Mega Mount for a Bicycle by RobWLakes

Last crawled date: 3 years ago

Fitness is a problem for people with chronic computer addiction. I found I spent too much time sitting on my bum and not getting even enough basic exercise. I had my son's bicycle handed up to me so I bought a bike stand with built in magnetic resistance (I chose one that provided a replacement axle bolt as well so that the stand matched the wheel nuts exactly).
I had a Mega2560 with a 3.2 Sainsmart Touch Display at my disposal so I rigged up this bicycle computer to monitor my effort. The added circuitry is extremely simple with only two wires to the reed switch required. I have found a moderate distance twice a day is very beneficial to the circulation in my lower legs, and gets into the aerobic range as well.
The two printed objects, the Mega mount and the reed switch mount are pretty much bread and butter efforts but do the job and may inspire others to improve the designs. I have used a proprietary reed switch ready mounted in a holder, and the magnet (on the spokes) that went with it. I had put these aside from a commercial bicycle computer a few years ago. If you don't have these, then I have adding an extra hole in the reed switch mount to take a standard mini magnetic reed switch.
The Arduino program is also pretty basic, but at the moment proves the principle and I am looking to improve it to make my exercises more interesting. Please use the UTFT library mentioned in the Arduino program. It works! My long term goal would be to use the computer to control the magnetic resistance system built into the bike stand. This way the effort required could be changed automatically or randomly to simulate hills etc
If this was to be mounted on a road bike and used in really riding through the country side I would imagine the whole thing would need to be beefed up and maybe even a water proof cover etc. I am sure this should not be "Sport and Outdoors", ho hum, anyway have fun!