Nairobi, week six (july 12 to 16):

after ordering the engine from the states last friday, we are resigned to waiting for it to arrive, with even greater desire that it arrives within the allotted 7-10 business days ...

the first half of the week was spent finishing up the mechanical hardware for the first prototype, namely working out mounting and alignment of mountain bike brakes, wheel choice/replacement and brake cable wiring ... the switch to a mountain bike wheel has been fairly fruitful in terms of brake mounting ease and performance; though more testing is needed, the brakes seem to be doing the job they were designed to do; hopefully the switch to the heavier duty wheel will provide additional durability to the motorized drivetrain

the second half of the week was spent testing the trike-sans-engine and getting parts for the final prototype; i spent the better part of 2 days in town again, walking around river road finding exceptionally long brake cable and a sprocket that fit our system for mounting to the drive wheel (among other things); though most items were easier to find the second time around due to knowing exactly what we wanted and having a better idea of where to get it, i spent most of my time checking inner hole diameters on countless rear-wheel motorcycle sprockets (the inner hole had to fit around a standard bicycle freewheel; so many sprockets were close, only one was right) ... with the end of our stay in nairobi looming ever closer, we were glad to find relative success in the trike-sans-engine with proof-of-concept in brakes and chain tensioning system; with this knowledge, we began the work of assembling the final prototype: getting a new trike frame, adding handlebars and frame pieces, making a couple new chain tensioning devices, and making sure sprockets were mounted concentrically on their respective axles

there was some work on the write-up for final production by APDK and presentation to MIT people, but much of that will be done next week after we finish the final prototype (minus engine and mounting) and while we wait for the arrival of the engine ... we have received several reports from previous contacts of engines that "match our specifications," but upon further questioning, there are always one or two things that don't actually match up exactly; however, the guys at "riders kenya ltd." who were extremely helpful when we first visited (understood what we were looking for and talked about being able to order from china) have contacted us about looking at an engine at the beginning of next week; though i remain highly doubtful (possibly even pessimistic), i have hope in their ability and understanding of our project ...

Nairobi, weekend five (july 10 to 11):

my second to last weekend in kenya was spent relaxing in nairobi, or rather, galavanting around nairobi hanging out with people from work as well as with random ex-pats and crazy football fans

following a late arousal from bed saturday morning, we went to a fundraiser for the building of a library in a town on the uganda/kenya border (that we had heard about the previous night from some other upperhill residents); after meeting a local kenya author, a university student, and a kenyan MP (high government official), we went to pascal's apartment on the outskirts of nairobi to enjoy an evening of football (germany vs. uruguay) and ugali and sauce (like to and sauce from burkina, and the rest of africa); we also spent the night there after conversing about america, kenya, and music (i introduced pascal to bluegrass, and he gave me his collection of krunk)

as full as saturday may have been, i ended up filling sunday with even more (even in kenya, i can't resist packing my schedule to the brim); in the morning we met another guy from APDK who took us to his church where we heard a sermon by brother william branham (one pre-service message from recording by branham, a second written by branham, but delivered by the church's pastor), let's just say the "end-of times worship center" was quite a different experience (from imagined african and american), with much enthusiasm and many challenging ideas ... we then met a couple other MIT grad students and a couple students from the university of nairobi for lunch to discuss american universities and how the nairobi students could get hooked up with summer work or other projects there; during lunch i also learned about an ex-pat ultimate frisbee game on sunday afternoons, which, of course, i had to attend; so after about 3 hours of good quality pick-up ultimate (on some super nice grass fields at the private international school/university), i went to a local bar/club to watch the world cup final; there we plenty of ex-pats cheering for spain or netherlands, as well as many locals joining in the world cup fever; despite a non-ideal job of refereeing, the game was rather entertaining, with many cries of dismay from both groups of supporters; though neither team had won a world cup before, i was supporting spain, so the goal in the last 5 minutes of overtime was a relief; however, the enormous roar that erupted when the goal was scored was still more entertaining! after waiting almost 2 hours for a goal, the place went absolutely nuts, with the screams and waving arms of the spanish fans hiding the disappointed faces of the danes ... not quite the same, but probably about as close as i'll get to watching a world cup game in person

Nairobi, week five (july 6 to 9):

this was a week of re-evaluation, both of the engine and the design of the drivetrain; it all started with the engine, which doesn't mean the engine started, it means the problems started with the engine; so after getting the trike to an essentially completed state, all we had to start was start the engine and drive it ... many times we were able to get a sputter of life from the engine, but no sustained operation; it took several (score) pulls of the pull start to break the recoil spring in the pull-starter for the first time; so after a couple different attempts to fix the spring, success was finally attained and the engine was reassembled to produce an additional several (score) pulls to again break the pull starter, all the while with only minimal signs of life from the engine; so that day was essentially spent fixing and re-fixing the pull start (needless to say, i can assemble and disassemble it in my sleep); towards the end of the day, there was one moment of success where we got the engine running and driving the wheel (held off the ground) for just under 5 seconds, however, that was the high point for the day; before going home that evening, we determined that yes, the engine runs, and yes, it drives the wheel (no human tests unfortunately), but the engine that we have isn't really worth any more time ...

so i come back the next day (wednesday), with a stubborn attitude, and decided to go out and try to start the trike for a bit more; the pull start mostly behaves that day, which allows the discovery that for the last day, i was not giving the engine enough gas to actually make it fire and run; the idle was set at closed, and so after fiddling with holding the throttle handle partly open and adjusting different nuts, we were able to get the engine running with a somewhat consistent pattern; there were a couple times where i could let it idle, and almost hop on to go for a ride, but as soon as i would touch the throttle handle, i'd kill it; so again, we never got any actually human-riding tests, but several instances of wheel propulsion under engine power; and again, after several failed attempts at riding it, we concluded that our design indeed worked, but was failing at the fault of the engine ... lesson number one when buying a used engine: make the seller start and run the engine for you before agreeing to pay money and take the engine home (something i should have known with great certainty before now, but alas ...)

the rest of the week we spent working on brakes and re-evaluating our engine choice:
- the brakes that we were using were difficult to set up correctly and we were increasingly disinterested in their implementation; so we switched to a mountain bike wheel with a flat side where we could use a different style of brake, one that is more easily actuated by regular cable; so the set up and fabrication of the brake system has been mostly completed, now we just need to figure out a parking brake for the trike
- the engine choice evaluation was mostly taken from the team last year, and had been concluded as a small, ~50cc engine with pull start and centrifugal clutch assembly, but with the non-availability that we are encountering with such an engine, we decided to look at our choice again; without detailing why which engines were determined to be better or worse in which areas, we essentially looked at pulleys and v-belts instead of chain, and a larger (125cc) engine instead of the small one; but in the end, we decided the the initial choice was the best and that we would order one from a company in the states; so we talked to a few more shop owners and found that we might be able to show them the engine when it arrives so that they can import it direct from china instead of us going through the states; in short, we are still hopeful for the long term, but have resigned ourselves to getting an engine in the middle to the end of my last week here, possibly leaving completion of the trike to the final week that maddie and wes are here (with me tagging along through skype and email)

the two days that we were out in the parking lot/driveway with the trike, there were countless inquiries as to where someone could get the trike, when could they get it, how much does it cost, and so on; unfortunately, we were only able to give the answer that "no, this is just a prototype; but APDK will be producing them at the end of the year" ... so as we have heard from the people we work with and the people who walk by every day, there is much interest in the completion of the project; we're getting close to the end of our time, and i'm starting to wonder at what state of completion will we leave the trike? i think we'll at least have a completed trike, something they can follow to build production models, but we hope to add a production manual/set of instructions to make the whole process easier; but that may be a write-up we complete back home in the states and send to APDK when it is finished

Nairobi, weekend four (july 3 to 5):

if my description of this weekend is anything similar to the number of pictures i took, go ahead and get yourself a cup of coffee and a snack now, you might need it before you finish reading ...

we left a bit early on friday after to catch the overnight train to mombasa that left nairobi railway station at 7pm; being the first time i've been on any significant train ride (that i remember), this was quite an epic journey; just to think about traveling through east africa on the "iron snake", through tsavo national park, to the indian ocean blew me away; another girl from upperhill came on the train with us (but was staying in mombasa after we left, so stayed at a different location than us for the weekend), so we were 4 to a sleeper car with two sets of bunks; we went for cheap and so brought our own dinner instead of buying on the train, but had breakfast included in the morning; traveling through the middle of tsavo at night was especially spectacular because of the lack of light; it was also a clear night so we had no trouble seeing the milky way across three-quarters of the sky and an absolutely uncountable number of stars everywhere else (even better than a good, clear night out at camp mennoscah) ... a full breakfast in the diner car in the morning put the cherry on the top of the train ride; we talked to a guy who had been eating earlier and got to watch a couple herds of elephants while sitting and eating ... definitely worth the 14 hours on an old rickety train

after arriving in mombasa just after 9am, we took the ferry to the south shore (free and necessary to get from the south shore to mombasa proper), a matatu to tiwi town, and a short taxi ride to twiga lodge (on tiwi beach); we were initially at twiga lodge by a view of palm trees, white sand, and blue ocean; after getting out of the taxi and going to the office to check in, we were then greeted by a waiting set of monkeys who descended on the open taxi and began to steal things from the trunk; we chased them back into the trees on the side of the driveway and never found out what they took, so no real harm done ... twiga lodge is essentially a resort and camping grounds on tiwi beach to the south of mombasa; for pittance per night, we stayed in a four bed bungalow with a 30 second walk to a white sand beach on the indian ocean; there was a coral reef from the beach out to about a quarter mile, so no significant waves reached the shore; the beach wasn't spotless (lots of washed up seaweed and coconut tree rubbish), but it was very picturesque with the perfectly blue ocean and the cliffs to the north and farther to the south; tiwi beach is a tourist hotspot, but much less so than diani beach, the neighbor directly to the south; prices are better here and there are fewer people, all in all a much better experience (aka, if anybody ever vacations in kenya, you should go stay at twiga lodge and hang out on the beach)

we decided to chill out at twiga that afternoon/evening, so after putting our stuff in our cabin and changing into shorts and sandals, we walked north along the beach and up along the rocks past the beach; since the tide was low, we were able to walk quite a ways on the coral floor along some small cliffs that were perpetually covered in small crabs and overhanging shrubbery; the point we turned around was when a native snorkeling guide walked by the other way and warned us of getting robbed at machete point if we went much farther while carrying cameras and the like; there were a couple cool caves, and some sweet tide pools with small fish, random crabs, and a few sea urchins, and of course tons of washed up coral and shells all along the beach ... the water was pleasantly cool (warm as bath-water according to maddie), so we went swimming after walking up and down the coastline; the tide was just starting to come in so maddie and i walked out to close to the end of the reef to be greeted by 10 to 12 foot breakers that boiled down to 2 or 3 feet after hitting the edge of the reef, however still powerful enough to pick me up and carry me a few feet ... and of course we saw argentina get thrashed by germany that evening, followed by spain squeaking by paraguay

i actually got up early for once on sunday morning, with the goal of seeing the sun rise over the indian ocean; the clouds had evidently been prevalent the last few mornings and so we were fortunate to get a rather spectacular showing (just more clouds than necessary, pictures to come soon); the day was then spent in mombasa looking around downtown and doing a few tourist-type activities; we got scammed for a tour of fort jesus (pronounced and shaped like the man on the cross), a fort the portuguese built on the coast in the latter half of the 16th century and used as a base for their slave trade in the indian ocean; the bottom two-thirds was carved from the coral and the top was added on at different times with brick, mortar, and concrete; after that we walked around old town for a while where practically all the old buildings from british colony days are still standing and in use as housing with small shops on the ground floor ... the funny thing was that i never even thought about american independence on sunday, and didn't really miss the fireworks (surprising since it's usually one of the favorite holidays); i guess the sunrise will have to do for all the fire in the sky this time around


as a feat of extraordinary measure and against all odds, i again got out of bed in time to have a seat on the beach before the sun came into view on monday morning; prompted by the spectacle of the morning before, we were slightly disappointed due to a significantly greater presence of clouds in the first 20 degrees above the horizon; before heading back to mombasa to catch the night bus back to nairobi that evening, we got taken out on a hand-made fishing catamaran (sorry, no pictures) by a local fisherman to go snorkeling not far from the beach; though extremely enjoyable, we all swallowed a bit more sea water than desirable due to choppy 3 to 4 foot swells (and because i've never been very good at controlling my movement in water, aka without two feet on solid ground); after 2 hours on the boat (and in the water), we went in to mombasa and walked around asking for small engines (it's monday after all, some work has to be done?); we also ran into problems of finding the small size we were looking for, but found a couple places that would possibly be able to import something or have some centrifugal clutches (which had been just about as hard to find in nairobi as 50cc engines); then we waited around in a western-style restaurant/cafe until 10pm when we headed to the bus station to catch an overnight charter bus back to nairobi

quite an epic weekend in my book, and quite a weekend vacation; i caught myself in disbelief several times wondering how i could be on a beach on the east coast of africa (among other things); there's been so much that we've done and so many people we've been able to meet, it's amazing to be here working on this project; and it's even harder to believe i'll be back in kansas in less than three weeks

Nairobi, week four (june 28 to july 2):

i apologize for not putting dates on earlier entries, i realize it just might be helpful for future reference ...

this week seemed like a semi-productive week in that we finished piecing together all of the components of the prototype trike; however, we only got it all put together by the end of the week, so we didn't have time to try and and drive it around the parking lot; after getting the engine started and running at the beginning of the week, we are hopeful for a working prototype come monday ... and again, we went to town a few times during the week; by this time, i'm really getting to know the city center and river road (where most motorcycle spare stores are located) pretty well; it's good to know i'm at least learning a little bit of nairobi while i'm here

specific items of engineering and work for the week were:
- adapting a set of road-tire brakes to the trike, which has proved more difficult than anticipated due to the geometry of the frame around the wheel and or non-familiarity with this type of brake; we took off the old flat-rod-into-the-tire style brake to add cables and a hand lever so the user won't have to take their hands off the handlebars to come to a stop (like on the current trike); but again, finding cable long enough and getting all the little fixtures rigged and pieces set is starting to seem a bit impractical for legitimate production
- mounting the engine we acquired at the end of last week, which was one of the only easy things so far this summer (as it should be), it was a side mount motor, so we just chopped some angle iron, drilled a few holes and actually got stuff to line up fairly well the first time around

Nairobi, weekend three:

we finally figured out our weekend activity schedule for the rest of the weeks in kenya: this weekend to lake naivasha, weekend four to mombasa (on the coast), five in nairobi, and six to maasai mara (for a safari)

lake naivasha is an easy hour and a half mutatu ride northwest of nairobi; it was a great weekend with pascal and the three of us walking and biking around lake naivasha and hells gate national park; saturday was spent checking out the campsite where we stayed and the nearby village; this morning we got up early, rented bikes and paid $25 to get into the park; there was some amazing scenery on the ride through the main road of the park, but the best part was taking a tour of the hell's gate gorge; hell's gate is named for the volcano and hot springs in the area, but is anything but a vision of hell; the gorge was cut by a stream that grows to a river every rainy season and descends into maasai land to the south; we walked through the bottom of the gorge, from the start to the devil's mouth (the point of no return) and to the first of the hot springs before climbing back out; it was a two hour tour (with a guide), but next time we'll have to take the 5+ hour tour that goes to the large hot springs and caves near the end of the gorge (and some scenes from the first tomb raider movie were filmed in the gorge and at those caves); definitely worth the entry fee, and definitely worth repeating if i'm ever in the area again

and of course we had to watch ghana beat the usa, as well as germany smoking england, and argentina beating mexico; wes is a soccer (properly, football) fanatic and so cheers for mexico first, then germany, then usa; so though germany had success tonight, he may end up drowning his sorrows in fanta (orange and black currant) after the mexico loss (we'll see how he takes the knockout) ... either way, now that the elimination rounds are started, there should be some excellent matches to watch every evening

Nairobi, week three:

instead of boring you with repeated accounts of weekly work at APDK, i'll attempt to keep further descriptions a touch more brief

wes, maddie, and i went searching for an engine on our own on monday (without allan from APDK), and found the nobody imports anything new and smaller than 125cc; so we had no idea of what to do for an engine besides shipping from the states; which is when i talked to rich at upperhill after being asked the question "how's the wheelchair coming?"; that's when we discovered the world of ngo ni wewe and parts mechanics ...

ngo ni wewe and the mechanics have no actual connection other than that the heads of the n.g.o. have tons of connections to mechanics and old parts dealers; ngo ni wewe is an n.g.o. based in gikomba (another nairobi slum) at a location called the treehouse (built around a tree more than in it); they work to take boys off the street (and off drugs) and get them involved in their drumming and acrobatic performances; so we walked around nairobi with matthias and ndogo (two of the heads of ngo ni wewe) for 4 hours on tuesday checking for engines ... result of the story being that after wednesday of walking around with these guys, there were promises of engines on thursday; nothing very fruitful on thursday produced a full day on friday where we finally found parts and an engine that should be good enough for an initial prototype ... as i had suspected, we had been asking the wrong people, the wrong questions; oh yeah, and we ended up ordering an engine from a kenyan guy in texas for a final prototype (we'll do more searching later for a reliable source of engines for eventual production)

besides spending time searching nairobi for engines with matthias and ndogo, we've hung out with them and at the treehouse a fair bit this week; we had a drumming session one morning, met the monkey that sometimes visits the treehouse, and found a couple good, local places to eat; needless to say, we'll be seeing more of the guys at the treehouse