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Gyrocar

A gyrocar is a two-wheeled automobile. The difference between a bicycle or motorcycle and a gyrocar is that in a bike, dynamic balance is provided by the rider, and in some cases by the geometry and mass distribution of the bike itself, and the gyroscopic effects from the wheels. Steering a motorcycle is done by precessing the front wheel. In a gyrocar, balance was provided by one or more gyroscopes, and in one example, connected to two pendulums by a rack and pinion.

The concept was originally described in fiction in 1911 "Two Boys in a Gyrocar: The story of a New York to Paris Motor Race" by Kenneth Brown, (Houghton Mifflin Co). However the first prototype Gyrocar, The Shilovski Gyrocar, was commissioned in 1912 by the Russian Count Pyotr Shilovsky, a lawyer and member of the Russian royal family. It was manufactured to his design by the Wolseley Tool and Motorcar Company in 1914 and demonstrated in London the same year. The gyrocar was powered by a modified Wolseley C5 engine of 16 - 20 hp, with a bore of 90 mm and a stroke of 121 mm. It was mounted ahead of the radiator, driving the rear wheel through a conventional clutch and gear box. A transmission brake was fitted after the gearbox- there were no brakes on the wheels themselves. The weight of the vehicle was 2.75 tons and it had a very large turning circle.

In 1927 Louis Brennan, funded to the tune of £12,000 (plus a £2000 per year) by John Cortauld built a rather more successful gyrocar. Two contra-rotating gyros were housed under the front seats, spun in a horizontal plane at 3500 rpm by 24V electric motors powered from standard car batteries. This was the greatest speed obtainable with the electric motors available, and meant that each rotor had to weigh to generate sufficient forces. Precession was in the vertical fore-aft plane. The car had a Morris Oxford engine, engine mountings, and gearbox. Two sidewheels (light aircraft tailwheels were used) were manually lowered on stopping; if the driver forgot and switched off the gyros and walked away, the car would continue to balance itself using the gyro momentum for a few minutes, and then the wheels would automatically be dropped to stop tipping.

Usage examples of "gyrocar".

A police gyrocar whined along the skyway, stopped before the surgery just in time to meet him as he got to the bottom of the steps.

The gyrocar kept rigidly upright while its occupants rolled sidewise in their seats.

With a sharp turn which produced a yelp of tormented rubber from the rear wheel, the gyrocar spun off the skyway and onto a descending corkscrew.

Frantically spinning his wheel, and turning the gyrocar in its own length, Wohl fed current to the powerful dynamo.

The gyrocar surged until its speedometer needle trembled over the hundred mark.

Without a word they struggled out of their battered gyrocar, sprinted along the skyway, over the long, smooth hump.

Fidgeting on the sidewalk, they waited for the gyrocar which Wohl had ordered over the phone.

Dakin, fifty-two years old William Street physicist, took the Grand Intersection humpback in his sports gyrocar last evening, and plunged to death at more than a hundred miles an hour.

The gyrocar whined like an eager dog, slid easily forward, built up speed.

The crisis-bank of extra batteries added their power, and with the dynamo screaming its top note, the gyrocar leaped forward.

Reaching inside the gyrocar, Graham hauled out his heavy topcoat, writhed into it.

Then, as the pair clambered in, he pressed the button of his red-lensed torch, signaled another approaching gyrocar to stop.

From the speeding gyrocar, Lucky caught glimpses of the mighty dome overhead.

Graham got a glimpse over the heads of the surging crowd, saw two crumpled gyrocars which appeared to have met in head-on collision.

It swooped crabwise across the concrete, missed a dawdling phaeton by a hairbreadth, flashed between two other gyrocars, wiped the fender off a dancing four-wheeler and slammed into the side.