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Been looking at these recently (knees getting dodgy) but apart from the price, I find they are limited to 250W and 15mph for road use. To me this is fine in towns and cities, but I want it for rural road use, they do "Conversion kits" to fit your normal bike, and these come in 3 sizes 250W, 500W and 1000W, the latter two restricted to 250W by default unless you buy a led panel to override the limiter, for off-road use. What's the point of limiting them when an ordinary bike, even with me on it can easily regularly travel at 20+mph even in town. It means folk like me can't go for a nice bike ride of any distance unless i want to pootle along at 15mph, surely it would make more sense to unlimit them so that you could use full power of the more powerful motor on the open road, but switch to 250W if you entered a 20-30mph restricted area. Similar to having to take your foot off the gas in a car!
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...they aren't limited to 15mph, it is simply the assistance that cuts out at that speed.
If the gearing allows, you can (legally) achieve the same speed as you could on an ordinary (albeit heavy) unpowered bike.
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If e-bikes became more powerful they would have the same or similar performance to mopeds and therefore would be dangerous to both riders and anyone who they run in to, especially if brakes etc. are not uprated to match and I suspect that this is the reason that they are limited to 15MPH.
Someone mentioned to me a while back that it is possible to sell a more powerful e-bike but riders would need insurance, licencing and a crash helmet. The e-bike would also need a registration number and show a registration plate.
Would type approval also be an issue?
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I think that cheap e-bikes would benefit a lot of people and perhaps remove the need for second cars for a lot of families and even mopeds and motor bikes for others. At the moment they don't seem to represent good value for money though.
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Someone here has a bike with a noisy, crackling small engine placed between the pedals I think. You burn your leg on the exhaust box, and the thing can actually go quite fast, better than 20mph I would say, quite a lot better.
The bike it is fitted to has short straight handlebars and there is something a bit loose about the front end and steering. Scared the bejasus out of me but someone else here, rather unexpectedly, loved the thing and hurtled off on it to do the standard road circuit.
I like things like that strap-on motor in principle. No doubt even a timid old geezer could get used to it with a bit of practice.
Last edited by: Armel Coussine on Wed 13 Jul 16 at 14:07
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It is probably an expensive option at the moment, but electric motors are now made which fit inside the seat tube of a standard bike and drive a geared bottom bracket axle (I'm sure you are aware of the problem of mechanical doping in cycle racing which now means pro riders bikes are regularly checked). They provide enough power to give you a burst up the hills or into a headwind, are light and unobtrusive and don't make your machine look like a poor man's Harley Davidson.
Worth a google to see if it is viable price wise.
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I had a play on one a few weeks ago. Trust me, 250W is more than enough (your typical cyclist can produce 3-3.5W per kg of bodyweight).
Any more than that and you may as well just buy an electric motorbike. And if you're truly desperate to go faster with motor assistance, have a hunt on eBay for reprogramming kits. Which are, obviously, illegal to use...
I think they're great fun, if I injured myself I'd have one in a heartbeat and some of the older people I know are rediscovering their love of cycling on eBikes.
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I saw a small petrol engine on a pushbike in Greece in May. First time I'd seen such a thing. I wonder what power output that gave.
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>> I saw a small petrol engine on a pushbike in Greece in May. First time
>> I'd seen such a thing. I wonder what power output that gave.
>>
Information can be found here: www.velosolex.co.uk/
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What I saw was an add-on to a mountain bike, as in aftermarket addition.
Similar setup to this:
www.sz-wholesaler.com/userimg/1250/1268sw1/gasoline-bike-scb2601g-246.jpg
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"Cyclemotors" were a thing - perhaps less so here but we used to see them in rural France in the early 80s.
goo.gl/RgVoDQ
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The one I saw was in Greece.
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In the fifties my dad had a Cyclemaster:
tinyurl.com/zv2j6ng
and one of our neighbours had a Trojan (a bit rough on tyres!)
tinyurl.com/jbywxum
Searching for those took me to this site, which has some amazing customised machines. I think I'd go for the Chrome Flyer:
tinyurl.com/jvf7cla
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Apologies for hijacking an e-bike thread. But reading the requirement for more power made me wonder if a petrol engine would be better.
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The French VeloSolex, like a fat heavy pushbike with this refined four-stroke engine over the front wheel, was often seen in the fifties and no doubt still is. But the bike I mentioned was an ordinary, slightly rickety bike with an aftermarket petrol engine and special chain arrangements down at the bottom of the frame. It was very noisy and quite horrible, but sort of jolly good fun somehow. .
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I used to have a Solex first the old model noisy but fun.The later models where quiet and fast.Few people used them for cycling to heavy.
Some of the top electric bikes I have seen in Holland are very nice but expensive.You get what you pay for.
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>> Apologies for hijacking an e-bike thread. But reading the requirement for more power made me wonder if a petrol engine would be better.
>>
VED, insurance, licence, MoT etc.
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>> VED, insurance, licence, MoT etc.
For a pushbike with a small petrol engine? Not in Greece I would imagine.
Last edited by: rtj70 on Wed 13 Jul 16 at 21:18
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>> and one of our neighbours had a Trojan (a bit rough on tyres!)
>> tinyurl.com/jbywxum
As a kid, we fitted something like that to a soap box. Someone had to sit on the engine to give enough friction for it to drive the wheel. Tore the tyre to pieces. Scary!
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E-Bikes - tyrednemotional
