bank loans for replacement batteries.

[gerryscott]

Now that I have a new kalkhoff with 18ah battery I have decided when the replacement battery time comes I will just take out a loan and pay it up over 3 years.I am in the credit union and they have always been pretty good with low interest rates.£520 or more is just a bit painful in one go and the good thing is the wife won't notice,but she would if it was £520 in one go.Just to ask, are all the present owners of the kalkhoff 18ah batteries quite happy with there's?Are they getting range there hoping they would get within reason?

 

[morphix]

Damn that's a fine idea, why didn't I think of it! Finance for batteries

 

[flecc]

Good idea Gerry. Of course, even better for those who can afford it would be to open a small high interest savings account and transfer a fixed amount in each month from bike purchase onwards. That way would make replacement painless and the interest earned slightly lighten the financial burden.

 

[10mph]

Now that I have a new kalkhoff with 18ah battery

Congratulations. Which model?

I have had my 18Ah battery for exactly 9 months. Just at the moment I am doing my 20th charge up, so you can see I am not a heavy user. I planning on the basis of my battery lasting at least 2 years which is the warranty period. I have not detected any deterioration so far. I can get the manufacturer's claimed range of 80 miles plus, if I operate in level 1 assist and ride at a relaxed pace around 10 to 12 mph, on a route without any big steep hills. I am not light rider at about 90 Kg.

I have started a replacement battery fund. When I use my bike for measuring a road running race I ask for a contribution of £25 towards my battery replacement fund. It is not much to ask when many of these races cost £25 for each runner to enter and they may have 100s or 1000s of entries. So far I have collected 9 lots of £25, so with £225 I am well on my way to replacing the battery when necessary. The money is effectively invested at about 3%, and I am hoping batteries may come down in price if the Euro weakens significantly.

I really only planned to use my bike for measuring assignments. Going around the local town I use an unpowered push bike, and going to the nearby city I use a car despite the horrible traffic - I have deemed it to be too risky to leave an expensive bike locked up in the street. So you may wonder how I have come to my 20th charge up, when I have only done 9 measuring jobs. The answer is that I often feel that I have to the bike out on rides to check its power assistance performance, check measuring performance, doing free measurements for people, and even keeping myself fit in order to be able to measure marathons. I find that spinning ones legs fast at around 14 to 15 mph is actually quite good exercise!

 

[gerryscott]

good thinking flecc.

 

[Kudoscycles]

GerryScott.....when you bought your Kalkhoff did you know you would be facing a £500 plus relacement battery cost?....I have been told that the replacement battery costs on a Nissan Leaf is over £15k,perhaps someone can verify that?....Ignoring the money this is hardly green,the energy costs/pollution/disposal costs of replacing these batteries,maybe after only 2 years, makes a mockery of our claims of e-bikes and e-cars being green transport....why do you guys put up with this situation?
The LiMno4 battery can reduce it's capacity by an average of 14% per annum,that reduction is a direct result of the chemical action and can be changed by good practice but ultimately the battery will fail. The LifePo4 battery used by Kudos only reduces it's capacity by 2-3% per annum,these batteries are used in unmanned weather stations,some are still in use after 10 years. Kudos replacement batteries only cost from £208.00.
At that price,and it may be 5 years hence, you don't need to consider loans from a credit union just raid the kids piggy bank!
It is this ridiculous battery replacement cost that is one of the factors that e-bikes are not more popular and the reason why e-bikes depreciate at such a rate. The situation will only change if you as customers push for more reasonable price replacement batteries. Obviously I have an ulterior motive in pushing for LifePo4 battery usage to sell more Kudos bikes, but I am also concerned about all these old Lithium batteries ending up on landfill waste.
To put this in perspective how many Ford Fiestas would Ford sell if the salesman told you that your engine will need replacing after 2 years at a relative cost of £4k !!!!!!!!!!!!
Dave
KudosCycles

 

[morphix]

GerryScott.....when you bought your Kalkhoff did you know you would be facing a £500 plus relacement battery cost?....I have been told that the replacement battery costs on a Nissan Leaf is over £15k,perhaps someone can verify that?....Ignoring the money this is hardly green,the energy costs/pollution/disposal costs of replacing these batteries,maybe after only 2 years, makes a mockery of our claims of e-bikes and e-cars being green transport....why do you guys put up with this situation?
The LiMno4 battery can reduce it's capacity by an average of 14% per annum,that reduction is a direct result of the chemical action and can be changed by good practice but ultimately the battery will fail. The LifePo4 battery used by Kudos only reduces it's capacity by 2-3% per annum,these batteries are used in unmanned weather stations,some are still in use after 10 years. Kudos replacement batteries only cost from £208.00.
At that price,and it may be 5 years hence, you don't need to consider loans from a credit union just raid the kids piggy bank!
It is this ridiculous battery replacement cost that is one of the factors that e-bikes are not more popular and the reason why e-bikes depreciate at such a rate. The situation will only change if you as customers push for more reasonable price replacement batteries. Obviously I have an ulterior motive in pushing for LifePo4 battery usage to sell more Kudos bikes, but I am also concerned about all these old Lithium batteries ending up on landfill waste.
To put this in perspective how many Ford Fiestas would Ford sell if the salesman told you that your engine will need replacing after 2 years at a relative cost of £4k !!!!!!!!!!!!
Dave
KudosCycles

That's a very compelling argument Dave.

I recently switched from LiFePo4 to Lithium-Ion because of a weight and size advantage Lithium-Ion had over LiFePo4 while costing practically the same. I had a 2x5Ah LiFePo4 (weighing 1.89kg each) originally and one died on me 7 months into usage. So I bought 10Ah LI (weighing 2.3kg). I must confess I gave no thought to how long it would last or the environmental factors tho.

There are cheaper options for battery replacement (such as BMS in China) if you're prepared to do a bit of work, but obviously that might not be possible for everyone. As the industry grows, perhaps we'll see more businesses offering "plug and play" bike-specific battery replacements in the UK (fitted with safe imported cells from reliable suppliers) to cater for different markets, much like ink cartridge recycling..and cheap mobile phone clone batteries on eBay?

 

[alban]

Hi Dave
A couple of Qs if you don't mind because if Customs are going to reg charge an extra 23.5% on Chinese imports then it makes the equation more favourable to buy from UK supplier.
What make and type cells does your battery use? What is the C rate i.e. max discharge? Charge rate? Are you going to stock bigger capacity batts, say 15AH, and is there a degree of customisability (connectors, shape, shell etc)? Your web site gives a min of info only! I presume there's a year's warranty too?
Thanks

 

[flecc]

....I have been told that the replacement battery costs on a Nissan Leaf is over £15k,perhaps someone can verify that?....

Yes that is the position Dave, the cost is roughly half the gross cost of the Nissan Leaf car, £31,000. It was this issue that killed the early Peugeot 207 e-car many years ago, £4000 to replace it's NiMh battery, said to be at 4 years intervals but proving to be much shorter. The Nissan Leaf battery was originally claimed to be good for 10 years, but they now say 7 years. In fact the warranty is 4 years.

Nissan are of course a wholly owned Renault company, and Renault also market e-vehicles, a range of three cars and a van. Their version of the hatchback Leaf has a saloon body and is called the Fluence. Interestingly Renault don't sell with battery, the Fluence is £22850 for example and the battery costs £86 per month over a one year agreement covering 6000 miles, or £70 a month over 5 years. For higher mileage drivers, there's an £81 per month agreement for five years at 9000 miles per annum. Any annual excess on these is at 4p per mile.

These seem to indicate the battery is only safe for 5 years, just a bit longer than the warranty period.

The competition is mainly from the Mitsubishi electric i-car, also sold as a Peugeot and a Citroen. They also lease the batteries, for a maximum of 4 years, another life indication.

N.B. There is a government subsidy on the original purchase of an e-car of £5000. That doesn't apply to Renault's smallest model, the circa £7000 Twizy which is not classed as a car but as a heavy quadricycle.
.

 

[Kudoscycles]

Alban> I think your 23.5 % customs charge is 20% vat plus 3.5% duty. This is the norm for most importers but of course the vat is reclaimable by Kudos as a registered importer.
Sorry cannot give full details of battery spec-at home at present.
The reason we don't supply above 10 Ah with LifePo4 is the weight... a 10Ah LiMno4 weighs about 3.5 kilos,a 10Ah LifePo4 weighs about 4.7 kilos but a 16 Ah LifePo4 would weigh about 7.5 kilos and I think that is too much-however we are looking at a special offer on price of 2 x 10 Ah LifePo4 batteries bought with the bike,this will give 20 Ah at a very low per 100 Wh price-details early 2012.
We looked at producing pattern versions in LifePo4 of competitors batteries but the individual sales of each type are too small and the number of type too many-it is for this reason that we intend to use the minimum number of battery sizes/shapes on Kudos bikes and utilise only those shapes on future bikes-our latest Kudos ECO bike uses the same battery as King,Tourer,City,Liberty-I have just changed the battery on my wife's car,not bought from BMW but from a local motor factors-if Kudos sell in volume and all indications are that 2012 will be very succesfull we need the same situation to exist with e-bikes-I would welcome others producing copies of the Kudos battery because that makes the Kudos bike more attractive,as a capital purchase.
Dave
KudosCycles

 

[morphix]

Kudos your last comment raises an interesting question... could manufacturers move to protect their replacement battery sales and prevent other companies making and selling copies (in the UK/EU at least)? I don't know if that would be practical or legally possible (I assume only with proprietary technology/patented casing design), would be interested to hear thoughts on this..

As you say, cheaper more affordable clone batteries (providing they are safe and guaranteed) should be a good thing for bicycle manufacturers and should help widen the market as people will be more likely to see higher priced bikes as a more attractive long-term investment if cheaper batteries are readily available... there is also the environmental side of it... it's better if people can "hand in" their old batteries and they can be recycled.

However perhaps not all manufacturers will take this view, if they have factored in ongoing battery sales as part of their business model?

I have an interest in this discussion and looking at how the market might mature and develop over the coming years, from the CycleCharge.org.uk prospective..

 

[flecc]

If the e-bike market really does take off, I'm quite sure most if not all manufacturers will protect future battery sales income in various ways.

There's every sign of that already with e-cars, both in battery design and marketing methods.

 

[morphix]

If the e-bike market really does take off, I'm quite sure most if not all manufacturers will protect future battery sales income in various ways.

There's every sign of that already with e-cars, both in battery design and marketing methods.

Remember the wars between printer manufacturers and the cartridge refilling firms? Many manufacturers tried to introduce chip technology to prevent refilling..and cloners got around that, they used more aggressive tactics like suing firms and also invalidating warranties on printers if you use re-filled cartridges. For some companies (like Epson in particular) rather than lowering their prices to appear more competitive and discourage cloners, they actually have increased them continually.

 

[flecc]

Although Kodak have now triggered a trend to lower cartridge prices which is even affecting Epson's new models to some extent. How much that will continue is anyone's guess of course.

An important difference I see with e-bikes is that success for them will be predicated on them being sold through bike dealers, rather as in the Netherlands. Dealers demand the rather high retail margins on what they sell, they won't get batteries for customers at cost, so that will keep the prices higher if anything in a future successful e-bike market. Again that's true in Holland, battery prices there being at least as high as in the UK and often higher.

 

[Mussels]

Interestingly Renault don't sell with battery, the Fluence is £22850 for example and the battery costs £86 per month over a one year agreement covering 6000 miles, or £70 a month over 5 years. For higher mileage drivers, there's an £81 per month agreement for five years at 9000 miles per annum. Any annual excess on these is at 4p per mile.

I've not done any calculations but if i did I reckon a diesel would work out cheaper to run.

 

[gerryscott]

yes I did know kudoscycles the price of replacement battery for 18ah before puschase.The offer of a absolute top of the range bike-kalkhoff pro connect alfine c8 disc 2011 for under £1600, was too good to miss.plus the fact that I will take out a loan for 3 years for next battery,did not make it a difficult decision.

 

[flecc]

I've not done any calculations but if i did I reckon a diesel would work out cheaper to run.

As I've mentioned previously, I've been looking at the possibility of an electric town car for more than a decade now, so I've done the figures again on these latest offerings. Certainly for me any i.c. car, petrol or diesel works out less expensive.

Even if that wasn't the case, there are many other problems once one goes into this more deeply. The home charging point installation costs £800 and it needs to be weather protected so in one's garage. That in turn means the garage will be for the town car and my better, larger car that I use for longer journeys has to booted out into the street.

Then there's the tied battery supply, how much will it cost in 4/5 years time, having spent £20 to £30k I'm trapped into price acceptance. If I've bought the Nissan Leaf I've got to pay whatever they demand for the new battery, £15k now but how much later? After all, I can't sell it with a dud battery at 4/5 years old when the buyer will have to spend £15k or more to get it going!

The more I've looked at this, the more I'n convinced the market will fail and the new e-cars all but disappear. For the short range reason they are all town/commute cars and also need home garages for a charging station to be installed. But how many city and town dwellers have garages, only a tiny minority in London that's for sure, and that's true of most older towns and cities. That factor alone eliminates much of the potential market.

 

[tillson]

I'm sure that some printer manufacturers sell the product with slim profit margins and recoup money on the printer cartridges. There is probably an element of this going on with bike batteries.

 

[morphix]

I'm sure that some printer manufacturers sell the product with slim profit margins and recoup money on the printer cartridges. There is probably an element of this going on with bike batteries.

That's definitely Epson's business model.. when I bought my first inkjet from them, it cost £50 and included a full set of inks, which were at that time selling separately for £20-£25 for a set of 4.

The price steadily increased and is now more like £30 odd for 4 cartridges. So I ended up ditching a perfectly good printer and buying a new (upgraded version of the Epson model) for less than the old one, and getting 4 inks again!

Talk about poor business ethnics and corporate responsibility! I recently discovered compatible inks on eBay are available for 95p each and work just as good as the original Epson inks.

Similar story with HP and the laser printer market.. Their cartridges cost well over £100 new, but the same compatibles that work just as good can be had on eBay for £15 delivered. When you put the cartridge in, it comes up ERROR incompatible toner or something and tells you contact manufacturer..you have to press the OK button twice and its good to go.

 

[funkylyn]

Even if that wasn't the case, there are many other problems once one goes into this more deeply. The home charging point installation costs £800 and it needs to be weather protected so in one's garage. That in turn means the garage will be for the town car and my better, larger car that I use for longer journeys has to booted out into the street.
.

How does it cost £800 flecc ?

I thought they just plugged into your electric supply with a electric hook up type socket ?

Cant you just fit a charging socket on your outside wall like we do with Motorhomes ?
They are weatherproof and dont need to be in a garage.

Lynda