monster

hi is it just me or is anyone else seeing loads and loads of electric bikes now? i am seeing them almost every other day now. i used to be the only person that had one. it must be something to do with halfords selling them?

hi i'm available to fix peoples electric bikes in the UK. labour will be £10 an hour. i can give you estimates over the phone for how long i think it will take. i can fix any electric bike. Regards, Dr Matthew Slinn PM me if your interested

your going to need a large battery, but its do-able. a 600wh battery would let you do 32miles. if you can charge at work then this would be the best solution. otherwise i would go for an even larger battery e.g. 1000wh. always buy more battery than you need because it protects against premature ageing.

we need a critical mass of electric bikers before we can hope to have any power over the writing of new legislation. bring it on!

get disc brakes and you could just continue riding on it.

if its an aluminium rim then you will have to replace it which involves respoking it. its possible to do it yourself but it takes a few hours and a spoke key. if its steel then you can bend it back with some grips. you probably went over something like a large pothole or debris. i had it happen once 5miles from home. i over heated the controller trying to limp home at 4mph. some rims kink in vertically, some rims flange outwards at the braking surface.

those running machines don't accuratly simulate running. theres no resistance from wind or gravity. even when you set it for "up hill" you are not having to move your whole body up a hill, just your feet and legs. its cheating. its probably very dependant on how you use it as well. there should definatly be a standard for battery range on electric bikes because they are lieing to consumers at the moment. i think it should be set at top legal speed (15mph), all flat terrain (velodrome) with no pedaling. if the bike doesn't work with out pedaling then hack/replace the controller to make it work. oh, and the rider would have to wear some standard suit of armor to eliminate body shape drag profie differences! i guess they could use a treadmill and wind tunnel to simulate wind resistance and use a dummy with training wheels? failing that, we will have to test just the batteries. maybe consumer magazine "which?" could do the independant tests.

just check that the positive and negative are the right way round for your battery and that the float voltage of the charger is the same as the old one.

i tried to make a legal ebike about 3 years ago. its wasn't worth the hastle. the punishment for riding a mini-moto is just a slap on the wrist. they only confiscate the mini-moto if you are caught a second time. i think we still need to wait for more of a critical mass of electric bikes before we can make fast ones legal. i remember the ppl at the DVLA/VOSA had to call their boss and have a big discussion before they could even decide what classification the bike should be in. They keep telling me that it was a bicycle and didn't need clasification. the cost of getting a vehicle classified as moped could easilt run into £500-£1000. i haven't ever seen anyone that has done it. anyone?

once you get it passed you then have to get insurance. no insurance company is going to insure you on a vehicle that is not in their computer database. before you go through the hurdles i suggest you phone insurance companies so that you understand that problem too.

G4 9 SMD LED Marine Warm white Light Bulb Lamp 12V on eBay (end time 12-Feb-10 12:02:15 GMT) these are really good. as bright as a 10W MR16 but only 3.5W.

Hi Reg i think you application for Ebike technology is very worthy. most of the commercial bikes will be a bit low powered as they are designed with pedaling in mind. fear not though, because with a few tweeks and some extra batteries you can increase the power of any bike. Xipi make some good high powered bikes if you don't want to tinker with anything. whatever you buy you can PM me if you need to tweek it.

i think green taxes will be much easier to sell than other taxes. hopefully we will see a lot more of them. i read in the paper that motorists are going to get hit by a tripple-wammy of higher fuel tax, insurance and cost of oil. i definatly think there is scope for more to be put on the car tax bands. it was a real shame that the scrapage sceme wasn't linked to emmisions though.

i got annoyed a week ago when i over-herd a group of females in a resturaunt discussing how some cyclists ride too far out and make it "impossible to pass". they seemed like nice people and none of them had a clue about why it was. i think there should be a gov TV campain about it, to increase awareness.

i don't have many problems with traffic any more. i think i've mellowed out slightly because i used to get very passionate about this issue. its only the high speed limit single lane roads that usually pose a danger of this. in these situations its difficult and probably illegal to block 50mph traffic just because you don't like it. the best solution is to go fast and get off that section of road asap or avoid it altogether. skimming doesn't happen in urban areas as our speed is almost the same as traffic speeds.

what battery is it?

speak for yourself im 29 and in perfect health. this is a wild assumption.

you call 16ths of an inch real units?

ive never done a long distance ride on my bike before so this will be a great opportunity. i was kind of hoping for a race though but i understand. + i think they have prooved the coming of age part of racing electric bikes with last years race.

can you prove its capacity with a watts-up meter? i guess a fair price would be around £150-200. 2wh/£ is the price for new ping

30mph is a bit much but probably acceptable on country roads especially if traffic is overtaking you at 50mph. through towns i think 25mph is a comfortable top speed, 20 average. this is push bike terratory. on bike paths i always go much slower. when i pass someone i drop to 8mph and say hello as i pass.

i used the Lariteck LT4DW11 18-72V IN 5V OUT DC-DC Converter

the week link in the chain is the welds. just put some grips on the link either side of the weld and bend it back and forth. it will break in 30 seconds. i worked this out when i was trying to chain my batteries to my bike and i needed to alter the length of the chain. my chain was 5mm thick and had links about an inch long. your results may differ. for the 5V dc converter i used something like this but i found one that went up to 72V input. requires soldering. great for charging phones, satnav, etc.

its wraped in duct tape. most of my bike is made of duct tape. noone would guess its there.

thats not bad statistics when you think about it. china has 4 times as many ebike as cars yet they make up only 3% of all road death statistics! am i wrong?