MOUNTAIN BIKE — ARTOYA Learning Hub

Watch

See it come together

Assembly video coming — scan again after the next production run.

Read

The leaflet in the box

The same leaflet that comes with the kit, English on one side, French on the other. Free to download and print.

Download the leaflet (PDF)

ARTOYA_LEAFLET_AV0118121.pdf — 198 × 298 mm, EN/FR

Learn

Four ways in

Mt. Tamalpais from Greenbrae (Marin County, California) — Guy Carleton Hovey (1870–1942), photographer — 1921 (first published 27 Dec. 1921; copyright deposit J253286, 1922) — Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, U.S. Geographical File — gelatin silver print, 20 × 25 cm — LC-USZ62-115494

A Timeless History

Repack Road, west of Fairfax in Marin County: 1,300 feet of descent in 2.1 miles. Fred Wolf and Charlie Kelly started racing it in 1976 on modified 1930s and 1940s balloon-tyre cruisers. Joe Breeze rode a forty-five-pound Schwinn Excelsior. Gary Fisher, Tom Ritchey and Wende Cragg were all there. Twenty-four races were held; a whole industry came out of them.

SourceMarin Museum of Bicycling and Mountain Bike Hall of Fame — mmbhof.org · Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division

Fig. 1 of US Patent 5,244,224, 'Rocker arm rear suspension bicycle' — a mountain bike with suspension fork and rear shock (sheet 1 of 2) — James S. Busby, inventor; assignee GT Bicycles, Inc., Huntington Beach, Calif. — Filed 14 May 1992, patented 14 Sept. 1993 — United States Patent and Trademark Office, Patent Public Search — PDF fetched from image-ppubs.uspto.gov — US 5,244,224

Science In Action

Tyre volume — more air, lower pressure, a bigger contact patch on loose ground • Low gearing — a much smaller ratio than a road bike, trading speed for the ability to climb • Slack geometry — a laid-back fork puts the front wheel further ahead: calmer at speed, harder to pitch over • Suspension — separating the wheels from the frame so the bike moves and the rider does not

SourceMarin Museum of Bicycling — mmbhof.org · Science Museum Group, cycling collection — collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk · Kooijman, Meijaard, Papadopoulos, Ruina & Schwab, “A bicycle can be self-stable without gyroscopic or caster effects”, Science 332:339 (2011) — science.org · US Patent 5,244,224 (1993)

[Untitled photo, possibly related to: Repairing bicycle. FSA (Farm Security Administration) mobile camp for migratory farm workers. Odell, Oregon] — Russell Lee (1903–1986), photographer, for the Farm Security Administration — September 1941 — Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division, FSA/OWI Black-and-White Negatives — safety negative, 3¼ × 4¼ in. — LC-USF34-070344-D (related captioned negative: LC-USF34-070368-D, loc.gov/item/2017815883/)

Arts

It began as counterculture, not industry: people who could not afford new bicycles rebuilding old ones to do something nobody had designed them for. The bikes were called klunkers, and the name was affectionate. Almost every sport built on modified equipment has the same shape of origin story.

SourceMarin Museum of Bicycling and Mountain Bike Hall of Fame — mmbhof.org · Library of Congress, FSA/OWI Collection

A mountain biker tests a rugged path amid the rock formations in Palo Duro Canyon State Park in the Texas panhandle — Carol M. Highsmith (photograph) — 2014-06-03 — Library of Congress, Prints & Photographs Division — The Lyda Hill Texas Collection of Photographs in Carol M. Highsmith's America Project — LC-DIG-highsm-29637

Applications Today

Disc brakes, suspension forks, wide tyres and indexed shifting were all pushed into the mainstream by mountain biking and are now standard on ordinary town bicycles. A sport invented on scrap ended up redesigning the everyday bicycle.

SourceMarin Museum of Bicycling — mmbhof.org · Science Museum Group, cycling collection — collection.sciencemuseumgroup.org.uk · Library of Congress, Carol M. Highsmith Archive

Coaster-brake hub, A. P. Morrow, US Patent 646,302 (1900)

Did you know?

Why the name Repack?

On the way down, the coaster-brake hubs got so hot the grease inside vaporised. After every run, riders had to repack them with fresh grease — so that is what they named the race.

One more thing

The first mountain bikers rode forty-pound 1930s cruisers down two miles of fire road, then stripped the hubs and repacked them with grease before the next run.

SourceMarin Museum of Bicycling and Mountain Bike Hall of Fame — mmbhof.org

An entire industry, started by people riding other people's old bicycles down a hill.

Go deeper

The long read

A two-to-three-page article with more images and full explanations — printable. Coming for this model.

Build

How it comes together

Every part is cut and marked on the board; full instructions are on the sheet in the box. Once built, it stays built.

1

READ THE SHEET

Take your time — every detail counts. Check all the pieces are on the board.

2

ONE PIECE AT A TIME

Press out each piece only when the sheet calls for it.

3

BUILD THE WHEELS

Both wheels first. Check each one runs true.

4

FRAME, THEN JOIN

Build the frame flat, then seat the wheels. Front last — the tightest.

5

PAINT LAST

Once it stands — or keep it plain. No two are alike.

What it will not do

It is a display model, not a working machine. The chain, gears and brakes are represented, not engineered. Nothing drives the wheels.

What it will give you

Why a bicycle frame is built from triangles, how gear ratio turns pedalling into speed, and why a bicycle stays upright — a harder question than it looks.