we’re getting more of lately), and because I already own a road bike that could be used with this Instructables project.  It does look somewhat dicey, but less so than being hit by, say a car or something.

At $35 in parts and apparently less than 4 hours or so to make, it looks to be something for the more venturesome, so YMMV, indeed.

[Instructables via Gizmodo]

“Leveraging ADI’s accelerometer technology, Cannondale was able to create the first-ever suspension bike that can remain fully rigid on smooth surfaces for pedaling efficiency while seamlessly opening up to maintain comfort and stability,” said Stanley Song, advance projects engineer for Cannondale Bicycles. “The accelerometer also provides insights into the bicycle system that would otherwise be unattainable. For example, by sensing free fall and the duration of the fall, Simon knows when a mountain biker jumps off a rock. ADI’s accelerometer effectively allows Simon to ‘read’ the terrain in advance and preemptively adjust the suspension settings in real time.”

The programmable settings on the Simon electronic suspension system with ADI’s high-g ADXL78 accelerometer are controlled using a handlebar-mounted joystick and LCD display.  As an avid cyclist myself, this is something to look forward to in the near future.

The device is very small at about two ounces and is designed to attach to the handlebars of a bike. Inside the small Edge 500 case is a high-sensitivity GPS receiver that needs no calibration. The GPS device also interfaces with ANT+ compatible third-party power meters.

The GPS device tracks the riders speed, distance, time, GPS position, elevation, calories burned, climb, and decent. The climb and decent functions utilize an internal barometric altimeter. The Edge 500 is also compatible with Garmin’s line of wireless speed/cadence sensors. Battery life is rated at 18 hours. The Edge 500 sells for $249.99 and when bundled with a heart rate monitor and speed/cadence sensor it sells for $349.99.