New Old Fart :)

[OldFart]

Hi there, My names Dave and im.. oops wrong group

Bit about me. Getting old but not past it yet.

I have a prolapsed disc problem so a normal bike wouldn't be an option, i would not be
able to pedal without severe pain. Not sure whether a bike saddle would
be an issue also. I have pain in my coccyx / bottom area when sitting also.

Looking to save fuel costs and had a bright idea of an electric bike or scooter. In my
ideal world i want an electric moped/scooter that will do 50mph and 100 miles
between charges. But that pushes up the costs of insurance etc. An electric
scooter like the kids all wanted a few years back seems ideal, But seems they are
not legal.

So it looks like an electric bike is the way to go, Then i spotted the prices and fainted.

Some time later i woke up. Checked ebay and the only cheap ones seem to be broken
ones.

Spotted a review one one from The Range £500 now £450. But it seems that it maybe
poorly built?
Even that would be pushing my budget beyond what i can really afford.

Seen plenty of wheel kits on ebay (german seller) £200 ish. I have some SLA batteries
i can use in the short term. So i could be on the road for that, But are they any good?

My main journey would probably only be 5 miles, I would say mostly flat but in a car you
dont really notice how steep some roads are.

I keep watching some of the scooter/moped type bikes on ebay i think the seat would
be a better option.

Wow.. Long waffle over. Any Advice?

Thanks.

 

[Deleted member 4366]

An electric bike that can get you up hills without pedalling will either be very slow or very expensive. How heavy are you? Normal ready-made ebikes need to be pedalled. They don't have enough power to go on their own, other than on flat roads.

I'm sure that a much better option for you will be a 50cc motor scooter, which works out at less than £1000 with tax and insurance.

Forget SLAs if you already have back problems. It's very difficult to mount them where you can make the bike stable. When you take it out of the shed/garage, you'll struggle when it tries to turn upside-down.

 

[OldFart]

13 stone ish. Not many hills but its been a while since i cycled around here. Trying to think of places around Telford that may have a similar layout.

Tesco at Jnct 6. The roundabout upto the motorway. Imagine that sort of gradient but for a much shorter distance, Half that at the very most.
In fact it may not be that steep?
Or the climb to Jnct 3 from the North side heading south. But again only a short hill. The rest is mostly flat.

So a slow crawl for that distance wont be a problem. A petrol scooter wont save me any money. With the insurance costs. And it will have to be wheeled through the house also.
I dont think the smell of hot engine/oil and petrol will appeal to the missus.

The weight being high with the SLA batteries had not crossed my mind.

Done a search on the height above sea level and it goes from a minimum of 276ft above sea level to a max of 347 spread across the whole journey.
Biggest jump on one stretch of road is 49ft but thats a short steepish hill i mentioned earlier.

Thanks.

 

[Deleted member 4366]

At only 12st and without many hills, you have a chance then, but if you torque, you need a high torque motor - something like the Woosh BPM kit should do it, which you can fit to virtually any cheap bike:

http://www.wooshbikes.co.uk/?hubkits

If you want a ready-made ebike, it'll cost closer to £1000 to get one with enough torque.

 

[OldFart]

Watching some of the moped style ones with pedals on ebay to see if there are any bargains to be had.

Mostly non working ones though. Am i right in thinking these li-po and similar batteries are junk if fully discharged?
Some can be dangerous to recharge and wont be the same ever again.

Unlike an old style battery that recovers after a few cycles if basically good otherwise.

There were some cheap mopeds on ebay. But the thought of insurance put me off a bit. 30mph and 30 mile range would be ideal though.
Then i read it would also need to be MOT'd and that put me off totally.

BPM kit £500. Bit steep. But im still not sure about the saddle on a normal bike being comfortable for me.

Thanks.

 

[OldFart]

What a minefield. Just asked one seller if it worked on power alone with no assist and they said it will but very very slow. maybe 4mph.

Thinking of boosting battery range on the cheap. Can you mix batteries?

If a bike has a lithium battery. Could i add a small SLA pack to extend the range, Or vice versa. A SLA battery bike, add lithium packs bit by bit to extend the range and save weight or buy enough to replace any SLA batteries.

I have a few SLA scooter batteries sitting here unused and thought i could use them if the range was poor. I do take your point of keeping the weight low though. The moped style bikes im looking at have a flat floor that seems ideal for a 2/3/4 small SLA batteries.

Thanks Again.

 

[Geebee]

Keep the packs seperate, just unplug the lipo and plug in the SLA.
Never a good idea to mix different batteries.
If you can find a used Tonaro it will do the job, it will climb slowly but should cope with almost any hill and should be able to do at least 25 kph on the flat just check it has a throttle as they were optional.

 

[OldFart]

UK here so no results when i looked for Tonaro.

Is it possible to bypass the pedal sensor to have throttle only?

Thanks.

 

[Geebee]

The Tonaro is a UK model, Mine was a one off import as far as I know, link to new bikes in UK http://www.powerpedals.co.uk/
The throttle on them works independently of the PAS as far as I know.
Tons of threads on here for them.
They pop up in the classified occationally.

 

[Deleted member 4366]

30 mph and 30 miles will cost at least £1500 just for the stuff you'd need to convert a bike. You need to know what you're doing. 30 miles at 20 mph is a bit easier. You'd need at least a 600Wh battery, which is about £300 to £400, and a 500W geared motor or 100W direct drive one. With the rest of the kit, that will cost about £250. Forget lead batteries, They're too heavy and not enough range. If you only wanted to go 10 miles, they could be an option, but will be very heavy. You'd need a build a special mounting system. A bike becomes unmanageable if you put them on a rack.

Messing about with lithium batteries is not for amateurs. You need to understand the characteristics of the different types of cell; how to charge, handle and manage them. Get it wrong and they will explode in a ball of flames. Until you understand all this stuff, it would be better to stick with a good ready-made battery.

The electric scooters often pop up on Ebay quite cheapwith blown controllers or knackered batteries. The 36v ones only do 15 mph, but you can get a 48v controller and a set of new batteries (4 for 48v), which gives a speed up to 20 mph, although range won't be much more than 15 miles. If you get one of those, it must have working pedals to use it on the road. Also, be careful, the kids often get hold of them and wreck them before selling them on Ebay, so check the history carefully.

 

[OldFart]

Yeah the 30mph/30mile range is a pipedream. I dont want the hassle of insurance and MOT's etc and the cost.
A 10 mile round trip before the batteries start to drop power would be more than sufficient.

5 miles then a break for a couple of hours and then a ride back would be typical.

Working pedals was another question. Spotted a bike listed that had the pedals removed, I thought that would not be legal.
From your comment above seems it wouldnt be.

I started to get into RC planes and have learned to be careful with Li-Po batteries.

Feeling the weight of a 12v 12Ah SLA battery, I agree 4 of those would be quite a load.