@plactagonic @ascentale @bikemonterey @bikenite
When talking about #solarbike , mentioning https://thesuntrip.com rallye is an absolute must.
My personal daily record on my own recumbent lowrider with ~300W panels (400Wp) is 288 km in 2025, with average performace being usually rather in 100-200 km range. Everything over 200 km is actually pretty hard, including navigation - there are no long distance stretches of local roads, and the motorways are of course off limit and even bike legal main roads are not very pleasant for cyclists.
The released/leaked data from the the top #thesuntrip racers show, that the solar power accounts for approximately 50% of the required energy, the rest is just athletic performance and resilient long distance cycling - slow, but restless. You just can't afford to stop :-)
Finally - someone, who promotes solar cycling (which is basically something between motorcycling and bikepacking) in a more professional way, than me: Kilian Weigand, one of the participants of #thesuntrip2024 to Morocco. Now travelling Turkey during winter! 
https://youtube.com/watch?v=aBSswz8INDc
@Petr90 @fotovoltaika přijde mi to "too god to be true", ale píše se o tom kupodivu všude.
To chlazení mi přijde jako nejlogičtější vysvětlení zvýšení účinnosti - já pozoroval u svého #solarbike vždycky značnou závislost výkonu na teplotě, zvláště u (doslova) "jetých" panelů...
I am all for #permacomputing and I always was, already in 1990s (!) ... but I am not really sure what level of permacomputing is right for us just now.
I sometimes feel like I was doing #solarpunk before it was a thing. I started my first #solarbike in 2013 (no computing, just bike... but the dual use for charging my Asus Eee on road while wild camping was strong motivation to continue...) and this is the first time I used the term "solarpunk" (as a joke).
But actually, I ran two important projects related to #permacomputing before:
In 1996, I started development of Arachne WWW browser for DOS, which was proprietary for many reasons (it was released as open source around cca 2000, but also abandoned). It ran pretty well on 386s with 4 MB RAM. While it could be used even on 286s or XTs, but the results were not very satisfying. I was shocked, that almost immediately after 386s started to be available (my country was lagging behind), the became obsolete, because Windows 95 required at least 8 MB RAM and were pretty unusable on anything less then Pentium. I hope I helped to prolong life of lot of DOS based PCs, but in fact, many serious bugs were not fixed before it was too late. But it was somehow (very limited) commercial success, surfing on early dot com bubble.
But I was not sole developer, I rather managed incoherent group of paid external developers. Kind of pre-open-source shareware approach.
The second attempt at PC recycling was participation in the CZFree.Net project since 2002, where we were re-purposing 386 and 486 PCs (originally even some 286s) as Wi-Fi routers by adding rather expensive PCI based 802.11b network cards with RSMA connectors. Basically, local community was supplying us with their obsolete PCs and we were recycling them into community wireless routers.
Again, this was kinda commercial success, because I learnt from my earlier mistakes (including being early web hosting provider) and added certain multi level marketing features.
1/2
@akkartik I am myself all for #solarpunk (see hashtag #solarbike on my instance...) but I am not sure how wise would be to start thinking in Basic again. Well, I spent way too many days of my teenage years programming in Basic... but I somehow don't feel like it was worth it.
I admit that interpreter that fits to 4 to 8 KB is amazing result. ZX Spectrum Basic was 16 KB. Basic interpreter for my Sharp MZ-800, which had to be loaded from cassette tape, unfortunately, was quite good, but it was around 40 KB big.
4 KB is really good. But the entire idea of line numbering is... well... it is not really comfortable way of thinking. Or editing. On the other hand, simple, non bloated software would be useful. For certain tasks, single task environment is more than enough. And of course, the shorter code can be much easier to understand and debug, than long code.
Some time ago, I was amazed by Tiny C compiler for POSIX systems (it was able to compile itself, of course). Having something like Tiny C for Z-80 would be nice. I really missed being to use C on Z-80. Of course, Z-80 systems are often missing filesystems at all... C without file I/O is kinda crippled, but still much more powerful than Basic.
The, well, basic idea of Basic, that integers (sometimes even floats) and strings must be enough for everybody, is more or less true: yes, lot of useful stuff can be done with integers and strings. But I would still prefer to use something like subset of Python syntax... which reminds me, that my current thought experiment (not really started as project yet) is subset of Python transpiler to C (should be able to compile itself too). I consider it kind of solarpunk too, although it is not using 70s technology, but should be pretty useful running of 80s highend or 90s mainstream.
Během cesty z Prahy do Wroclavi jsem sice čekal kopec přes Orlické hory, ale že mě cykloturistická navigace navede na traily na sjezdovce, to už moc ne :D
#solarbike #cyklotruck #cyclelogistics #cargobike #bikepacking #businesstrip #biketouring
Takhle vypadá #solarbike přes noc, s přehozem proti dešti....
Dnes jedu menší víkendovou trasu kolem stovky tam a zpět. Když zrovna není pod mrakem, dává to slušně... #mikroblog
Rekord včera nepadl, z řady důvodů. Jednak dny jsou už přeci jen kratší, ale hlavně trasa vedle přes Lužici, která je v podstatě hustě zalesněná, což pro solární kolo není to pravé. Rovinatá krajina je sice pro rekordy ideální, ale silnice nevedou vždycky správným směrem. Takže jen 203 km...
Speciálně pro @tymoty vlajka EU ... zastávka na kafe v Krásné Lípě.
Chao-c'
Cobic