Hi,
Having learnt a lot from this forum, I thought I should give a little back. I've recently finished fitting a "25-mile" Swytch conversion kit to my girlfriend's new bike, a Ryedale Harlow -- she saved a fair chunk of cash by getting a discontinued model. She wanted a girly bike that wasn't too heavy and had a decent range of gears. And a basket.
With only a single chainring, the Harlow doesn't have much clearance between crank and bottom bracket. On the non-drive (left) side, it was just under 4mm. The PAS disc that comes with the Swytch is 4.5mm thick so that wasn't going to happen.
Having tried a few alternative solutions (see notes, below), I ended up shaving a few mm off the inside arms of the disc with a Dremel and Stanley knife -- in hindsight, just the knife would have worked better as the plastic's pretty soft.
This let us fit it nicely around the "ledge" on the inside of the crank arm (see first photo) without faffing around with cable ties, etc. It seems pretty secure, but I will keep an eye on it in case the shaved arms aren't strong enough, and add a bit of glue or Sugru if needed.
Notes:
1. The PAS disc would have fitted BEAUTIFULLY on the chainring side, with the bonus of the chainring for support and protection. Unfortunately, this would have required a right-handed version of the PAS sensor (KT-D12R rather than KT-D12L). These seem incredibly difficult to track down, even more so when you need Julet (or even Higo) a connector on the other end.
2. Further to note (1), "flipping the disc" doesn't work on this one. Only one direction of rotation works, regardless of the disc's orientation.
3. Also, the magnets have to pass fairly close to perpendicular to the sensor, so Woosh's mount solution on this thread wouldn't work. We couldn't "flip the sensor" as the bottom bracket gets in the way -- and you can't move that!
4. There is a setting, deep in the Swytch LCD settings, for PAS direction. Forward or back. I honestly thought I'd cracked it and would be able to use the L sensor on the right side. But no, that didn't seem to make any difference.
5. Swytch customer support, specifically Cerys and Harriet (I think) were incredibly helpful and responsive on live chat and then a phone call. They offered to send out a modified disc (free if we had bought the kit ourselves, but unfortunately £25 as we'd got it off eBay), but we declined when we found out that it'd just have the inside arms cut out. They also offered to send us (well, sell us) an alternative all-in-one KT-V12L sensor, as used on their Brompton kits, as it works with a narrower setup. As this would have meant removing the crank arm, we decided to try our solution first. Swytch don't have right-handed sensors.
6. It's not clear from the Swytch instructions which way round the disc should be mounted. The main instructions suggest the smooth side, marked "working surface", outwards, but the troubleshooting section has it the opposite way. The clincher was a picture I found on here of the same disc, posted by Woosh, with the smooth side out. I figured that he knows what he's doing so went with it.
7. On an unrelated note, also in the Swytch settings is the maximum assisted speed. It defaults to the UK (EU?) maximum of 25km/h but can be set up to 40km/h. Might give that a try some time. Off-road of course!
As an added bonus, the old model Harlow comes with a basket rack on the front fork. Unfortunately it came with a current model basket, which uses a much uglier strut support that clamps on to the stem. Thankfully I was able to butcher it and fit the basket to the rack...which means that she can have it on even with the Swytch pack on her handlebars.
We took the bike out for a test ride yesterday, after about three days of solid rain here in Manchester, and it was very nice indeed. Very smooth power delivery and very quiet motor. There is a marked gyroscopic effect, which I guess isn't helped by the battery pack in front of the handlebars, but I guess that's the way with all front hub motors. It wasn't helped by me really not being used to Dutch style handlebars, rather than my usual MTB straight bar or drop bars.
I hope that helps someone.
Having learnt a lot from this forum, I thought I should give a little back. I've recently finished fitting a "25-mile" Swytch conversion kit to my girlfriend's new bike, a Ryedale Harlow -- she saved a fair chunk of cash by getting a discontinued model. She wanted a girly bike that wasn't too heavy and had a decent range of gears. And a basket.
With only a single chainring, the Harlow doesn't have much clearance between crank and bottom bracket. On the non-drive (left) side, it was just under 4mm. The PAS disc that comes with the Swytch is 4.5mm thick so that wasn't going to happen.
Having tried a few alternative solutions (see notes, below), I ended up shaving a few mm off the inside arms of the disc with a Dremel and Stanley knife -- in hindsight, just the knife would have worked better as the plastic's pretty soft.
This let us fit it nicely around the "ledge" on the inside of the crank arm (see first photo) without faffing around with cable ties, etc. It seems pretty secure, but I will keep an eye on it in case the shaved arms aren't strong enough, and add a bit of glue or Sugru if needed.
Notes:
1. The PAS disc would have fitted BEAUTIFULLY on the chainring side, with the bonus of the chainring for support and protection. Unfortunately, this would have required a right-handed version of the PAS sensor (KT-D12R rather than KT-D12L). These seem incredibly difficult to track down, even more so when you need Julet (or even Higo) a connector on the other end.
2. Further to note (1), "flipping the disc" doesn't work on this one. Only one direction of rotation works, regardless of the disc's orientation.
3. Also, the magnets have to pass fairly close to perpendicular to the sensor, so Woosh's mount solution on this thread wouldn't work. We couldn't "flip the sensor" as the bottom bracket gets in the way -- and you can't move that!
4. There is a setting, deep in the Swytch LCD settings, for PAS direction. Forward or back. I honestly thought I'd cracked it and would be able to use the L sensor on the right side. But no, that didn't seem to make any difference.
5. Swytch customer support, specifically Cerys and Harriet (I think) were incredibly helpful and responsive on live chat and then a phone call. They offered to send out a modified disc (free if we had bought the kit ourselves, but unfortunately £25 as we'd got it off eBay), but we declined when we found out that it'd just have the inside arms cut out. They also offered to send us (well, sell us) an alternative all-in-one KT-V12L sensor, as used on their Brompton kits, as it works with a narrower setup. As this would have meant removing the crank arm, we decided to try our solution first. Swytch don't have right-handed sensors.
6. It's not clear from the Swytch instructions which way round the disc should be mounted. The main instructions suggest the smooth side, marked "working surface", outwards, but the troubleshooting section has it the opposite way. The clincher was a picture I found on here of the same disc, posted by Woosh, with the smooth side out. I figured that he knows what he's doing so went with it.
7. On an unrelated note, also in the Swytch settings is the maximum assisted speed. It defaults to the UK (EU?) maximum of 25km/h but can be set up to 40km/h. Might give that a try some time. Off-road of course!
As an added bonus, the old model Harlow comes with a basket rack on the front fork. Unfortunately it came with a current model basket, which uses a much uglier strut support that clamps on to the stem. Thankfully I was able to butcher it and fit the basket to the rack...which means that she can have it on even with the Swytch pack on her handlebars.
We took the bike out for a test ride yesterday, after about three days of solid rain here in Manchester, and it was very nice indeed. Very smooth power delivery and very quiet motor. There is a marked gyroscopic effect, which I guess isn't helped by the battery pack in front of the handlebars, but I guess that's the way with all front hub motors. It wasn't helped by me really not being used to Dutch style handlebars, rather than my usual MTB straight bar or drop bars.
I hope that helps someone.
