Adjustable Head Tube Angle Headset

Senior Project: September 2020 - June 2021

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A senior project to design, build and test a mountain bike headset capable of adjusting the effective steering axis angle. This geometry change has a large effect on the dynamic response of the bicycle due to changing the trail of the front wheel. As the trail increases, the bicycle becomes more stable at high speeds but less so at lower speeds; and vice versa. This leads to modern mountain bikes designing in the middle of ideal operating conditions to enable performance up and downhill.

Installed headset at the top of the trail Shooters on The Grade in SLO.

This goal provided the context for the basic requirements of 1) fitting on modern mountain bikes, 2) allowing +/-2 degrees of adjustability, and 3) requiring no extra tools and quick adjustment. Over the course of this project, we were able to achieve all of this.

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I personally supported the design, manufacturing, and testing effort for this project.

 

Skills Developed

• Design and development skills

• Manufacturability and system aesthetics and capability

• Instron tensile load testing

• Optical CMM automated inspecting

• CNC machining & manufacturability