LOW-TECH MAGAZINE

How to Downsize a Transport Network: The Chinese Wheelbarrow

For being such a seemingly ordinary vehicle, the wheelbarrow has a surprisingly exciting history. This is especially true in the East, where it became a universal means of transportation for both passengers and goods, even over long distances. 

The Chinese wheelbarrow - which was driven by human labour, beasts of burden and wind power - was of a different design than its European counterpart. By placing a large wheel in the middle of the vehicle instead of a smaller wheel in front, one could easily carry three to six times as much weight than if using a European wheelbarrow.

The one-wheeled vehicle appeared around the time the extensive Ancient Chinese road infrastructure began to disintegrate. Instead of holding on to carts, wagons and wide paved roads, the Chinese turned their focus to a much more easily maintainable network of narrow paths designed for wheelbarrows. The Europeans, faced with similar problems at the time, did not adapt and subsequently lost the option of smooth land transportation for almost one thousand years.

Pedal powered farms and factories: the forgotten future of the stationary bicycle

If we boost the research on pedal powered technology - trying to make up for seven decades of lost opportunities - and steer it in the right direction, pedals and cranks could make an important contribution to running a post-carbon society that maintains many of the comforts of a modern life. The possibilities of pedal power largely exceed the use of the bicycle.

Bike powered electricity generators are not sustainable

Pedaling a modern stationary bicycle to produce electricity might be a great work-out, but in many cases, it is not sustainable. While humans are rather inefficient engines converting food into work, this is not the problem we want to address here; people have to move in order to stay healthy, so we might as well use that energy to operate machinery. The trouble is that the present approach to pedal power results in highly inefficient machines.

The short history of early pedal powered machines

Ever since the arrival of fossil fuels and electricity, human powered tools and machines have been viewed as an obsolete technology. This makes it easy to forget that there has been a great deal of progress in their design, largely improving their productivity. The most efficient mechanism to harvest human energy appeared in the late 19th century: pedals. Stationary pedal powered machines went through a boom at the turn of the 20th century, but the arrival of cheap electricity and fossil fuels abruptly stopped all further development.

Hand powered drilling tools and machines

Hand-powered devices have been used for millennia. However, during the last quarter of the 19th century a radically improved generation of tools appeared.

These tools took advantage of modern mass production machinery and processes (like interchangeable parts) and an increased availability in superior material (metal instead of wood).

One of the outcomes included an array of new drilling machines. These human-powered tools were not only a vast improvement over those that came before them, they also had many advantages in comparison to the power drills that we use today.

A 1922 breast drill (picture credit).

Automata: engineering for a post-oil world?

Our fascination with sophisticated technology lies at the core of many of our present-day problems. Yet, it need not be. By definition, technical virtuosity doesn't need to result in yet another electronic gadget or an even faster accelerating sports car. It can also lead to stunning yet completely harmless artefacts called "automata".

These are mostly hand-cranked machines that can be extremely complex, often with the only purpose of astonishing the spectator. Automata have been built for more than 2,000 years, but contemporary artists have elevated the craft to a higher level. Aside from their emotional value, automata offer a glimpse of a future, post-oil technology.