In anticipation of taking the bike building class this quarter, I went up to Portland in February for the North American Handbuilt Bicycle Show. http://www.handmadebicycleshow.com/2008/. I split my time between checking out the bikes on the show floor and sitting in on some custom bike making seminars. The seminar that particularly caught my attention was taught by Craig Calfee about his Bamboo Bikes.
Calfee has been a leader in carbon composite bikes for decades. Recently he has been producing some high end frames made with bamboo tubes. The joints were originally wrapped with carbon fiber, now he uses hemp fibers. Either way the joints are cured with an epoxy resin. Bamboo bikes are not the stiffest or lightest available, but they have an aesthetic appeal. He also mentions the low carbon footprint of the bike on his webpage.
To my surprise, the seminar was not focused the construction of bamboo bikes. Instead, Craig outlined the bamboo bicycle fabrication business he is trying to start in Ghana. As a raw material bamboo is readily available in Ghana, and the population could benefit hugely from improved mobility. Craig has visited Ghana twice to teach framebuilding workshops to some local entrepreneurs. The bike design he uses in Africa is much more utilitarian than the bamboo race bikes he builds in America. It can carry roughly 200 pounds of gear over rough terrain. His goal is to spawn a business that can sustain itself employing local Ghanaians building frames from inexpensive, local, renewable resources. His hope is that the frame builders will be able to extend credit to local farmers and business people. This way the whole community can work to lift itself out of poverty. Ultimately, the business will be able to run without foreign aid.
All of the component in the frame of the bikes except for the resin, head tube, and bottom bracket shell are made from renewable materials. Instead of hemp, the frames are wrapped with a natural fiber imported from Northern Africa. It has been widely used up there for home insulation. While I have not done a LCA, I imagine the environmental impact of farming bamboo is much lower than that of mining and producing aluminum or steel tubes. Also, the bikes are easy to repair. When a bamboo tube breaks, it can be cut out and another one wrapped and cured it. If an aluminum tube breaks, the frame is headed to the scrap heap because re-welding aluminum does not produce reliable results.
I was blown away by his presentation. I had expected to hear an eccentric designer wax poetic about the virtues of an unusual material. The nobility of his goal to help people help themselves by empowering them to create bikes from renewable materials inspired me. You can check out his diary of the experience on his webpage:
http://www.calfeedesign.com/Ghana2008.htm
