Epic Engineering of the Gyrobus - No Gas No Batteries!

In the UK, the Parry People Mover is a flywheel driven light railbus operating the Stourbridge Town branch rail line, and is in regular reliable use, so the transport technology is not dead.

I feel like flywheels are like the mechanical equivalents to supercapacitors. They are better for transport though, because they are cheaper and more easily scalable. That gyrobus was an awesome thing and I wish we could use more mechanical energy storage.

I never would have imagined “pimp my ride”, Keith Richards and fly wheel energy all in the same video. Bravo.

Sometimes old engineering answers are just amazingly effective. The Archimedes screw is a great example. A very short version is still used to propel most of our watercraft ie the propeller.

I want to compliment you on your clear voice, enunciation, and proper diction. Easy to understand. You don't talk faster to cram more content into a smaller time frame. Thank you. I have been listening to YouTube videos since its inception and probably listen to 20 or more a day. I say you are the best.

what I really like about this channel is that you explain things simply. But you also include the math for science-y types. Great job on this one.

I grew up in sf in the 70s and 80s riding our electric gyro busses. Dad explained the tech but I had never seen it until now!

A little comment worth is that Zurich replaced the gyro-busses with wired electric ones. Zurich has a big history/legacy in electric transport, still making it extremely carbon/emission reduced.

The gyroscopic effect could be canceled out by using two counter-rotating flywheel devices side by side.

This show reminded me of when I was in the navy going to Class A damage control school on Treasure Island in San Francisco Bay. One weekend I was walking down the street where the cable cars ran and found the power house for the cable cars. Walked into the building and the engineer who was running it gave me a tour. It had a huge flywheel that powered the cable and it was very quiet. I understand that they shut the cable cars down later but then brought them back at a later time. If you are ever in San Francisco and have a change, do that tour.

I'm so glad to see some content about this exotic and forgotten piece of engineering

I'd love to see a flywheel storage system designed for a typical home. Run off solar during the daylight hours and off the flywheel for nighttime energy requirements.

Every small ICE has a flywheel. Its mass is the magnets needed to power the magneto, thus solving 2 issues, ignition and smoothing the engine. Larger ICE's with manual transmissions all have flywheels to store the surge of energy required while engaging the clutch. There is also a lightweight flywheel on automatic transmission ICE's. Industrial presses utilize flywheels to store the energy of a small electric motor until it is sufficient to stamp the part, so a clutch drives the ram down and back up where the motor brings the flywheel back up to speed for the next cycle. The old hit and miss ICE is the best illustration of a flywheel that I can think of.

I have always been interested in this concept, having created in my head twenty years ago and wondered why no one had done it before---- then I found out that it had been created long ago. Very Fascinating story.

When I was in Seattle several years ago, I was impressed by the fact that they had electric busses powered by overhead cables through poles attached to the busses and hooked over the cables. It wasn't unknown for a bus to fail to manipulate a turn in just the right way, forcing the driver to get out and re-hook a power pole on the cable.

Bonus Fact: When KERS was allowed in F1 Williams adapted flywheel tech for their racecars back in 2009. Not sure if they are still used today but it worked.

The modern replacement would be the supercapacitor! Almost instant charging and 'slow' discharge!!

Little side note, when a flywheel is used to adjust the angle of a space craft by either adding energy, or taking it away, they're referred to as reaction wheel, usually having 3 of these wheels on 3 different axis

This might work better on trains or trams that run on smooth tracks with wide curves rather than vehicles that have to drive over rough surfaces and sharp corners. Especially with regenerative braking and friction-less magnetic bearings.

Awesome! You showed the RTA from Dayton, OH! That tripped me out when I seen that big green turd! They got rid of all the trolleys, and now have a fleet of silver and black hybrids, but they've still got the green turds as well. Cheers from Dayton!