I’ve been itchin’ recently for a mechanical project. As a woodworker, I’m a furniture man through and through. Sometimes a father just gotta put some flames on his boy’s new set of wheels.
It’s a balance bike, or as I will call it now, a suicide trike. The physics (and teaching) of bicycles holds the key to a balance bike. Bicycles stay upright and balanced not because of the movements of the rider (though they are a factor) but by the motion of the wheels. The spinning wheels act like a gyroscope and naturally want to spin upright – the wheel essentially creates its own gravitational force. The faster you go, the more stable a bicycle (or motorcycle) becomes. That’s why it’s harder to control a bike going slow than a bike going fast.
So why put extra wheels on a bike during a kid’s formative years? To stop him or her from crashing at slow speed of course! The training wheels, instead of promoting balance, promote a kid to lean over the bike for stability. The training wheels train a kid to ride the bike the wrong way because he or she isn’t strong enough to get it up to speed while pedaling. A balance bike lowers the center of gravity, removes the pedals and teaches a kid to ride upright. When the kid gets up to speed, the bike stays up! The transition to pedaling happens at a more natural age (six to eight) and is easier because the kid has already learned to balance. They only need to learn to pedal now.
Or so they say. My eldest took one look at the thing and decided to ride his mother’s choice, this contraption. His loss. The little one likes it.
WSC Designs 
