I have a new job now so this is up for sale. Will stick an ad up soon...
New member! Looking for first ebike or kit...
- Thread starter zombiemax69
- Start date
So I was intrigued - I read through the thread from the start and you were looking for something to commute 22 miles each way ? You discarded the carrera that was assist limited to 15.5 mph and ended up with a Yose power - you looked like you were getting an amazing average speed on that. Did you regularly do that ? How long did it take. Did you recharge at work ? Sounds too far to e-bike regularly but interested in your experience - tell us the rest of the story !
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Hey!
Ok, here is the full story... my initial estimate of 22 miles was not accurate. It was in fact 19.8 miles - from Watford to Baron's Court (West London). The Yose powered bike was awesome. On a nice clear run I could do it in a shade over an hour (an 1.10 / 1.15 ish). In a car it was taking me a minimum of 1 hour 30, public transport was around the same. Loved the commute on the bike too as there's a lovely stretch of quiet path down the side of the A5. Very peaceful to ride.
The assistance was amazing - I'd basically be travelling the same kind of top speeds I would make on my road bike, but with half the effort and way quicker acceleration. The battery would show still half charge at the end of a run, though I didn't chance it and charged up at work.
However, I suffered hearing damage and tinnitus towards the end of October '22 (I've worked as a drummer for a lot of years, also a music producer and music performance teacher) - insomnia, stress, anxiety set in (something I've never really suffered with before) so didn't end up commuting very much as I wasn't able to work - I made the run maybe five or six times. Then in a re-think of my work/life balance I took a job way closer to home (half a mile away lol) that is way easier, and term time only. Having a 350w motor to do a half mile commute is a bit of overkill, hence I'm moving it on!
To summarise, a 20 mile commute is pretty comfortable with the set up I had (350w rear motor, 36v 13ah battery) - the difference between that and the Carrera was like night and day. Once over 15mph on the Carrera it felt like you were working against the bike to get it to go faster. The assistance from the Yose set up felt great and I think the battery would have made it there and back on one charge, though was easy enough to just top up at work. I wouldn't fancy it in the dead of winter, but it was certainly more enjoyable than sitting in a car in stop start traffic.
One thing I forgot to mention... once I found a clear route, I got my average speed up to around 19mph.
AND I didn't use the thumb throttle at all... seems to use way more battery than pedal assist so I just stuck with that.
That's really interesting
Can't help thinking the existing assist speed limits do restrict what journeys people will tackle with electric bikes.
What average speed did you get with the Carrera ?
What is the no load max speed on the Yose hub (if you lift the wheel and apply maximum throttle or max assist level and turn the pedals with the wheel off the ground) ?
Can't help thinking the existing assist speed limits do restrict what journeys people will tackle with electric bikes.
What average speed did you get with the Carrera ?
What is the no load max speed on the Yose hub (if you lift the wheel and apply maximum throttle or max assist level and turn the pedals with the wheel off the ground) ?
Out of curiousity I've just put my bike on a stand to test the no-load max speed (Yose 350w. rear hub, same as OP but freewheel and 26" wheels).
Max speed is 24.7mph using either PAS 5 or thottle alone with battery voltage at 39.6v. Yose list the max speed as 30-32km/h (18-20mph), and I think that's about right. I've only tried to see how fast it would go on the road once. On the flat with no perceptable wind I "spun out" at 24mph. That's with PAS 5, 48t chainring /14t sprocket, and I'm fairly certain that the motor had cut off at around 20mph.
The longest distance I've done on one charge is 49 miles, mostly using PAS 2 but with a few hills using PAS 5. I still had about a quarter of the charge left. This was with a 36v/13Ah battery that was only a month old. I'm expecting the range to reduce over time. It was also a leisurely ride and I didn't check the average speed, but I would guess at around 12mph.
I broadly agree with the OP's assessment of the performance. Even though it's on an old steel MTB, the acceleration with mine is very impressive. It will be interesting to see what he comes back with. The bike looks like a good buy for somebody.
Max speed is 24.7mph using either PAS 5 or thottle alone with battery voltage at 39.6v. Yose list the max speed as 30-32km/h (18-20mph), and I think that's about right. I've only tried to see how fast it would go on the road once. On the flat with no perceptable wind I "spun out" at 24mph. That's with PAS 5, 48t chainring /14t sprocket, and I'm fairly certain that the motor had cut off at around 20mph.
The longest distance I've done on one charge is 49 miles, mostly using PAS 2 but with a few hills using PAS 5. I still had about a quarter of the charge left. This was with a 36v/13Ah battery that was only a month old. I'm expecting the range to reduce over time. It was also a leisurely ride and I didn't check the average speed, but I would guess at around 12mph.
I broadly agree with the OP's assessment of the performance. Even though it's on an old steel MTB, the acceleration with mine is very impressive. It will be interesting to see what he comes back with. The bike looks like a good buy for somebody.
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Thanks for that, very interesting - think the Yose kit is very good value - If I have understood correctly, the later versions of the Yose kit ( I think including yours) have speed based assist levels, so that PAS2 will stop assisting at a certain speed level
The top speed when the wheel is off the ground is directly proportional to the battery voltage, so with a fully charged battery, it would have gone a bit faster. Speed on the road without pedalling is less because the power is inversely proportional to the speed in the upper speed range, so the faster you go, the less power you get.
Your motor didn't cut off at 20mph. It still cut at 24.7mph. The power it gave at 20mph wasn't enough to sustain it, and it decreased as you went faster.
The speed that suppliers quote for motors is at nominal voltage, but only when they give you it in RPM that comes from the manufacturer. If they give you MPH, it's very nebulous. Generally, a 36v 250 RPM motor in a 26" wheel can hold 15 mph on a flat road without pedalling, and a 320 RPM one can hold 20 mph. When you increase the voltage given to those motors to 48v, those speeds increase by 30%.
Yes it does, although to me it doesn't feel like it. The rate of acceleration seems much more pronounced as you move up the PAS levels and it doesn't feel like an "all or nothing" on and off. That might just be my perception though as I've no experience with anything else. What I can say, having used them for a while, is that there is a marked difference between the 350w and the 250w on my other bike. The 250w is slower to accelerate and to maintain a reasonable pace I have to use PAS 3, whereas PAS 2 will suffice with the 350w. On the other hand, the 250w seems a bit better at hill climbing. The 350w bogs down earlier than the 250w and I need to attack the hill at a higher speed. I suspect that the 250w has lower reduction gears, which might explain why the max speed tops out around 16 mph, despite trying it with a different controller and display. They are both good to ride though.
(Edit .. The differences could also be down to different RPM as posted by @saneagle above. The 250w is an Aikema 95RX and the 350w is a 95RS. Although they are both listed on Aikema's website they don't state RPM or gear ratio).
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The specifications for those two motors are nearly identical. There aren't separate 250w and 350w versions, neither do they mention different speed versions. Are you running them in different sized wheels, are they both running with the same voltage, and do they have the same max current written on the controller?
MY experience of speed level assists was the Bafang BBS02 mid drive conversion, which, by default, had both speed and power limits on the assist levels. Even at lower levels I found the assist far too powerful until it hit the speed limit which was really sudden. Reprogrammed it to remove the assist level speed limits and lower the power at the lower assist levels which is much better. I can see now (having got one) on a hub motor that the power delivery is quite different.
The 250w. kit is on 700c wheels and the 350w. is on 26". They share the same battery. The 250w kit came with a 15amp controller and a Lishui c500 display that doesn't allow speed setting. The 350w kit comes with an 18 amp contoller and c500 display that does allow speed settings.
I bought an 18 amp controller from Yose and fitted it to the 250w. This allowed me to derestict the throttle from 6kmh (which is why I did it). As an experiment I tried using the C500 display from the 350w. kit. Despite the display allowing speed settings and the controller being the same as the 350w, the actual max speed would not go above 15.5mph.even when set above that in the display. I came to the conclusion that there is something about the motor that restricts the speed - gears,RPM, I don't know.
Judging by some of the other threads it seems that a "how fast will it go" bug infects most who are new to electric bikes and I caught a mild version. In reality I'm not that bothered about speed. At anything above about 16mph "things" can happen a bit too quickly for my liking. I'd much rather go slower, get my head up and look at the scenery. I'm still curious about why the 250w motor won't go faster with the 18 amp contoller and different c500 display though!
A motor can't restrict you to 15.5 mph because its speed depends on voltage. If it were 15.5 mph at 36v, it would be 17 mph with a fully-charged battery and 14 mph with a nearly empty one. You'd notice the difference. If it always reaches the same speed, you're limited by the controller.The 250w. kit is on 700c wheels and the 350w. is on 26". They share the same battery. The 250w kit came with a 15amp controller and a Lishui c500 display that doesn't allow speed setting. The 350w kit comes with an 18 amp contoller and c500 display that does allow speed settings.
I bought an 18 amp controller from Yose and fitted it to the 250w. This allowed me to derestict the throttle from 6kmh (which is why I did it). As an experiment I tried using the C500 display from the 350w. kit. Despite the display allowing speed settings and the controller being the same as the 350w, the actual max speed would not go above 15.5mph.even when set above that in the display. I came to the conclusion that there is something about the motor that restricts the speed - gears,RPM, I don't know.
Judging by some of the other threads it seems that a "how fast will it go" bug infects most who are new to electric bikes and I caught a mild version. In reality I'm not that bothered about speed. At anything above about 16mph "things" can happen a bit too quickly for my liking. I'd much rather go slower, get my head up and look at the scenery. I'm still curious about why the 250w motor won't go faster with the 18 amp contoller and different c500 display though!
The information you provided is always useful. maybe you don't want to go faster than 15.5 mph, but some others might want to. Also, people can make better judgements aboit suitability of kits for their needs as you can make good judgements about power characteristics and efficiency when you know the max rpm or Kv of a motor.
If you had used identical motors on the two bikes, the 700C one would go 7.5% faster, but have 7.5% less torque for accelerating and hill-climbing. The 18A controller would give 20% more torque, which would affect the acceleration and make it easier to sustain a higher speed, plus better hill-climbing.
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I've just taken another look at the listing for the Aikema 95RX:-
aikema HUB MOTOR
| Rated Power | 250W/350W |
| Speed(km) | 27/32 |
This reads as two versions to me - 250w or 350w with corresponding speeds of 27 and 32 kmh.
Knowing the square root of nothing about motors, does this mean that the motors are somehow restricted internally to those speeds? If so it would explain why I can't get more out of the 250w with a more powerful controller.
That's normal. It's because you can run it with 36v or 48v. The higher voltage increases the speed and the power in the same motor.
The average speed I managed on the carrera was 13.4... I'll find ouf the max no load speed next time I'm out on it
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Just looking back through my strava... the average speed on the carrera was pretty much identical to my average speed on an 8kg carbon road bike.The average speed I managed on the carrera was 13.4... I'll find ouf the max no load speed next time I'm out on it
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