Recent content by Bandit

All words are English words - as a language it has very eclectic tastes. This makes it much richer than almost all others, while still managing to convey the same information in dramatically fewer syllables. This richness shows itself all the time. How do the Welsh and Irish manage with no...

Do you work it from "battery nominal content" by seeing how many miles it takes to exhaust the battery, or do most people have some kind of instrument like a Cycle Analyst?

How are we measuring wh - from the battery or from the wall. We get about 10wh/mile from the wall from our e-Motions, but not knowing the efficiency of the charger I don't know what the "true" figure is. As a comparison point, the electric buggy we're testing is managing about 120 to 150...

Terrain will certainly point up the difference between the relative efficiencies of the two kinds of drive system, and it's difficult to compare the performance of the two fairly, since the Panasonic system requires a rider input that could not be guaranteed on any hub motored bike. I'm...

And if not, at least there will be someone you can sue for damages, who will be wary of negative publicity. The difference in price is called a "brand premium" and it pays for better product liability insurance (hopefully, but not necessarily, among other things). :)

How difficult is it to remove and replace the wheel of a hub-motored bike? I'm glad I have never had to do it - I have enough trouble with punctures on our crank drives. All this talk of punctures reminds me that it is puncture season here in the country - the annual event where hedge-cutting...

If it was a puncture on a hub-motored wheel, you could understand why a regular bike shop might be nervous, but the Dover is a Panasonic-powered bike, isn't it?

I guess if you're skilful you can (with either type of drive) arrive at a balance between the watts you can (or are willing) to contribute and the watts the motor can contribute to achieve any particular speed. What less skilful riders like me might find helpful is to be able to fix the speed -...

That was certainly our experience when trialling both types over the course of a few months in our very hilly area. Despite being harder to explain, the Panasonic system seemed to require much less thought to operate "efficiently" than a hub motored bike (once you have mastered the...

It ought to be close, because the un-motorised bike is widely said to be the most efficient, and that has a not terribly efficient engine. According to MacKay's chart, the closest thing to a push bike is a "cross country" type electric train when it is full. This has something to do with being...

He might, but he'd also have to change his diet. I think if you subsist on, say, Walker's Crisps, you extract less energy from the food than was embedded in its production, and the production process itself would be pretty fossil carbon intensive. We're doomed, I tell ya. :)

In terms of energy efficiency (kWh per 100 passenger km) e-bikes come out pretty well. The Vectrix scooter reportedly needs 2.75kWh per 100p-km which compares well with the 80kWh required by a single passenger car. My e-bike seems to require about .65kWh per 100p-km, but that doesn't include...

Good. I hope you can help. We had to insure two bikes ourselves for a trial we were running, and it was very expensive because it included liability for anything that happened to people while they were using the bikes. This is the same risk a bike hire company takes, hence the hefty premiums...

Mine allowed our 2 bikes to be added last year for nothing, but they now added about £85 to the renewal premium. Still a lot better than specialist bike insurance, though I doubt very much the cover is the same. The ultimate insurer on this policy is Legal and General. Speaking of bike...

It depends on (a) whether you believe insurance fraud affects premiums and (b) whether an illegal electric bike actually poses a greater risk for the insurer. Unfortunately, the insurance market has gone way beyond its high-minded original idea of the many banding together to share the cost...