Five Brothers and a War

Experiments with Lighting

The trouble was that each rider was meant to go for fifteen minutes, but when Leen would take his shift on the bicycle, he would become so engrossed in his book that the headlight would dim. When he would get yelled at, he would pick up the speed and the light would get brighter. Then it would dim again. The pattern of brightening, dimming

and yelling would continue until Piet took over. This led to the other major concept, where the front wheel of the same bike was installed on the chimney top, along with the same dynamo. Kees had fitted thin slats of wood on alternate wheel spokes by drilling small holes on either side of the designated spokes, and then running string through the slat, over the spoke and back through the neighboring slat hole. Aside from being naturally aligned with the spokes, the slat fins were also pitch-angled to capture the wind. The electric wire was then run from the chimney top down to the first floor fireplace and onto the floor into the living room, where the same headlight was again pointed at the ceiling.

van Pelt

The bicycle wheel was briefly mounted on the Margrietstraat 20 chimney—the third from the right.

Five Brothers and a War

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