Shaft drive,can I find one?

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El C

El C

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I´ve never seen one in person but I´s like to make a bike that´s shaft driven.
Is there some place where I can buy the components?
(Picture lended from Internet)
fibsjRp.jpg
 
http://www.chainlessbike.com.cn/sds_en.html

I also found this info ranslated from a dutch article:

The Dutch article covers the main problems. To recap:

  • very high torque meaning heavy parts are required, and shaft wind-up may be detectable to the rider.
  • high torque also means accelerated wear for gears
  • two pairs of gears means extra losses compared to a chain drive (the gear arrangement also increases losses compared to a chain because there's more metal sliding on metal under pressure)
  • usually cannot change the gearing, what's designed in is what you get. Edit: I have seen internally geared hubs fitted so you can get multi-gear shaft drives, but you're still locked into that particular model hub gear (you can't swap the 3 speed hub gear for a 5 or 8 speed hub gear).
  • unusual design makes servicing harder, and replacement parts may not be available.
https://bicycles.stackexchange.com/questions/20591/any-experience-with-shaft-driven-bikes

Then there is also this:
https://brikbikes.com/features/

http://www.arcadecycles.eu/Contenu/des-velos-de-qualite-faits-pour-durer.html

If You think of building it Yourself (and have welding skills) the first option that comes to my mind is go to the salvage yard and get a car differential. This should provide You with some bevel gears. It is going to be quite heavy though... But real heavy duty as well.

Also this:

 
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I've never ridden one, but have seen a few and the people I talked to who owned them said the drivetrain loss is nowhere near as bad as people claim. One of them was a TOC bike, so I'm not sure if the comparison is to TOC bikes or modern ones or what, but one was a newish Dynamic bike, which I just looked up and is based in the UK. Other than the interesting shaft drive, it looked like a pretty basic goofy newer hybrid with cheap components. Again, I can't speak for their experiences to know what they were comparing them to, but they liked them. I would really like to try one myself.

If you just wanted parts, that Dynamic bike and probably some other cheap one I never heard of might be a good start to cut out the parts and weld into a better frame. I love the weird things, even if they're not as good (like steam cars and radial engines), because it's not always about what's best, it's about what's fun and different can definitely be fun (when it's not a nightmare a . . . and even sometimes it can be both).
 
That concept is wicked awesome! I bet it's great for the track--not so great in the real world. Those tiny bearings have got to be a magnet for dirt and damage.
 

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