News: German cycle industry takes a stronger stance against e-bike ‘tuning’

[Pedelecs]

AGF, an umbrella organization consisting of several German cycling associations, has issued a shot across the bows at those that tune or otherwise manipulate electric bikes to enable greater speeds or power than the bike is legally set up for.

AGF’s remit to discuss ‘common, overarching topics to find strategies and solutions’, according to Two-Wheeler Industry Association (ZIV).

The group association issued the following statement: “The members of the AGF strongly oppose any kind of manipulation of e-bikes and e-bike drive systems of the German and international bicycle industry, which are intended, for example, to increase the power or the maximum support speed...

Full story: http://www.pedelecs.co.uk/news/german-cycle-industry-takes-stronger-stance-e-bike-tuning/

 

[Steve A]

No surprise of course, Germans over regulate everything, just ask a German.
This will not effect speed tuning as like other industries there's always ways around things and people able and wanting to do it. Being honest, myself included.

 

[flecc]

No surprise of course, Germans over regulate everything,

I'd leave the word Over out of that, they just regulate everything which is a very good thing.

Why?

Because that enables them to regulate in what people want, unlike the stupid UK which just bans so many things. Examples:

They have the S class for higher speeds.

When it was realised more power was needed for those higher speeds, they regulated in twice the power.

They have high speed motorways allowing the full performance of modern cars, not the stupid single limits catch-all regardless of road quality that we have.

In other words their government works for their people, unlike ours which mainly works for themselves, the self-appointed elite.
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[Steve A]

Good point, but as i do lots of business in Germany and stay there often, you should here them moan about their government. It is very much a bIg brother state.

 

[mike killay]

I think that there is the point that Europe favours the Napoleonic approach of a permissive government and law.
i.e. Things have to be authorised.
The UK favours a restrictive legal system,
i.e. all things are permitted unless specifically banned.

 

[flecc]

Good point, but as i do lots of business in Germany and stay there often, you should here them moan about their government. It is very much a bIg brother state.

Indeed, something I'm familiar with when I worked there long ago. But I still think it more sensible, permitting as much as possible within law. It also has the benefit that because their laws permit so much by regulations, the German people are generally much more law abiding, even with minor regulations, than ours in the UK.

As another kiwi says, the UK approach is always to ban, an excellent and early example being the Highway Act 1835, which bans every and any form of motorised vehicle. Since then any form of motor vehicle has been automatically illegal until specifically permitted in law. With our reluctant legislators, that means widespread illegality, Segways for example being illegal.

I think two EU countries have got the administration of the law right. One is Germany as shown above. The other is Italy, where they happily accept every law and then ignore most of them, each person making their own mind up about what is sensible. That has the advantage that prosecution generally only follows something going wrong due to someone's misjudgement, meaning only those truly guilty are punished. Here in the UK we prosecute every offence detected, whether it's caused a problem or not. That's oppressive.
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[mike killay]

I guess that the UK problem stems from the 19 century. There were not that many laws that affected most people, mainly Biblical injunctions made into law.
Then came the motor car, Suddenly the middle classes were subject to the law.
We never got the balance right after that.
Apparently, Tony Blair was responsible for about 3000 extra restrictions.
Talk about social engineering.
Blair killed the Labour party which has now become a middle class party.

 

[flecc]

Apparently, Tony Blair was responsible for about 3000 extra restrictions.

But Blair's party only continued an established trend.

It was reckoned that between 1945 and 1973, more laws were passed than in the whole of previous parliamentary history.

So that was as many in 28 years as in the 730 years before, and its continued that way ever since. The outcome is that hardly anyone knows what the law is on anything relevant to their lives, not even the lawyers.

They have to look up the law, which often leads them to miss crucial factors and their implications, something I've shown in an e-bike matter when stopping a prosecution.
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[Danidl]

No surprise of course, Germans over regulate everything, just ask a German.
This will not effect speed tuning as like other industries there's always ways around things and people able and wanting to do it. Being honest, myself included.

Everybody in a functioning democracy will find things to complain about with their government. If it is working well then equal numbers will be complaining about both sides of the same argument. ..

Looking at the original post can one see a logical pattern. Germany has invested heavily into engineering e bikes . They are the second largest purchasers of new ebikes in the world . They do not want this industry damaged by illicit operations. The motors and gearboxes will not withstand excessive forces, and public acceptance will not tolerate accidents by uninsured cyclists travelling at high speeds.
The current status quo of medium speed commuter bikes is in line with their green agenda and reduced energy consumption. Even by the early 1970s they had organised their traffic flows to help separate automobile s from pedestrian and cyclist traffic. (Mind you the assistance of the RAF and USAF some 30 years earlier had given them a headstart).

They are not adverse to high speed electric bikes as their approval of the S type shows.
There are also strong commercial reasons in having a premium and unique infrastructure. Eg Apple...

I would anticipate that their strategy will include
1. insertion of data recording of torque, speed and battery consumption into memory chips. 3bytes of data taken at 1 second intervals, while the bike is operational would only require 0.3MB per day, provide 0.5%accuracy, and a 1GB chip would store a lifetime of usage.
2 .The use of customised and linked battery chargers and batteries, to protect against fire hazards.
3. Only authorised repair centres equipped with the official diagnostic kit .

 

[flecc]

2 .The use of customised and linked battery chargers and batteries, to protect against fire hazards.

With batteries getting ever lighter and longer lived, we could see a return to something from two decades ago in e-bikes, the charger built in.

Then they were built into the bikes, but for removability the charger could be incorporated with a light long life battery for charging on or off.
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[Danidl]

With batteries getting ever lighter and longer lived, we could see a return to something from two decades ago in e-bikes, the charger built in.

Then they were built into the bikes, but for removability the charger could be incorporated with a light long life battery for charging on or off.
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... There is an attraction in having the battery pack inserted in the downtube , but the downside is that the charging point must be adjacent to where the bike is stored . I can certainly see the charger becoming even lighter in weight with improved ferrites in the trafo.

 

[Steve A]

The motors are designed well within tolerances, so a little extra speed is not going to hurt motor or anyone else, providing cyclists are sensible. Have a look at strava times around Richmond Park, or some downhill times i wouldn't even do in a car.

Bearing in mind these are just e-bikes, i doubt whether we need to worry about a chip reading torque etc. It would be a pointless measure in any case, as it depends on so many parameters and would prove very little.

I think they are looking to produce responsible quality bikes at lower costs to get more people interested in any case.

When i look at the tech in my car and how it could have been put in years ago, but they don't. More things to go wrong i suppose.

As regards to servicing etc there is none other than the standard brakes, pivot joint etc. Once the motors gone, it generally gone and your looking at a replacement.

 

[Trevormonty]

It is not that difficult to design a drive system that is tamper proof. The number modification people do is derestrict speed by fitting dongles. A GPS chip in controller can detect this, the other thing is making speed sensor smarter and integrating it with magnet into wheel/frame. Removing spocket magnet would also be one less thing to go wrong.

 

[Danidl]

The motors are designed well within tolerances, so a little extra speed is not going to hurt motor or anyone else, providing cyclists are sensible. Have a look at strava times around Richmond Park, or some downhill times i wouldn't even do in a car.

Bearing in mind these are just e-bikes, i doubt whether we need to worry about a chip reading torque etc. It would be a pointless measure in any case, as it depends on so many parameters and would prove very little.

I think they are looking to produce responsible quality bikes at lower costs to get more people interested in any case.

When i look at the tech in my car and how it could have been put in years ago, but they don't. More things to go wrong i suppose.

As regards to servicing etc there is none other than the standard brakes, pivot joint etc. Once the motors gone, it generally gone and your looking at a replacement.

[
They are already selling 1.6 million per year, 10 times the UK market and they are manufacturing them also.
Since they are already measuring and displaying torque it is trivial to include this in a data set. Rather than being an irrelevant measurement, torque and speed are the measurements of power and therefore strain on the motor components.
Were it to protect them in even a single court judgement, it becomes financially worthwhile.it is not quite trivial, but is low cost to implement, It is the type of assignment that an intern engineer might be given for a three week task.
I don't know how many defective kalkoff motors were produced or how many had been dongled before damage, but would you not think that the daum company would have liked to know?

I agree that the majority of faults in an ebike are the classical bike faults.. mechanical parts, but companies like Bosch want to protect their technology, and using factory fitted and return of defective units before replacement is a good strategy. Like all others, it works for a limited time only but by then the next model in the range is launched.[/QUOTE]

 

[Steve A]

Going around in circles here. My last comment would be someone will usually always find away around an item being tamper proof, and certainly a much more expensive motor than bosch for an e-bike.
One of my friends is German, lives in hamburg and his business is to chip tune cars and very expensive ones at that with supposedly tamper proof engines. If they can't do it then Bosch certainly are wasting their time, if they choose to bother, which i doubt.
I have a dongle on my bike and i'm aware of any risks. I certainly wouldn't encourage people to have a dongle or not, its their choice.

 

[Danidl]

Going around in circles here. My last comment would be someone will usually always find away around an item being tamper proof, and certainly a much more expensive motor than bosch for an e-bike.
One of my friends is German, lives in hamburg and his business is to chip tune cars and very expensive ones at that with supposedly tamper proof engines. If they can't do it then Bosch certainly are wasting their time, if they choose to bother, which i doubt.
I have a dongle on my bike and i'm aware of any risks. I certainly wouldn't encourage people to have a dongle or not, its their choice.

We are going around in circles here. Appropriate for a cycling forum!, Ever since Henry Ford's day, there has been a market in customising cars, and chipping or remapping the ignition timing on engines is just the latest stage in a process. But once done, will the original car companies honour warranties, if it goes wrong.?
The majority of users of both cars and bikes are happy enough to leave well enough alone, bar the occasional fuffy dice and nodding dogs.
It is to that market that the likes of Bosch will be addressing their protection.
We will agree that no security system remains secure over time, but provided it does so over the economic life of the product, it has served its purpose.