tgame

This may be of interest:- Electric Bikes Gaining Traction - BusinessWeek

Door stop on prop stand This is what it looks like and also shows the angle of lean. http://www.axst45.dsl.pipex.com/bike/prop%202.jpg http://www.axst45.dsl.pipex.com/bike/prop%201.jpg

My little mod has the advantage of not making the arm stick out any further from the bike centre line which I find useful.

Weird coincidence! I had only seen the couple of further breakages. So glad you are enjoying your Agattu. I get more attached to mine every day that goes by. It has just the right amount of shove to avoid getting breathless while never making one feel one is simply being propelled. And of course the current weather is a joy.

My Agattu was delivered with a faulty prop stand, and although 50 cycles immediately sent me a new one I remained slightly dubious about the very obvious strain which it placed on both the frame and the prop. Now several others have suffered from broken prop stands, and my worries have increased. I have thought of all sorts of ways round the problem, but nothing appeared to be easy. Eventually I wondered whether the angle of lean needed to be quite as great as it is. I experimented with various blocks of wood under the foot, and came to the conclusion that raising it by 1 inch still left the angle of lean at a perfectly safe level whilst the strains on frame and prop arm were very obviously much less. No doubt someone could readily calculate these stresses, but my fourth form physics are too far away for me to do so, but it is trivially obvious that they are much less. Of course the bike can more easily fall over but in my opinion it is still perfectly safe. The sort of gale that would blow it over would mean that one would wish to lean the bike against something in any case, and the risk of careless people or hooligans pushing it over are as great whatever the angle of lean. I decided to make this modification. I found the easiest way of doing it was to drill a hole through the centre of the foot and bolt on a round rubber doorstop which was readily available. This has worked perfectly well, and although it does not look quite as one would wish it to do I think it very little noticeable. I am sure others more technically able could devise a more satisfactory solution but mine does work and is cheap and I am very pleased to have done it.

If it's a change and a rest, Flecc, it is very well earned. Enjoy yourself and we will hope to see you again later.

Well folks spring really is coming - I can state if for a fact. In order to avoid a traffic roundabout in heavy traffic, I cheekily cut through a back route into a hotel car-park and round the hotel gardens. It was a bright sunny morning and I passed between two large beds of massed wallflowers (Gilly-flowers my mother used to call them.) The scent was an experience one would have travelled miles for and I took it with me into town and shopped dreamily knowing that the annual miracle of spring was definitely under way at last.

Useful if punctures could be coloured!

I had actually forgotten about it. Automation can be a pitfall!

Well I should say at once that I know nothing of commerce or finance and my gut feelings are just that - hunches. We HAVE to stop the carbon cycle. That is going to involve cutting down on car usage among much else. We don't have any options here - this has got to be done. One way to alleviate the pain of this greatly would be to popularise and promote ebikes. Sensible government, preferably world, but usefully local, would in my view REALLY sort out incentives and promotions and advertising and so forth to facilitate this. Current battery prices are (in my view but others have demurred) a monstrous hindrance to all this. Never mind the sacred precepts of capitalism, action needs taking, whether subsidisation, government manufacture, whatever. It won't work I shall be told - IT HAS TO BE MADE to work. People should read the current AtoB with details of what the Dutch have done to promote cycling. We must do it. We must change our ways or we shall be back in the trees where there won't be much carbon to muck about with! Anyway - that's my tale and I'm sticking to it. ==== RANT - on/off O DO YOU REALLY WISH TO CLOSE THIS RANT? Y SURE? Y Rant over.

My offer was just that - not in any way a threat. I am of no importance but Flecc is vital. I've now had my say and shall say no more. Nobody has been hurt, nobody has lost money. Small things like a fire at Panasonic or Derby cycles could see people still waiting this time next year, but not compelled to do so. On any sensible scale it's all a storm in a teacup. . .

[quote=keithhazel;23995..hope this clarify's things for now It does indeed, Keith. And that whisky top up in the nighty-night coca is a fine institution! Long may it continue to loosen tongues and lubricate communication!!

Possibly 50cycles too get fed up with exactly repeated moans and ignore them when nothing can be done. I have told of my own experience on here, which is one of fast efficient service, including the replacement of a faulty part without fuss on any sort. If people want smarmy salesmanship then it's true they probably won't get it from 50cycles and will need to go elsewhere. They should do so. They can get their money back immediately. I know very little of 50cycles beyond my own satisfaction with them but I feel for them. They had a totally unforeseeable and fatal hitch with battery systems. They had a bad fire. They are trying to set up a good service as a Kalkhoff agency and run constantly into supply problems they are powerless to do anything about. They have apologised several times in a sincere and adult fashion. If they were to employ a telephone operator to croon sweet nothings into impatient ears would anyone be any better off? Of course not. There is nothing to be done. As you say those who must have instant satisfaction should cancel their orders and shop elsewhere. I am speaking frankly and curtly in an intentional way. I believe this badly needs saying. If a significant number tell me that my comments are unacceptable I will leave the forum but with much regret.

None at all - the first time. It's when they blow off steam on here over and over again in exactly the same way that it gets irritating to say the least. And it does damage. It has already lost the forum one valued supplier. If steam has to be let off every thirty seconds over a matter which is completely inevitable people should go into their gardens with a spade and dig. That will be useful as well as comforting.

I'm a little loath to speak having got my Agattu almost as soon as I ordered it, but things have now come to such a pass that one feels bound to stand up and be counted. This constant bitching at 50cycles is now not so much bathos as absurdity. There is nothing 50cycles can do; people have GOT to wait or cancel and have no other option; why keep endlessly on and on about it? It simply wears down everyone's nerves including the moaner's own. We all feel for you. You have been unfortunate. Grin and bear it. There is nothing else you can do and acting up like silly kids helps neither you nor anyone else.