Bike Constructors ChallengE

This year Sherpa embarked on an exercise in team building in the form of an engineering constructor challenge.

Two teams of engineers at Sherpa were tasked with designing, producing, procuring, and assembling a bike for the office that employees can ride around town. The teams were each given an antiquated mountain bike frame and about 16 weeks to work together on design and manufacturing. 

They were challenged to create custom features, work within a tight budget (of $800,) and partner with Sherpa’s 3D printing department and CNC machine shop for producing their components. Both teams were expected to work in NX CAD or SolidWorks, manage their projects in our Teamcenter environment, create a BOM, and track all expenses.

A leader was designated by each team to coordinate tasks, report progress, manage the budget, meetings, communication and schedule.  Each team was given a different theme for their bike design: Everest and Moab.

Everest Team

Team Everest was led by Fernando Ramirez with six teammates.  The theme of Everest, specifically the idea of the Sherpa transporting gear to basecamp, inspired the team to pursue the cargo bike design.

Our industrial design engineers, Samuel Backes and Brett Axness, played an advisory role for both teams, developing mood boards, suggesting color schemes that reflected the landscape associated with the theme, developing a wordmark and frame livery and then painting the bikes and applying wordmarks.

For Everest the colors that stood out naturally included the whites of the snow, but the team also considered the vibrant hues of prayer flags for bold contrast. The wordmark developed was to give the impression of mountainsides and forward momentum.

“The most rewarding aspect of the challenge was getting to work with team members I do not usually work with and building connections.” Hanna Eha 

Moab Team

Team Moab was led by Kevin Hlas, and his six teammates all brought their unique experience to the challenge.

For the Moab theme, the team decided on a futuristic utilitarian design that incorporated elements of the Moab wilderness without being overly literal. They chose a matte base color complemented by rust orange accents inspired by the desert. The wordmark called on the image of the rising sun and evoked a mirage effect as the base of the logo. They went onto design a landscape for the main bike bar, utilizing a custom sticker to paint the landscape in orange and sky in blue, cutting the shape that evoked Moab. The rest of the bike was spraypainted a single rust orange color. 

Design Feature Highlights

Bike Fob Lock

One cool feature from Team Moab was a bicycle lock that was operable by the RFID key fobs that we use for building and floor access at Sherpa. Senior Design Engineer Jim Collias led this effort by first acquiring an RFID key fob reader and deciphering the data that came out whenever a key fob was presented to the sensor. He found the trigger pattern and was able to design an integrated circuit that watched for that signal and would actuate a solenoid to unlock the mechanism.

Key fob bike lock with chain held up to frame with magnet.

3D Printed Bike Saddle

One of the features of the Everest bike was a 3D printed bike saddle. Engineer Avi Meyer worked with our 3D Printing team, Connor Shimamoto and intern Aiden Rodriquez, to complete the saddle.  They scanned the rigid plastic shell of a bike saddle and took the scan data into NX reverse engineering to create a bike saddle model that looks and functions well. Using Carbon Design Engine, they defined regions with different lattice parameters for optimal comfort and support. They prepared it for 3D printing by adding skins and perforated textures for ease of cleaning and handling. It was printed along with other parts for both bikes like matching handlebar grips with the help of 3D team members Zach McKinney, and Taro Unterburger. 

Phone Charger

Many people rely on their phone for navigation in vehicles where charging power is always available.  When riding a bicycle, however, prolonged use of navigation, particularly with the screen always on and brightness up, can quickly drain a phone's battery.  On the Moab Team, Engineer Mike Erwin set out to design an all-weather phone mounting and universal wireless charging system allowing the rider to display navigation and other information continuously while maintaining phone charge and protecting against the elements. He modeled the system components in NX and integrated them into the front fork. He then added wireless charging capability to a weatherproof phone case and modified an off the shelf power bank to function as a removable battery pack, supplying power for the charger as well as the bike's lights and key fob lock.  

Phone case and charger attached to front fork with connection to battery pack integrated into fork.

Custom Brakes

On the Everest bike, Tamara Dib decided to CNC some custom brakes levers in-house. She designed them in NX, and 3D printed a prototype before refining it and handing it off to our machine shop.   Shop engineers Teddy Zimmerman and Patrick Smith, brought the step files into NX CAM to program and ran the parts on our 5-axis CNC. The finished levers had a retro look and functioned well on the bike.

Bike brakes custom designed and machined in our CNC Machine shop.

“Seeing the creativity from my fellow teammates, following them through ideation in meetings week over week… was really rewarding.” – Jim Collias 

The Big Reveal

On a Friday afternoon at a park in Estacada, Sherpa employees gathered for the reveal and judging of the first Constructor Cup challenge.  The event featured a presentation from each team, showcasing their design process, the accuracy of their bike digital twin in Teamcenter, and revealing their bikes.

Sherpa employees gathered for the reveal and judging of the bike constructor challenge.

The bikes were test-ridden by employees and judged. Judging was provided by owner, Pat Barrett, our resident cycling expert and Additive Manufacturing Manager, Connor Shimamoto, and a guest judge, former Sherpa team member and competitive cyclist, Sam Pepperwood.

Team Everest gather around the bike..

The judging was based on five criteria.

• Functionality (40): is the bike safe and easy to ride, comfort, quality of ride, enhanced functionality/capabilities, novel concepts/design.
• Style Points (15): appropriately incorporate theme into various parts, components, and accessories
• Accuracy of CAD/BOM (15) to real bike, manufacturability taken into consideration, DFM/DFA
• Budget utilization (15): appropriate expenditures to value, accurate cost tracking
• Project Management (15): meets schedule, quality of overview presentation to company, feedback from internal resources (Machine Shop, 3D Printing, Admin, Industrial Design.) accurate time tracking and notes, and capturing of marketing materials (video, images, etc.)

Conclusion

The bikes both turned out great and the entire process was a tremendous exercise in team building.

Team Moab gather around their bike.

“Both bikes exceeded my expectations. The entire process was a huge boost in team building, project/time management, and a good test drive for our Teamcenter PLM tools.” Said owner, Pat Barrett.

Here are the final bikes from Team Moab and Team Everest.  In the end, Team Everest narrowly won. Which do you like?

Sherpa Everest Bike

Sherpa Moab Bike

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