Bikee E2 with Xiongda 2 speed front hub motor.

[bigoilbob]

Just got my Bikee E2 fixed up with the 48 volt, 2 speed Xiongda front hub motor. Want to show it off.

It uses roller clutches and reverses into it's planetary gear box at ~7 m/h, automatically, with my 16" front wheel, to go from low to high. High/low ratio ~1.82. I can hold it in low if I want. With my 720 w*h, 48 volt lithium pack, (right pannier bag) I can go ~20 miles solo, ~14-15 miles with my wife on back. It will climb a ~14% grade with 2 aboard, no pedaling. No speed demon. For tourist town cruising. Best efficiency at ~14 m/h, and huffs out at ~17 m/h. You will see us riding around Pismo Beach from Jan-March, while winterbirding.

In a former life, this bike had a 35cc Honda, thru a Staton 18.75 box with a 13 toothed sprocket, chained to a 27 tooth sprocket, attached to the big Nuvinci hub, with developer's kit, laced onto my 20" rear wheel. I built a 12v charging system for it, which enabled me to be the only NVDK user that I know of to get this kit to successfully shift up and down under power. Winched like a champ, but it was too loud for the missus on back. Our Xiongda hub is totally inaudible to her now.

If it warms up, I'll try for a vid....

 

[bigoilbob]

Spokes! I had Xiongda lace a properly sized 16" wheel to the motor for me just to avoid spoke breakage. They used thicker spokes, and of course 36 of them. Since shorter spokes would lend themselves to less bucking and less elongation/unit stress, I did not anticipate any problems. Big mistake. They were fine solo, but started breaking after just a few tandem road miles on the Cal central coast. The local Pismo Beach bike shop told me that this is symptomatic of Chinese spokes. They are now hunting Swiss spoke replacements for all 36, with my blessing.

This is NOT a power house. Granted, the Xiongda hub does have a low gear, but there are MANY hubs that pull harder on spokes than this one. So, to all Chinese e hub shoppers, buy the best spokes/rims you can, and get the best lacing possible - whether it's from you or store bought. Learn from my inconvenience....