The bicycle is one of the most ubiquitous and indispensable technologies ever developed. It is efficient, elegant, environmentally friendly, fun, healthy, inexpensive, and user-maintainable. It is a human scale means of travel that increases our range and speed ten-fold — yet we only use its core technology for transportation even though it is suitable for performing a multitude of tasks.

For the past five years, we have designed and built stationary pedal-powered machines (dubbed “dynapods” by Alex Weir). In addition to several custom dynapods, we have developed two core products: 1) the Big Rig, a multifunction machine with a built-in seat and work surface, and 2) the Pedal Genny, a more portable, single function machine.

Why a Kickstarter? Our machines are built by hand in our spare time and are expensive as a result. Our hope is that someday they will be as economical and widespread as the bicycle. To take a step towards affordability, we’re going to open source the designs of our machines. Our goal with this campaign is to raise a small amount of funding to enable us to produce high quality, open-source build plans with dimensioned drawings and step-by-step instructions.

Learn more here http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2014/01/the-electricity-generating-bicycle-desk-that-would-power-the-world/282692/