Anyone remember these battery lamps? Went dim and rusted in no time at all !Yeah, I know the type you mean. I urmmmm, borrowed an unlocked bike when I was rather drunk in Germany which had similar brakes.
Needless to say, me and my mate, having a backie, ended up in the bushes and abandoned said bike. That was many many decades ago and I'm not proud of what we did
View attachment 12826
BTW, that's not the actual picture of the bike. Camera phones hadn't been invented back then lol
OMG 'D' cell batteries. Last time I used those in anything, was in a boombox back in the 80's.
That was the later D cells version Fordulike mentioned, The original and forerunner used the Ever-Ready 3 volt twin cell battery which was in fact a pair of side by side joined F cells with brass strip terminals. There was a knob on top which when screwed down made contact with the top strip to light the bulb. Here's two of the earliest examples:
how may bikes have you tried before you come to this point of view?Just compare this to some of the old fashioned eBikes still for sale that have not changed their design in many years, that look like hilly billy transport with all the attached tat
Your going to feel quite hungry by tomorrow
Come on, break is over, back into class!!!!
on the face of it, the Smart should have been a resounding success. It's designed by a very well known company and backed by a very successful distribution network, sleek advertising. So why did they see the need to cut the price from £2,500 to £1,800? the truth is, it's not as successful as it should have been. There is an old view in marketing, if your dog food does not sell, maybe because the dogs don't want to eat it.I haven't tried any smart bikes prior to this, at the end of the day you are limited to the power output and speed, what I did like about this one is the design, it has been well thought out rather than the lazy add ons put on standard bikes without redesign, if that is what you like fair enough but not for me, I like to se things evolve not just stuck on parts. This thread is about what each person views as improvement, I have just added my views.
With regards to the internal battery, I have two, they are £300 each which is a reasonable price compared to even some bottle batteries.
I see this bike as a 2yr cycle, after that period of time there will or should be greater advances and I will off load this and upgrade, the Smart eBike has already been in production for 3 yrs so was well ahead of itself in design and equipment when launched, and from the looks of it no other manufacturer has really evolved more in terms of design, just more bolt on bits for standard type frames.
Again this is my view and I am very happy with my purchase, these are commuter touring bikes not off road or silly chip and go as fast as you can spotty youth type bikes, more for the mature individual with class should I say
SO you don't see the on/off and record buttons on the Ricoh camera to show I know what I am talking about?
I will be the first to say that £2,500 was a bit rich, but then when it was launched it was ahead of its time and still is in terms of design, not many beat it for that. You have to remember it was only sold in Mercedes showrooms so not being sold to the masses, you also have to remember that from what I saw the car salesmen didn't really want to be selling bikes, so I don't think there was a ouch which is a shame as a lot of research went into it.
