The perfect project for Deacon!

[deacon]

Today's tip for Ebike builders. When you do precision grinding with a rotary tool, use a vise don't hold it against you sweat shirt. The sweatshirts today are mostly synthetic material. I only know this because I melted a big hole in mine this morning.

 

[deacon]

I have the pusher trailer 95% complete. I need to wire the motor to a switch and put a male electrical cord end on the motor and switch. When I do that the bike is ready to test ride. It was by far the simplest build yet. Now will it work? the motor runs, the wheel turns. What will it do on the road is anybody's guess at this point. The total watts of both engines is 650 I have no idea if it will push and pull the bike along or not. If it does, I have no idea what kind of life the batteries will have. I am pretty sure the pusher motor by itself won't do much but we will see.

I did learn how they mount the motors to the ebikes. It has to be the same way this one is mounted. If you had a strong enough motor you could mount it in place of the pedal chain and it would rock. Better than a gas bike since you wouldn't have any gear or maintenance issues much. Oh well.

The pusher trailer has a 12.5 inch wheel from a scooter and a 350 watt motor also from a scooter. It uses the number 25 chain which I happen to have several of here. I'm going to start with a simple on off switch as I want to see how simple I can build it.

After I rest a bit I'm going into the shop to tighten everything, then I'm going to test ride it if the rain holds off. If not I'll have it ready for when the rain does stop.

The wheel I got had the complete brake assembly still attached. I now know how those small scooter's brakes work.

 

[deacon]

I did it. It works but it has bugs. Im going to have to rebuild the frame but the concept is basically sound except I need weight on the push motor frame. I have had the batteries on it then on the bike. It looks like I'm going to have to move the batteries back to the pusher again.

 

[DOC BOLM]

Deacon try adding bar bell weights a little at a time till you get the weight right.HD

 

[deacon]

Good plan but I am trying a brace from the luggage rack to the frame of the push rails. It should hold it down. I did a lot of cross bracing and it seems to have done the trick for twisting. Now it has the top rod in to hold it down as well. It should help with the twisting too. Too bad the rain came while I was finishing. I have a feeling this little pusher is going to be pretty darn good.

I had it working for a few minutes earlier, before it started to swing on me. It seems to be about as powerful as the hub motor I have. It has no controller, just an on off switch, so it will be simple to build and inexpensive as well. I have no idea why I waited so long to do this.

Without the battery pack I have less than a hundred bucks in the bike and pusher. I'll try to shoot a picture of it tomorrow.

 

[deacon]

The pusher engaged

the frame of the pusher

pusher folded for storage and it is impossible to get it out of the shop otherwise...

I have not been able to ride it since I redesigned the trailer but it should work just fine. It almost worked with the last design. This one has zero twist, I think, and the tie from the luggage rack should hold it on the road.

If this works out okay, I might either add it to the bubba bike or buy a 24" bike with gears for it or something else even I just don't know. I suppose I could even run a three speed with it, or a lightweight road bike. Or a full suspension twenty four inch bike.... Now that might be the ticket.

 

[deacon]

What if your pusher trailer had TWO countem TWO power wheels....

 

[fasteddy]

Decon--That is sweet with one wheel so Heaven only knows what it would be like with two.
I'll have to order a bike from Workman today and get off my wishfull.I'm a great planner but my do'er does at times leave a whole lot to be desired.Well really it's most of the time now.
Can't wait to hear how it goes.Hope you can hold on.
Steve.

 

[deacon]

Well here is the deal... It stopped raining so I gave it a shot. The bike rides differently. The bike does best when it is going perfectly straight. It does slight corrections fine but you need to be off the heat when you make right turns. Its are not too bad. Tight u turns are difficult. That the bad news.

The good news is that it sings. It has almost as much power as the bubba bike. It uses the same or less juice I think. I left the house with probably 26.5 volts on the pack. It was full charge last night. I ran it two miles doing wide open when not in the turns. It runs wide open or off those are the only two speeds. It came in at 26 volts.

It climbs and picks up better than it cruises. I think it is the little wheel that does that. It doesn't need a controller which is good news for me. I had runs about four blocks then back again then over and four more blocks. The bike did excellently on the straight and pushed me with enough speed so that I could make the turns no sweat. I could have done a lot more pedaling and saved on the power as well.

I deem it a decent helper system. Stiffening up that frame made all the difference. In this configuration I think the front 20" wheel would have done just fine. I'm thinking suspension bike for this power system. I will need a longer frame for a 24" wheel but that is no big thing.

Oh it also has a decent ah factor as well. Kids in the hood noticed it. It has a pleasant hum of the small chain and that wheel dragging behind gets noticed.

Ah I did blow up another bike charger that's it for me. I have one car battery charger and one batter maintainer. I am going to use those two till I get to the wallymart to buy a second maintainer. Those are a lot more rugged than those lil scooter chargers. I have blown three of them now. Way too many. its easier to take the top off the battery pack and hook up two chargers.

 

[deacon]

I rode the bike again this evening and decided it has more torque than the bubba bike I think the top end goes to the bubba but I'm not positive. I still have to get the pusher to grip the road a little better. not too much better just a little.

Im going to change the hook up configuration a little tomorrow. I might have to move the battery pack back to it somehow.

 

[fasteddy]

Deacon--Great news!So glad it's working.
I think right turns are really overated so if it were me I'd do without them.
Do you think 2 wheels would work or would you have torque steer problems?
Went over to the bottle depo with my brother to take back some cans and we went past a bike and scooter store.
Glad I went in.They had what I think is the perfect bike for lard butt.The frames are super strong and they have a 500W,3phase,brushless hub motor.with 36V SLA batteries.
The one I want has 21 speeds which surprised me.I was under the impression that you couldn't have gears behind the motor.
The father/son who sell them are in the game for 7 years and work out of thier automotive repair shop.Having seen thier dragster I'm sure they know thier business.
The stories they told about the early days when they started was worth the stop.
My brother asked about taking the pedals off and is seems the customer who did could have bought a couple of bikes for what the fines and court time cost him.
The Royal Canadian Mounted Police who are our local police didn't fool around.
The price of the bike is $1,250 Canadian.Another $125 or so for comforts like a shock absorber seat post and jell seat and saddle bags.
The forks have nice shocks on them and there is a better frame/forks ect for $1,475 but it has a bar on it and it was hard to get on.
I think the exchange rate is around 25% so if you are using real money you would save that much.Duty of course is on top of that.
They did look into shipping but the boxes were $500ea.
Going back Saturday when thier parking lot is quieter to try it out.The deal is if you don,t try it and they watch you while you do, they refuse to sell it to you.
Some up tight about customer satisfaction.Just like Wal-Mart.
We talked batteries at length and they were strong on SLA.Told me a story about Li-ion[?] batteries that one of the customers swapped in.Wish I could have seen the 9ft flames when it went up
The bike I want looks very much like your blue one.Tried putting my leg over the bar of one they had there and I tore parts of me I,d forgotten about.
Steve.

 

[deacon]

Some of the hub motors go on the back and have complete gear cassettes. I think the gearing is only good for the pedal and chain not the hub motor. Still it is nice to have gears to assist the motor.

Somebody said to me that the ebike with the chain and motor, not the hub, just a motor driving the chain is a better performing bike. After the pusher I think that they might be right. If I were going to go with a chain drive motor i would go with the walmart for three hundred bucks.

 

[fasteddy]

Deacon-- As I said the brain took a lickin and ain't always tickin.
You are as always right.It is just a hub motor. The gears are on the pedals and I'm not into peddling my tired old self down the road.
Guess you can't have gears on the motor after all.In that case the walmart bike won't be sold here and God can't help you if you get caught with one if it has gears driven by the motor.
I'll have to work this one over.
Thanks
Steve.

 

[fasteddy]

Deacon--Quick update.Just checked Wal-Mart . Only one E-bike on the site.Three speed/hub motor,don't know wattage. The price is $899.93.
Steve.

 

[POPS]

Steve
Don't jump the gun on buying anything yet. I've come up with something that is E/bike and is completely different and will comply with BC laws! I will be launching my company with in the next couple of months ish. "POPS CHOPS" I should get media coverage. It will be revolutionary! I can't let the cat out of the bag until I'm out of the gate but I will share with all as soon as I'm to market. I'm still going to beta test but I know I'm there. I will have a choice of 4 box store bikes to choose from but I will custom anything! Right down to OCC chopper like builds. Stay tuned...POPS (Rick)

 

[deacon]

Good luck Pops.... This part of the bike world is moving ahead quickly. I'm really happy to see it happen.

And steve how about the push trailer. If it is legal it is cheap to build and I think if you used a 500 watt or more motor the pedaling would be minimal at best. I tossed my chain on the pusher bike yesterday and brought it home all under power. It wasn't setting any records but it make it just fine.

 

[deacon]

I went to bed early last night, so naturally I woke up in the middle of the night with an idea for the pusher motor. I decided to return the batteries to the trailer for the weight it needs to keep the wheel in contact with the road. It was going to require a complete redesign of the trailer until I remember that when I bought the hub motor it came with two small metal battery holders. They were supposed to go on the bike, but I didn't use them.

So I got up first thing and welded them to the sides of the trailer. I even did a pretty good job I think. Then when I tried to put the batteries in, they were too big for the holder. Out with the zip rotor tool and cut the sides out so the battery would slide in. I used a large hose clamp like goes on a dryer hose to hold the batteries to the three sided rack Seems to work okay.

I can't lift the trailer for storage but it does come off the bike now. It's a bit of a pain but I'm sure something will come to me to make it easier to set up. I'm resting a little before I test ride it.

One of the reasons for the change was to make the drive easier to use on any bike. I am probably going to get a different bike for this drive. I'm leaning to a full suspension bike with gears. Maybe 24" and see if I can swing my lard butt over it. I might can find a twenty inch suspension bike. That would be fine with a seat extension.

 

[deacon]

I have always used a piece of plywood as the starting point for my trailers. I bolt side rails to it and then assemble it from there. Of this pusher I couldn't really do that and boy have I suffered. I can't just weld everything together to cut down on the flex and twist because I might have to work on the tire.

My latest try and so far the most sucessful was to screw a couple of almost 2x2s inside the channel. That seems to have done some more good. I'm getting there.

The good news is that it runs better and handles better with every slight improvement. The bad news is I'm shooting blind as I go along. Still it is coming along.

I rode the bike three miles today and it used half of the available current. Well less than half but I want to stop it in time to charge the batteries without any damage. The performance still seems to be equal to or better than the hub motor. I should ride the bubba bike today just to see if I remember it correctly..

 

[fasteddy]

Pops--Would like to hear from you when your ready.Just had a knee replaced and a bike seems to me to be the perfect way to get it mobile.The other one has to be done also.
Glad to hear your working on an E-bike.They are the future here in Canada and I'm sure the U.S.will be pushing them too
My Dad told me 60 years ago that we had to be careful of the earth because we had no place else to go.
Steve.

 

[fasteddy]

Deacon--Well old son I don't think the push trailer is legal here because you could use the gears in the bike.If it was a push bike with no gears you may have them at thier own game so long as your motor isn't rated over 500W and all axels have a brake on it.
I'll check that today and see what can be done.I'm just the lad to poke the angry bear in the backside with a short stick.
Will car batteries work for a longer charge/distance or does the added weight work against you?A 36V SLA battery pack is $200 here or about the same as good car batteries.Do to the hills here you really need 36V500W.
We might be going over to our local tool/parts/surplus store today.They sell everything you would ever need. Much like Harbour Freight with a lot of Gov./Industrial surplus toss into the mix.I'll see what they have to make a push trailer out of.
The race is on.
Steve.[I really hate to be pushy.]