Loco-Motion : Joe Grutzik’s Bouncer Bike Looks Weird and Rides Weird--but It’s Supposed To

You’ll pardon Joe Grutzik if his bicycle appears to have the hiccups.

Grutzik’s invention--a half scooter, half mountain bike that lurches itself across the pavement--is what old-timers might call a high-falutin’ contraption, of the what-in-tarnation class. Grutzik can hear the know-it-all codgers now: “Some fella had a mighty poor eye who built that front wheel; the axle’s all haywire.”

Which, of course, is the whole idea. Grutzik, who grew up in Orange County, is not eccentric, but his wheel is, by design. The pedals are missing, too.

That off-center axle is what propels the bike--with no small amount of help from the rider, whose bending knees, sashaying arms and general yo-yo motion help keep the wheel loping forward (a pretty good aerobic workout is part of the bargain when you get on this bike).

The rider first steps on the deck with one foot and pushes off in skateboard fashion to get up to speed. The off-center axle causes the bike frame, along with the rider, to bob up and down comically as the wheel turns. The rear wheel, a 12-inch garden-variety scooter tire, is just along for the ride.

It’s pure science, if fun science, says 37-year-old Grutzik, a self-described former ski bum. His wife and business partner, Cindy, were sweethearts at Buena Park High School in the 1970s and now live in Los Angeles.

Grutzik has given his invention a name only a garage inventor could love: the Frequency-Accelerated Velocipede. (He knows how to throw around terms like that, having earned a degree in aerospace engineering from the University of Arizona.)

Teen-agers, who Grutzik says squabble over riding rights to his prototype model, tend to shorten that name to the acronym FAV, or the Bouncer Bike. Grutzik thinks his market niche is 15- to 20-year-olds; They know a fun ride when they see it.

Grutzik came up with the idea while at college.

“I used to ride a skateboard to class, but that takes a lot of work, because you have to lift your foot on and off the ground a lot, and very little of that energy goes into propelling you forward,” he says. “So I was thinking of how to harness that up-and-down energy into forward movement. And one day while I was walking home it hit me--bing!”

Other eccentric-wheel bikes are in the patent books--including at least one design from the 19th Century, but Grutzik says his is unique. It’s easily portable, at 12 pounds, and at a price Grutzik expects to be about $250, he wants one in every garage in America. He’s now scouting around for a distributor and financing for production.

He assembled his latest prototype in a dash around Orange County just before the Interbike bicycle trade show opened at the Anaheim Convention Center last month.

“I started to work on this idea at the beginning of the year, but I wasn’t doing anything serious about it,” Grutzik says. “Then I found out Cindy was pregnant with our first child, and I figured I’d better get to work. That was the motivation that put me over the hump. I built three early prototypes out of old bikes that I cut up.

“Then I built one completely new for the trade show. Some friends who work at Sunny Hills Orthopedic in Fullerton--they make prosthetic limbs--helped me make the platform. It’s fiberglass and graphite.

“Then I went to four metal shops to try to get the frame bent, but they just looked at me funny; they couldn’t get the idea. Finally at Cempi Industries in Orange, they bent up the frame and welded it together.”

At the trade show, the bike was the buzz of the new-product demonstration area, according to Allan Seymour of Interbike.

For Grutzik, the invention helps make up for the bad timing of earning his aerospace degree just as the Cold War was ending.

“I looked for work in the industry for about a year, but there was nothing,” he says. “This is fun. I plan to work on the design a bit more, try to lower the center of gravity on it. But then, that’s it. It’s a new bike.”