One of those crazy stupid ideas by pauljs75
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No AI - This artwork was created entirely by hand or with traditional digital tools.
Description
Ok... The idea is this - why not put a radial type engine inside a motorcycle wheel? There's probably plenty of good reasons in reality why this hasn't been done. However, this is one of those random ideas that's been bouncing around in my head and had to get out.
The neat thing about this is that by removing the engine from the framework, you can make the cycle ride really really low. I'm thinking along the lines of a recumbent style cruiser.
Or on another ridiculous tangent... Have one of these engine wheels in the front in addition to one in the back. Dunno how wise that would be, but hey - I never said it was.
Image is a PSP6 screen capture of a Wings3D smoothed preview, in case anyone wanted to know.

Comments (5)
Wow nice concept tho paul ..never know a wheel independant of the main engine ..could work ...nice model ........MQ
nice concept.although it would probably tear itself to pieces due to the torque of the engine.
Good point, that was one of the things bugging me on this. Obviously there needs to be reduction gearing of some sort (planetary would make the most sense), and it's not possible to run a through shaft because of the crank. So that would result in unbalanced torque loading on the trailing arms. Also getting the clutch worked out would be tricky, I'm thinking a double clutch that would be half centrifugal and half gearset. But you know what could work with a hollow through shaft and balance the torque loading? A wankel type rotary engine... Hmmm... Me and those crazy ideas.
Nice concept great idea
Powered on methane? Must have a strange seat! ; ) Excellent modeling!!!