1980 Electric Bike

[eclectic_bike]

I came across this article from 1980:

Archive Viewer | Popular Science

Interesting to see how much it resembles a modern bike. Not really a pedelec though, the article notes that the pedals are for steep hills.

 

[lemmy]

Very interesting. The similarity to modern ones makes you realise how little development is possible for electric bikes, in that nothing today is very different compared with the changes in cars or motorcycles.

 

[flecc]

Very interesting. The similarity to modern ones makes you realise how little development is possible for electric bikes

The Panasonic crank drive unit goes back over ten years and is now being widely copied by such as Yamaha, Daum and Bosch, so only progress in details on that type of e-power.

Internally geared hub motors have switched from brush to brushless in that same time, but the BionX and similar direct drive types are unchanged for all of that time and longer.

Batteries have transitioned from either SLA or NiMh to lithium during that same decade, though it's worth noting that Panasonic's crank drive folder was using a lithium-ion battery very early in that last decade.

So not much progress to get excited about, considering that ten years was half of the main commercial life of e-bikes.

 

[eclectic_bike]

Batteries have transitioned from either SLA or NiMh to lithium during that same decade....

It is really all about the battery. There have been developments in improving the efficiency of motors and delivery of power to the transmission, however the overriding factor is the power density of batteries, the number of charge cycles they can deliver, before degrading too much, and of course the cost. Lithium batteries have improved enormously but they are still limited by poor service life and cost. Some way to go before they can be regarded as a mature technology, I think.

 

[lemmy]

t is really all about the battery.

Yes.

I've had several letters in the Sunday Times and Saturday Telegraph in the past year pointing out how starry eyed are journalist and politician's views about electric cars.

In the UK for only double the price of a petrol/diesel family saloon you can buy one with a quarter of the range, which takes several hours to refuel, pollutes only a little more and after four or so years has no residual value.

Now that's what I call progress.

 

[indalo]

....and that's what I call irony, lemmy!

Regards,
Indalo

 

[flecc]

It is really all about the battery. There have been developments in improving the efficiency of motors and delivery of power to the transmission, however the overriding factor is the power density of batteries, the number of charge cycles they can deliver, before degrading too much, and of course the cost. Lithium batteries have improved enormously but they are still limited by poor service life and cost. Some way to go before they can be regarded as a mature technology, I think.

Absolutely, and there's little indication of any substantial progress. I've followed rechargeable battery "development" closely for over half a century of false dawns and inflated announcements and it's largely a business of advantages counterbalanced by disadvantages at each step, with prices always rising disproportionately.

That's why vehicles still use the 19th century lead-acid technology for starting etc, almost no usable and economical progress in all that time.