Now for the rhino bike

deacon said:
Over the weekend I bought a seventies schwinn girlie girl bike. That thing is the cat's PJs. I can actually step through the frame. It was made in the days when girls still wore skirts to ride a bike. It's a cool ride for a gimp. I'll send some pictures soon.

You know I had to put on some higher handlebars and a strange front end. I have two really cool fenders, I don't want to use. I hate to toss them but they really are in the way. I guess I could chop one down and make a fender for the Rhino drive wheel that sits on top of the rear wheel. That would be interesting.
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Deacon, we be men. We don't need no steenking fenders. LOL
 
True on the fenders but it is so cool to actually step through the frame without having to use the bike as a brace. I think this is going to be my favorite bike frame ever.
 
I know what you mean. After all this and having said something about cruiser frames being flimsy, I'm tempted to go back to one since I'll be sticking with a 24volt system anyway. Tipping a men's bike at such an angle to make it easy to swing my leg over is just not working for me. For commuting, errands and practicality, a step through is good enough for me. I'll save the other bikes for other projects. ;)
 
Go for one old enough that girls still wore skirts. I found that is the secret. These days with women wearing shorts and jeans the girls model is one a couple of inches lower on the top bar. In the old days 60s they were much lower. The one I bought is heavy steel tubing. I had to put a second brake on it and will probably have to weld the hanger to the frame but it will do it I'm confident.

I put the extra emergency brake on the rear wheel. Just calipers actually, I had about decided to do away with the brake handle on the handlebar and go with a pull handle of some sort on the caliper itself. It would have been a check of a lot easier than routing brake cable. I still might do it when I do the final rigging. It in test stage now.
 
I just got back from a two mile test ride of the sissy schwinn rhimo drive bike. It did very well. The ease of getting on and off it is amazing. It makes a huge difference in my enjoyment of the ride. It is like a huge scooter to be honest. I almost never pedaled it at all. The pedals are there mostly for the braking now.

Note I also tested the hybrid pack. The results are posted here as well.

Im going to go down and shoot a picture now. I will come back and add it to this post in a bit.
1xxn28.jpg
not great indoors but I didn't want to roll it out just for a pic...
 
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The rear hand brake did nothing. I have no idea why. I moved it to the front with a pull handle as I wanted to do before. It looks a lot like a 1940 willys emergency brake hand lol.
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Lighting wasnt the problem its just an ugly bike lol...
 
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At last, a picture :) I always thought it strange for someone who is a photographer that you rarely posted pictures.
A picture paints a thousand words. Good job Deacon, I dont think it looks girly at all, in fact I think it looks kinda butch with the little batt trailer ;)

Regards
Tom
 
I like that frame. As for paint - I heard of recent scientific break trough - paint in a can and with push of top button you can spray it :).
 
Yeah i tried that new fangled stuff but you still have to do that darn prep work. My painting is like my other skill just about those of a fifth grader.

About the frame the more I ride it the more I like it. Also the more I realize that it is the frame of an early scooter. If I welded the pedals in place it would really be just like a scooter frame wise.

On another note I checked the emergency brake in the front. That is so cool. if the chain breaks I can stop the bike but most likely I will fly over the handlebars into the back of a BMW.
 
Try to aim less expensive car...Have you considered airbag?
Brake on front wheel can be somewhat dangerous (it didn't seem like it was dangerous when I was 12, but recently I've changed opinion). Why don't you make friction brake on rear wheel (somewhat like it was made in pioneers wagon) using the same cable (or construct a lever) and , if you want it fancy , it can be foot operated? It is a simple device.
Prep work on that frame is a matter of half an hour work (bike must be disassembled first). Some paint thinner for degrease it and fine sand paper afterward and you are good to spray (modern paints , especially acrylic ones stick to everything and anything , so you don't have to be Michelangelo). Of course , I understand that you're keen to ride it , but on a rainy day perhaps?
 
I know i hate taking bikes apart but I probably will have to do that and paint it when I get the battery and wiring all settled. I really do like this bike better than the other one.
 
Since I am starting the chain drive I have been giving some thought to the rhino. I found that the motor is about twice as hard to turn as the 350 I had here in the ship. It is toast so I can't use it but I think I might get a 350 with the same mount and just switch it out for the 600. I can jack the 350 up to almost 500 watts which is the minimum I am comfortable with. It would most likely do a lot for my range. I'm not sure I need any improvement since I really do go anywhere on the bike now. Still you never know when I might have to. First thing I have to do is to get the chain drive working and then I'll give some thought to downgrading the rhino.
 
I know got to be a first for me as well. To be honest the 900 watt set up now is like riding a very slow motorcycle. It runs too fast to catch the freewheel to help it on the hills and too slow to keep up with traffic. The range is pretty bad as well, but it is fun. I'm going to run it on 24v one day soon (maybe tomorrow) That would be the same watt as the 350 at 36v. It will give me a feel for how much pedaling I will have to do. should be an interesting test.
 
I made a minor change in the rhino bike today. When I build a bike I lower it by reducing the size of the wheels. I always have to install a shorter crank so I did that today. As always on junk bikes it had to force fitted.

I did reuse the chain ring. I like to pick up the pedal early when I run a motor bike. The larger chain ring does that.
 
You can ( I believe that you know that) weld end parts of scrap rear fork higher on existing fork and be able to use bigger wheel. That gives you lower center of gravity and more torque (on friction drives).
 
My reason is the get on and off the thing. with the new super low step through, I probably could have kept it taller. I once fell, then had the ebike with three batteries on the bike fall on top of me. I had leaned the bike so that I could swing over. I got on one foot and the thing just got away from me. I like for the bike to be upright now when I swing onto it.
 
The new 350watt motor is due in this week. I did some work on the spare rhino drive yesterday. I'm trying to stop the drift of the drive wheel on the bike wheel. Even a slight movement of the motor mount at the bike moves the rear wheel an inch or so off center. the real problem is that the seat on the bike is in the way of mounting it directly to the frame. the mount has to have an extension to clear it. There is where the movement comes in. I'm going to give that some more thought today. I expect to be busy next week. The chain drive parts also should arrive. fun... fun.... fun

And of course I might get more batteries from china.
 
All my new motors came at once. It's like Christmas here... I changed the Rhino from a 900 watt behemoth to a 500 watt piggy. I got the motor on today and tested it on a wet road and the bike did pretty darn well. I does not have the speed or the torque of the 900watt but for what it is, it seems okay. I am going to test it as a compromise bike, 250 watt is what all the range tests are on I'm sure. I can't get a 250 motor to climb the hills around here any better than a 10 speed.

The 350 at 36 volts runs faster than I personally could pedal a bike. it even climbs the highest grade on my test track unassisted. Almost gets slow enough to pedal but not quite. On the long not quite so steep grade, it does slow down enough for me to pedal assist but not much is needed.

tomorrow I will probably work on the chain drive most of the day after I get through with my running around with the wife.
 
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