jaydeeuk1

... and loving it. The difference between my old hub based legal 250w bike is night and day. So far had no issues (other than chain coming off once when changing too many gears at a time under power) nor have I had to adjust anything yet. I'm a fair weather cyclist but have managed to bike it to work at least 3 times a week so far. It will conquer any hill, let me arrive at work in a decent state and best of all I feel much safer being able to keep up with traffic at 30mph (think having a decent 30q battery helps), no more having to ride almost in the gutter dodging drain covers. Most of the 'serious' lycra cyclists take it in good humour when I shout 'morning chaps' as I blast past them up the a6. I still get a good work out as I like to travel at top speed in highest gear, and I now have a decent routing for changing gear (haven't bothered with a gear or brake sensor), so I stop pedellaing, wait 1/4s, change gear and then blip the throttle, let it engage and then pedal / will full throttle, seems nice and smooth. Might get the wife on board with a BBSHD. Shame the laws are so restrictive, although I guess the Govt and oil companies would lose huge amounts of cash if people were able to ditch their cars.

Will the headlight work from 5v? Some batteries like mine have a usb port. I've configured my bbs02 750w, at 22a with a fresh battery it's capable of putting out well over 1kw, with a throttle in a low gear it will wheelie and blasts up Derbyshire hills. The bbshd looks epic, but I'd no need for all that power, not looking to go 40mph. It's not legal, but neither is 71 on a motorway, downloading films, being drunk in a pub or betting under different identities.

I know **** all about bikes and managed to fit a bafang BBS02 kit in an hour or two to my new bike (first bike in about 20 years), was incredibly easy just followed a youtube video.

Finished building it today (well, apart from throttle, looks a faff taking off the brakes and gear selector) and gave it a test drive after uploading Karl's firmware and dropping max current to 20amps. My God it's quick. My last ebike was some small wheeled 24v 250w machine, this is in a whole different league. Whole office now wants one! The surge of power even on lowest 1 setting is amazing and cranked up to level 3, even at 20a is epic. Had huge smile on my face, i dont think there's a hill in Derbyshire this won't blast up. Installing was surprisingly easy, i didn't know what a bottom bracket or crank was until the other day. My soldering skills are crap so might give it a sort out one day, and need to tidy up cabling, there's about 5 miles of cable included. Really glad i spent weeks researching and didn't just go for some 1500w hub motor that wouldn't be anywhere near as good as the bbs02. The Boardman hybrid made a pretty damn good donor bike, everything just fit nicely, and still stops dead.

Had my heart set on the 750w after reading and watching g hours of reviews and comparisons. Ordered from eBay, cost £500 but probably works out the same if ordering from China with import and vat. Really impressed with the bike, although halfords thought 10% of 375 came to £358... Bloke seemed knowledgeable and was put together well, his colleague had fitted a bafang so gave me a couple of tips. Another bloke was instore too and had a cycling membership, offered him a tenner to use his discount but halfords having none of it! Shame, £300 would have been a steal!

Have gone for the boardman, managed to haggle another 10% off too making it under £340, must be my dazzling personality. Looks like I might have to order the bafang from china out of stock in uk unless you want to pay extortionate prices and I'm too impatient to wait till may.

Thank you. The bike itself is £300+vat, the motor and battery will add another £700 (I presume eclipse are vat registered too). Or are you giving me an incentive to find a bike costing over £500?

How does that work then? If I'm ss'ing (already paying myself minimal salary for tax purposes) that might push me under some ni threshold. I'll speak to our accountant and see what he says.

Before I press purchase, I'm director of a small limited company. Will confirm with accountant but instead of faffing about with the cycle to work scheme, I presume I could just purchase through company, say officially the bike is a pool bike, and then claim back vat? Won't be used for business just commuting so not bothered about losing out on the 20ppm.

Plenty of people have removed/blocked off the DPF on their older diesel car - now its illegal to drive (although I imagine most won't be aware of that) The m1 north from where I live looks like it might become 60mph. Govt won't ban cars (at least not until they've cracked self driving ones), just like they won't ban smoking or drinking due to the revenue it brings in. But it could introduce further limits on cycling. They could force all electric assisted bikes to have insurance, or riders must have a licence, ban imports of motors capable of producing 251w or more. As with my example of quadcopters we're already banned from going more than 120m up and line of sight out (despite FPV and range of 2 miles), and we might have to register our drones and carry a serial code if it's over 250g, and get a proper flight licence costing thousands of we want to fly something approaching decent and generally kill off the industry. Will it stop the people who fly over airports or over groups of people? No, will just affect those who follow the rules. It will be just a matter of time.

This forum doesn't seem too dissimilar to rcgroups. A few years ago you could build RC planes capable of flying 50 miles or so and do it all within the law. You'd get kids and adults coming over with interest to see your screen and ask questions on how far and high you can fly and generally amazed at what off the shelf components can do. Then cheap sub £1000 GPS camera equipped quadcopters arrived, far simpler to setup, maintain, incredible performance and lifting capability, but also meant a tiny minority who are idiots - the types who would buy a flashy 5kw ebike and go 50mph, could get in to the hobby without knowing the rules, or having any training or experience and then ruin it for everyone else They're the only ones you ever hear about in the news, flying over airports, around peoples gardens etc. Now the hobby is being heavily legislated, quads like mine capable of flying FPV which were perfectly safe one day now ruled highly illegal, in parks we now get hounded out by the same people who used to watch with interest, and regular forum members looking down at disdain at new members wanting to buy a dji phantom etc or asking questions on how fast, how far or how much weight something can lift. I can see it from both points of view, the tiny reckless minority will probably sooner or later ruin ebikes as it takes off over the next few years, just like it has with RC, but members like minime (and myself) who are going in to this with their eyes open, not intending on blasting around at 30mph drawing attention to themselves and well aware of UK/EU laws are genuinely looking for advice on what plenty of other ebikers have achieved but perhaps not as willing to share in a public forum.

Thanks for the info, will only consider a UK supplier though, even if it works out 25% more. Looking at getting this battery http://eclipsebikes.com/12ah-lithium-frame-battery-samsung-cells-p-1123.html And then this kit either when back instock or from elsewhere http://eclipsebikes.com/bafang-8fun-bbs02b-drive-750w-motor-p-1100.html Other than a toolkit with a crankarm puller, perhaps some velcro straps, and I presume some connectors for the battery (I should have a few 30a capable plugs from building quadcopters) is there anything else I'd require?

Thanks, but have found somewhere else with the bbs02 in UK a bit cheaper. Would this bike make a good candidate for a conversion? http://www.halfords.com/cycling/bikes/hybrid-bikes/boardman-hybrid-comp-bike

Right, after many many hours of reading, adding things to basket, looking elsewhere etc I've decided to go with the general consensus and build a bike myself. I've also decided that I'm going to get a bbs02 750w kit as I think that will be most suitable for me, rather than going for a 1000/1500w hub driven thing, especially as I've decided to get a new bike (and therefore not have to chuck half of it) I see eclipse do the kit, although currently out of stock till May, and a suitable matching battery. Ok, so my next question, and seeing as I know next to nothing about bikes is what would be a good candidate bike for around £300, read that it needs either 68m, or 73mm bottom bracket (only knew what one was as of 3 hours ago), not seen many sites that show that in the bike specs. Cheers.