| Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, I'd like to take this opportunity to welcome you to our exhibition, |
| "Two Centuries of the Bike". |
| Let's stroll around the exhibition, shall we? |
| Although there were a few early efforts back in the 1700s, |
| you didn't really see many bikes till, say, the 1830s in England. |
| Bikes were a response to the rapid growth of cities early in the 19th century. |
| Cities like London were getting too big to walk across! |
| The early bike let people travel with less effort than walking. |
| Plus a bike was a lot cheaper than a horse! |
| Think of it. No one invented a bike for, what, 5000 years of human history? |
| Why did people do it then? |
| Probably because this was the start of the Machine Age: |
| people wanted machines to do all the work. |
| There were some drawbacks, however. |
| For one thing, there were no pedals. |
| You simply pushed yourself along using your feet. |
| Kind of like today's skateboard. |
| That meant you went fairly slow. |
| And uphill, you actually worked harder, pushing that two-wheeler. |
| Plus, the wheels were made of wood covered with metal, as you can see from this model. |
| So the downside was that the ride was quite uncomfortable on most roads. |
| Only a few gadget lovers had or used them. |
| By the 1860s, though, improvements were being made. |
| As you can see from this specimen, metal frames had become the rule. |
| They're more durable than wood, and they don't warp in the rain. |
| The biggest improvement however was the development of the chain and sprocket system. |
| They're connected. |
| This meant you did not push the bike. |
| You used pedals just like today. |
| You had to try harder to balance, so it took some practice to figure out how to use the pedals. |
| But it made the ride so much easier. |
| As a result, the good thing was that you could ride a lot more smoothly and with very little effort. |
| By the 1880s, another big change was the use of rubber wheels. |
| These became pretty common at that time. |
| Though the first ones were solid rubber, |
| the ride was a good deal more comfortable than the old iron and wood system. |
| This is a big consideration because the faster you go, the more you feel every bump. |
| Air-filled tyres - "pneumatic tyres" - didn't really come into use till around the year 1900, |
| as you can see from this exhibition over here. |
| That made the ride even more comfortable. |
| So, by 1890 or so, people were going a lot faster and a lot more smoothly. |
| There was one problem when you were going quickly and comfortably: |
| "OH NO! HOW DO I STOP?" |
| Yes, we all laugh now. |
| But for a long time, the only way to stop was drag your feet. |
| That didn't work very well and it would be dangerous if you were going fast. |
| In the crowded cities of those years - New York, Chicago, and so on, |
| you'd get killed if you couldn't stop for, say, a streetcar. |
| Plus look at this bike. |
| The front wheel is nearly a metre and 2/3 tall! |
| They made them that way so you could see over people and wagons. |
| But you couldn't drag your feet. |
| This model is called a "velocipede" - a "speed pedal". |
| Another characteristic of the bike in this period is that it has 2 equal-sized wheels, |
| which signalled a big change in bikes. |
| For with the velocipede, brakes appeared. |
| If you wanted to stop, you just pushed the pedal backwards. |
| Doing that stopped the back wheel of the bike. |
| This technique worked a lot better than dragging your feet or jumping off the high seat there! |
| This meant that bikes became a great deal safer. |
| It would've been safer if people wore helmets, |
| but the first bicycle helmet wasn't invented until years later, |
| and even then it was little more than a leather ballcap. |
| It really wasn't until the 1970s that the bike helmet was modified to provide some real protection. |
| Before continuing on to look at developments since the 1890s, let's say a word more about safety. |
| Everyone knows if you're going downhill, you can get going dangerously fast. |
| To go more than a hundred kilometres an hour isn't all that difficult! |
| But even on level ground it's easy to go too quickly. |
| On a city street, today's bicycles can be ridden at a speed of over 40 miles an hour, over a short distance. |
| That's about 64 kilometres an hour. |
| Remember you're on a bike, not in a car. |
| There's nothing to protect you. |
| People are killed in single-bicycle accidents every day, just from hitting the road. |
| A good rule to remember is, if you're going faster than the cars, slow down. |
| And please wear a helmet. |
| Nearly one quarter of the epilepsy cases come from head injuries in accidents on bikes and motorcycles. |
| I don't mean to scare you, but safety is everyone's business. |
| What? Now that's a good question. |
| Why are today's bikes so much faster? |
| Well, it's not just that today's athletes are faster. |
| The answer is partly mechanical. |
| If you look closely here, at the back wheel you'll see a number of gears. |
| Changing gears is what makes those fast speeds possible. |
| You can shift gears depending on the terrain and how hard you wish to pedal. |
| So you can put it on a higher gear for downhill, |
| and a lower gear for uphill travel to make it easier to climb that slope. |
| You'll notice this gear-shifting mechanism is attached to the back wheel, |
| and when the rider shifts on the handlebar gear shifter, |
| the chain moves to the appropriate sprocket. |
| And, speaking of changing gears, |
| let's look over here at our "Tour de France" exhibit... |