Wind-powered motorcycle for a Mad Max world

June 25th, 2015

Come the days of scarcity, hopefully we won't be living in a post-apocalyptic desert wasteland warring viciously over the few resources left -- and hopefully we'll be a little more prepared, with sustainable replacements for the fossil-fueled technology we live with now.

This is the idea behind James Dyson Award entry Strangeworld -- a motorcycle powered by the wind and the sun.

"I was riding a rented motorcycle through Glencoe in the Highlands of Scotland in late 2013," explained project creator Alistair McInnes, an industrial design student at RMIT University in Melbourne, Australia.

"In the middle of Glencoe I stopped as a thought hit me, in some years' time there will be no way for me, or others, to enjoy a recreational ride like this; thus I envisioned a motorcycle design that would allow for people to travel for leisure, when fuel is no longer an option."

The machine -- its name inspired by Dr Strangelove -- was specifically designed for the Australian environment in a hypothetical 2050, by which time, McInnes calculates, fossil fuels will be in very short supply, if not completely depleted.
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"The design for a 'renewable energy' motorcycle has to address two major problems surrounding tourism travel in Australia; the vast environment Australia has to be traversed, and how to supply the means," he said. "The chameleon-like manoeuvrability of a motorcycle in today's society, lends itself to the environments of 2050, and the hostilities that may arrive in this new age."

Strangeworld doesn't collect kinetic energy and use it simultaneously. Instead, slung from its frame is a compartment that contains a collapsible wind turbine that can be erected when the motorcycle is not in use. It also uses photovoltaic panels to collect additional solar energy.

All this energy is channelled to a battery housed in the motorcycle's chassis to power the motorcycle.