Wisper ties up distributor deal for Grace bikes e-bikes in the UK

[Wisper Bikes]

Thanks Dave,

Looking forward to seeing you in Germany!

All the best


David,am at Eurobike for 3 days this time so plenty of time to visit you in the Zeppelin hall,I assume that is your location? My only reservation is that the sales of these high end bikes in the UK is small volume,the Kalkhoff appears the exception but it is such an established brand and still a rare site on our roads.
My own experience is that the £1k customer is on a ratio to the £2k plus customer of 50-1. I admire your bravery in going up to bikes costing £2.5k plus.
Thanks for your invite will meet with you next week.
Am currently in Budapest,never visited before,what a beautiful city!
Regards
Dave
Kudoscycles

Hi Dave, we are not in the Zeppelin hall this year, we will only have a small presence on the Dapu stand. As you may know we have taken on a new Director, a German national who has been in the bike business for more than 25 years. Dieter has recommended that we attend a show in Cologne instead of Eurobike this season, unfortunately we can't do both.

I totally agree with you, Grace do not make cheap electric bikes, they build superb machines that push the boundaries. We understand that the MX is not a mass market bike and we are aware that we will not make a fortune selling it. The Grace MX is simply a fantastic bike engineered in Germany for the true pedelec enthusiast.

Looking forward to seeing you in Germany!

All the best

David

 

[Wisper Bikes]

Cycle sport has a rule for just about everything and there is probably a rule which tells them what the drivetrain has to be made of, what weight and what size. Technical advances in cycling are very much about how to push the rule envelope and not all out tech advancement. It's a shame as I think it holds back cycle development but I guess without the heavy rules the team with the biggest wallet would always win like they did in F1 a while back.

Unfortunately I think you will find that there is a lot of interference from the big manufacturers, look what happened when Lotus produced their monocoque framed pursuit bike. It won everything and was immediately outlawed!



All the best

David

 

[flecc]

I'd happily believe that belt and chain drives are equally efficient and it's the other design considerations (adjustable length, robustness, weight, cost, fashion etc) that will decide the drive type rather than the designer flipping a coin to see what he picks.

The main inefficiencies are the necessity to force a shape change as I've described above, plus the rubber to metal friction of the belt teeth, friction which chain rollers onto steel teeth have only to a much smaller extent, especially when lubricated.

These belts have improved over the years, thinner profile to minimise the reshaping losses and shallower teeth with shaped profiles to reduce teeth friction. That still leaves them decidedly less efficient than chain, but the benefits can outweigh any losses as the motor industry decided with camshaft belts. The chief danger with bicycles are that the drive alignment and tension are not those of a precision machine, being much more under the control of owners and cycle dealers. Any degree of misalignment or incorrect tensioning have major consequences for belt life, I've seen them shred and break very quickly.

 

[Wisper Bikes]

Yep im aware of this. However in this country where the government has slowly been doing all it can to kill of motorcycles by introducing tougher and tougher testing I really cant see this loop hole ever being allowed. Even if it is I can see it very quickly going the way of sports mopeds in the 1970's.

I can see the argument for say a 35kph class with some regulation as a in between class but I get the impression that all the speed freaks want more than this just with out all the hassle that this currently requires. But even this worries me as the next thing will be "if they have to have insurance etc why dont we introduce this for all bicycles" (place your bets ).

Hi Garry, the speed pedelec in Germany has been a massive success, taking more and more people off public transport and out of their cars for the daily commute especially amongst the 20 and 30 somethings, not the usual audience for pedelecs. Having now experienced one first hand, they really are not for speed freaks and need to be pedaled quite vigerously to maintain 45kph. As we are all aware many people can quite easily maintain 45kph on a decent road bike, speed pedelecs simply make the possibility riding at 28mph available to more people. Unfortunately I don't think we will see them here in the near future but I will certainly be pushing for legislation allowing their use in the UK ASAP. I too hope that we will not see interference from the Government and from all our discussions (BEBA) so far, we cannot see this happening any time soon.

All the best

David

 

[Wisper Bikes]

The chief danger with bicycles are that the drive alignment and tension are not those of a precision machine, being much more under the control of owners and cycle dealers. Any degree of misalignment or incorrect tensioning have major consequences for belt life, I've seen them shred and break very quickly.

Alignment was the biggest problems Grace needed to control. It was found that even precision made frames could vary enough to throw the belt off one bike and be perfectly OK on the next. One of the parts developed by Nicholi of Germany was the adjustment mechanism to enable belts to be aligned as easily as adjusting brakes.



All the best

David

 

[NRG]

Alignment was the biggest problems Grace needed to control. It was found that even precision made frames could vary enough to throw the belt off one bike and be perfectly OK on the next. One of the parts developed by Nicholi of Germany was the adjustment mechanism to enable belts to be aligned as easily as adjusting brakes.

View attachment 4084

All the best

David

Hmmmm, all that engineering effort and added cost though Dave and then the use of the heavy Nuvinci CVT hub...engineering for the sake of it? KISS.

 

[Wisper Bikes]

Of course you are right NRG, it is expensive and a little more involved.

Grace are really comfortable with the Gates/Nuvinci transmission for very high torque applications, as I am since trying it out, and want to make it work perfectly. The Gates/Nuvinci drive set up is perfect for faster ebikes (Speed Ebikes etc) and mountain e-biking where the transmission system needs to be able to cope with a lot more torque than the standard Shimano hub products are specified to resist. I understand that mountain bike riders often stand on the pedals pulling down on the handlebars to give max torque up a steep incline, add that to the 50Nm the Bosch system is set to on this bike and there is no room for a weak link. I understand Grace feeling that the advantage of using such a robust transmission system out-weighed the extra effort required to add an alignment system.

All the best

David

 

[flecc]

Certainly there has been some history of gear hub failures and excessive chain and sprocket wear with crank drives, and the Bosch system has definitely made that more crucial.

Toothed belt does fix the chain wear problem and the torque rating of the NuVinci is higher than any of the Shimano hub gears. But I wouldn't like to have them both together on any unpowered bike, though a toothed belt on a utility bike used for pottering to the shops etc might make sense for it's lack of maintenance.

 

[GaRRy]

Hi Garry, the speed pedelec in Germany has been a massive success, taking more and more people off public transport and out of their cars for the daily commute especially amongst the 20 and 30 somethings, not the usual audience for pedelecs. Having now experienced one first hand, they really are not for speed freaks and need to be pedaled quite vigerously to maintain 45kph. As we are all aware many people can quite easily maintain 45kph on a decent road bike, speed pedelecs simply make the possibility riding at 28mph available to more people. Unfortunately I don't think we will see them here in the near future but I will certainly be pushing for legislation allowing their use in the UK ASAP. I too hope that we will not see interference from the Government and from all our discussions (BEBA) so far, we cannot see this happening any time soon.

All the best

David

Sorry not convinced by the many people can maintain 28MPh/45kph argument. A certain Mr Wiggins only averaged 52kph to win a Olympic gold and I doubt there are many cyclist that come close to him and he did not have to worry about other traffic. Cycling around on my ebike at 15 mph or so I find I over take far more cyclist than ever over take me. I really doubt there are many cyclist that can sustain more than 20 mph for more than a mile or so on the flat and virtually no recreational/casual cyclists. I have also travelled at 30 mph on a moped and on a bicycle and the feeling of total control is in a diffrent league.

As I see it this is proposing moped like speeds with no training/no license on a vehicle this is far less equiped to cope with those speeds.

I also feel that using the its sucessful in europe argument also completely ignores the fact that they have a cycling infrastructure to help support it.

Personally I think BEBA would be better of pushing for higher wattage to allow better hill climbing performance / ease of use by disabled etc with current speed restrictions as that would almost certainly open the market up far more than any increase in speed.

Obviously this are just my opinions so feel free to disagree.

 

[flecc]

Personally I think BEBA would be better of pushing for higher wattage to allow better hill climbing performance / ease of use by disabled etc with current speed restrictions as that would almost certainly open the market up far more than any increase in speed.

I know that BEBA have been trying to do this as well, but as yet we don't know how successfully. One problem in this respect is that there already is exactly a class for that, the "low powered moped" class. This is for pedalled bikes with a more powerful motor up to a maximum of 1000 watts but still with the e-bike 15.5 mph assist limit. Of course that undermines any attempts to make changes in e-bike law when parliament has already made a provision.

 

[Scimitar]

Harley reckon there belts are good for 100,000 miles which a chain gets no where even close to.

You've not used a Scottoiler then. With a modicum of care, a chain will easily last 30K, I've known 60K and still going strong and unworn on one bike belonging to a courier. The longest one of mine was 40K and the bike was sold with that chain still on it, having been adjusted once in its lifetime.

 

[GaRRy]

You've not used a Scottoiler then. With a modicum of care, a chain will easily last 30K, I've known 60K and still going strong and unworn on one bike belonging to a courier. The longest one of mine was 40K and the bike was sold with that chain still on it, having been adjusted once in its lifetime.

Thats still well less than 100K and no need for oil spraying everywhere making a mess and you are also expressing the exception rather than the norm.

Not anti chain or pro belt just find in a shame that we are mainly using a technology just because its fashionable as its used on race bikes.

Oh and to OP sorry for taking part in dragging this thread in three different directions two of which are way of topic .

 

[Scimitar]

Thats still well less than 100K and no need for oil spraying everywhere making a mess and you are also expressing the exception rather than the norm.

Hmm... be interesting to find a Hardly that actually did 100K on a belt. I suspect their money was safe there.
Otoh, I can point to several Scottoilered chains that were well on their way to that. Your observation about 'oil spraying everywhere' is indicative of a careless /clueless owner who doesn't know how to set one up properly. There's absolutely no reason for the back of the bike to be an oily mess.
Anyway, I'm a longtime shafty owner and the only bike I have now with a Scottoiler came into my hands with it already fitted (although I would certainly have fitted one if it wasn't already there). As a matter of interest, one shafty has done 240K, the other >130K, both on original shafts and gearing.

 

[grasshopper]

Hi Grasshopper,

We have had a few people asking to buy the bikes now so are currently trying to get some in for the end of this season, hopefully we will get a few and of course I will earmark one for you now, no obligation. Otherwise it will be in the new year. The Grace Easy, will certainly not be available until 2013.
...
"Patience young Grasshopper!"

Or should that be GraceHopper???!!

All the best!

David

Thank you David. I am looking forward to seeing the bikes at the NEC ... I'm sure that the Grace Easy would meet my needs, but I do like to have the very best ... and the MX seems to have all the bells and whistles a boy could wish for!

Thanks again for the 'earmark' offer.

GraceHopper(?)

 

[Kudoscycles]

David,I rode a Nuvinci equipped bike in Holland 2 years ago. The riding profile sort of reminded me of the Daf 'rubber band' car-that vehicle worked on the principle of expanding and contracting pulleys with drive bands climbing up/down the pulley slopes. This meant that when the throttle was depressed the vehicle determined that more acceleration was required,the pulleys reduced in diameter and the gearing lowered,the engine revs increased,however to go faster it was necessary to back off the throttle,the gearing raised and the vehicle went faster,drivers found this driving profile strange and the Daf was a failure.
The Nuvinci equipped bike had a similar riding profile,instead of expanding pulleys it has mating cones,it was necessary to understand how the system worked to avoid always being constantly in acceleration mode,to go faster it was necessary to pedal slower. The bike I rode was a Batavus non e-bike,the salesman agreed with me that education was necessary to get the best from the Nuvinci system.
To be fair this was an early Nuvinci hub,it was very heavy and may have had some considerable development since that bike,also the power of an e-bike may change the riding profile.
Dave
Kudoscycles

 

[Wisper Bikes]

Thanks for that insight David.

I think you need to ride the new Nuvinci in conjunction with an electric drive to understand how good the system is now, it has come a long way since the earlier version.

The Nuvinci is really nothing like the Daf system as you describe it, I am not surprised it failed! Did you really have to have to release the accelerator to gain speed!!

It is best to think of the Nuvinci as a VERY smoothly operated hub gear system like the Alfine8 from Shimano. But instead of changing gears with thumb and forefinger you use a twist changer. The only unusual sensation is not having 8 distinct gears, but an infinite range between top and bottom. Of course the Nuvinci at 360% has a massive range between highest and lowest gears compared to other systems.

My personal experience was one of becoming relaxed with the system within a couple of miles, by the time I arrived home after my first ride (about 5 miles) I was changing ratios automatically without really thinking about it. Quite uncanny!

All the best

David

 

[Wisper Bikes]

Thank you David. I am looking forward to seeing the bikes at the NEC ... I'm sure that the Grace Easy would meet my needs, but I do like to have the very best ... and the MX seems to have all the bells and whistles a boy could wish for!

Thanks again for the 'earmark' offer.

GraceHopper(?)

Hi Grasshopper, please would you email me regarding the "earmark" so we can make sure we have put one aside for the correct person?

All the best

David

 

[grasshopper]

Hi Grasshopper, please would you email me regarding the "earmark" so we can make sure we have put one aside for the correct person?

All the best

David

Done .......

 

[Wisper Bikes]

Thanks Grasshopper, got it!

Just to confirm the Grace MX sent to me as a sample was indeed a 45kph speed pedelec. Confusing, as it did not feel super quick but it did aid me to sustain a steady 28mph. However, because the bike had been designed and built to travel at such speeds, it is absolutely solid and the brakes are superb.

My personal opinion is speed pedelecs would be a boon to the industry in the UK for the obvious reasons. My only worry is that car drivers did not expect me to arrive at a junction as quickly as I did, more than once a car pulled out of a junction, necessitating my having to brake quite heavily. If the speed pedelec was ever to be introduced here, I would advocate MOT testing to ensure the bike was road worthy. Bad brakes on these bikes would cause problems.

All the best

David

 

[Cakey]

Let's hope grace have improved. The bike on the gadget show showed not a great deal of grace .
I have always fancied one , so it's a maybe .
When Ian at valley scooters gets a demo , I will have a try.