boghopper

heh thats really cute, they have been around a while havent they? theres definitely something more satisfying about an electric bike - quiet, low cost, cheap to run, no tax, insurance, traffic. aah its a breezy joy... i hope its sunny tomorrow

D8veh is right, the issue is having an accident and getting sued. If you are going to go fast on a shared path you need to be ultra considerate. There is no point comparing ebikes with mopeds, they appeal to different people. I have a car If I want to use the road and sit down all the way. Also, I don't want to leave a moped out on my street. I store my bike in the shed. Also its an efficiency thing. An ebike is designed to be as light as possible, making it able to use a very low power motor and get you from a to b for just a few pence. Less than a shower in the morning! Ok so maybe 20mph unassisted would be a sensible limit. This feels like a good speed when on a normal bike on the road...25 with pedalling...

Hmmm do you think maybe 36v/48v is where its at right now? Maybe the 24v systems delivering 200w are a little under powered. I seem to remember a human rider delivers about 250w so any less than that and you feel like you could do better on your own. If my battery is made of separate cells maybe I could reconfigure it to a higher voltage? I will take it apart and have a look. If that's no good then maybe a new battery is what I need. if my controller and motor aren't up to the higher voltage then maybe I will need to upgrade them too. It's a slippery (expensive) slope... Good point morphix about the gearing, I could get a buy more thus way buy its more assistance I would prefer Cheers Dan

Hi all, I'm new here and new to ebikes. I've been interested in the phenomenon for a while but they have always been out of my budget. With the cost coming down and an increased desire to ride to work, I decided to go for it. I restricted my budget to £250 and found an unbranded Chinese bike. It's obviously quite a low spec bike but its got an Ali frame, disc brakes and shimano gears. Other than than I think it has a brushed 200w motor, 24v 12ah battery, pedelec sensor and throttle speed limited to 15mph. It has a fairly decent controller with safety cut out on the brakes and under voltage protection. As far as performance goes its ok. Bearing in mind I have nothing to compare it to other than my regular mountain bike I would say I am satisfied: I get to work in about the same amount of time but with about 50% of the effort. It is still going strong after the 12m journey and fully charges before I leave again. But as you can guess, I would like a little more speed... With peddling and throttle on the flat I cruise at about 17mph this gives me a journey time of about 45m. I would love to have top speed of 20-25mph giving me journey time of half an hour. There is some resistance at top speed and I can't imagine I could pedal faster to achieve more speed. So I'm thinking: A) derestrict some how B) higher voltage C) higher torque motor. By the way, most of my journey is off road on flat terrain. Any thoughts welcome! Cheers Dan