newbee from shrewsbury, with questions

[ady347]

Hi,

Im Adrian i have recently purchased an electric bike. i started off with something cheap and cheerful to see this wasnt just a mid life crisis purchase! i will use it to travel to work to save on ever increasing motoring costs.
I paid £230 for this bike, purchased from a chap who brought it new and hardly used it but thats all i know,it is in amazing condition like new. I have been for a ride on it and found it great except for rattling my bones on any bumps. it is 24 speed.

my questions i cant seem to find the answers for when searching are

can anybody tell what sort of age this bike might be? ( i forgot to ask owner)

when i charge bike (around 4 hours) as soon as i start going within minutes the battery indicator drops 2 bars but goes back up to full when stopped, is this normal?

i managed 10 miles on this bike before battery was nearly flat, the only time i pedal assisted was uphills, i weigh 13 stone and the ride was a mixture of flat, downhill with very few uphills. Is this about right or should i invest in new batteries?

is their any preventative maintenace i need to do? i will be doing about 50 miles a week so i hope i am not going to overuse it and cause problems doing this sort of mileage.

any finally, does the wet weather have any effect on these, i was worried about water getting into places i dont want it to.

thanks for any replies.

 

[flecc]

The Powabyke Euro type has been in production since 1999, but yours is obviously much more recent. It's normal for the battery level indication to drop when the throttle is opened, just indicating the current drain into the motor, but shutting off the throttle and stopping pedalling for a moment will give a truer reading.

From what you've said I think the batteries are quite late in life since I'd expect you to get at least 20 miles in those circumstances, but you might as well get whatever life there is left before changing them if you can manage with that ten mile range for the moment. If the batteries are the originals, that indicates it's unlikely the bike is more than three years old, and the chainwheel shows it's not an early model.

50 miles a week is well within the capability of your bike, some do that every day or two at times, and it will last for many years with that usage. There are many ten year old Powabykes still in regular use. There's no maintenance specific to the electrics, just the normal maintenance of the cycle parts will do. As for water, try not to store the bike outside at all times so that it has drying time between wet rides and you're likely to escape any troubles.
.

 

[ady347]

thanks for your help, currently the battery life is enough so will wait to replace, i had a feeling it should do a few more miles on a full charge than what i was getting. Batteries are about £100 to replace with sla. It is kept in my garage overnite i just had concerns on riding it in a downpour.
so far i have fitted lights and trip computer, i have removed a few stickers that were peeling and seemed of poor quality, but im very happy with the rest of the bike. I start using it fulltime next week so see how it goes! i will save £25 a week in fuel and parking costs, and i guess this cant be much more than 10p per charge. It will also get a charge at work for return journey.

 

[flecc]

Sounds fine. I did add a sentence just before you responded to the end of the second paragraph which you might not have read, this concerning the bike's age.

 

[ady347]

Yeah I had missed that, thanks for that. I will open up the battery case in the next few weeks to see what I have inside