Popular during the 1870s and 1880s, the penny-farthing bicycle is considered a symbol of the late Victorian period and the ancestor of the modern bicycle. Its odd name was inspired by the size difference between its front and rear wheels, with the British penny coin being considerably larger than the farthing. The iconic bicycle was only in style for about a decade, until the invention of the modern bicycle, which proved much safer, more comfortable, and easier to ride. There’s just something about the odd look of the penny-farthing that still fascinates people, which is why engineer Greg Mitchell, of Swindon, England, decided to spend hundreds of hours converting a 20-year-old Yamaha motorcycle into the world’s fastest penny-farthing. He first planned to build his SuperFarthing out of aluminum, but then realized the raw material alone would cost him about $5,000. He decided instead to go with steel to build the 363-pound front wheel that’s made up of 420 individually-machined pieces, as well as a massive vertical swing arm. The world’s fastest penny-farthing isn’t road legal in England because of its non-pneumatic front wheel, so testing it out on the open road isn’t an option. Mitchell says he would really like to ride it on a perfectly flat track to bypass the hydraulic power steering. Although being far from the world’s safest or most comfortable vehicle, the SuperFarthing is still both visually and technically impressive. Mitchell believes that under the right conditions, it could even reach speeds of around 140mph.
