Engineer Builds Bike With Flywheel Kinetic Energy Recovery System
Tom Stanton is an aerospace engineer who was "sidetracked by the endless possibilities of 3D printers" after graduating, and he now spends his time on YouTube working on one amazing project after another.
In his most recent video, he decided to build a kinetic energy recovery system by equipping a basic bicycle with an energy-harvesting flywheel system. An 11.8 inch (300 mm) steel flywheel is positioned in the center of the bike's frame and is coupled to the rear wheel through a chain and a clutch. The clutch is controlled by a handlebar lever, which allows the rider to slow the bike by charging the flywheel or to charge the flywheel to maximum speed by pedaling hard.
It doesn't exactly perform well, but it's still an interesting project that could teach you one or two things about flywheel energy storage. If you're curious to see the bike in a practical demonstration, make sure you watch the video embedded above.