Zen & pp/e bike

[deacon]

no this one is ms winners chicken ..... I have a 1.5 amp charger and it takes about three hours. I took a look at the clock today for that reason. But since i am charging two batteries one at a time I used another two amp one at the same time.

What I really wonder is will a lead acid be damaged by hitting it with a 6amp charge for a short time. Have you tried that Doc.

 

[deacon]

Since it's raining today I won't be riding.

While standing over the kitchen sink eating a bowl of cereal, see my recipe below. I got to thinking about the difference between the ebike and the old gasoline bikes I used to build. I tinker mostly with the battery packs now, not the engine. But I still get to problem solve, which is a good thing.

I get to interact with the environment sooo much more with this bike. I am moving slow enough so that I can speak to the people around me and they can speak back to me. I can really see what is happening on the side of the road.

People still notice me and the bike but not in the same way as with the gasoline bikes. It much more subtle. Kind of like, "Oh yeah, he is going up hill and not pedaling his butt off."

I do not wish I had bought a bigger hub motor but I will tell you this, Ideally you should have about 500 watts or more, You should also have it on a bike with gears and a full size rear wheel. That would be the most efficient expenditure of your energy.

With the 20" rear wheel, I get a better mount and dismount of the bike, which is important to me because my balance is bad. But I also have to pedal more rotations to achieve the same speeds.

I noticed the teenager who rode beside me riding up a hill effortlessly with a mountain bike and 26" rear wheel. Yes he is in better shape and weighs less but I noticed how many more pedal strokes that I was making to achieve the same uphill speed.

Next time I might have to build my bike for minimum effort instead of maximum. Right now I ride for exercise more than anything else. One day I might want to actually use it to go somewhere on a regular basis.

Who am I kidding, I'm never going to have to be anywhere on time again in my life. lol a nice feeling by the way.

Cereal recipe

mix bran flakes with corn flakes half and half.

Into a cereal bowl cut up half a banana or other fresh fruit.
Add a half hand full of dried trail mix. I chop mine a little before I toss it into the bowl.
sprinkle cinnamon atop the cereal
add milk to the bowl
Then add maple syrup instead of sugar.

I use sugar free syrup and low fat milk. It makes a great bowl of cereal by the way.

 

[DOC BOLM]

Deacon I use a quest 3 amp charger.I dont see a problem with using a 6amp,i would think it would charge faster.I have a batt. on my mower and i charge it with a 12amp.HD

 

[deacon]

im going to give it a try on another battery first to see what the effect is. if any. I guess battery overheating is the only thing I need to worry about.

 

[deacon]

It's raining so naturally I have too much time on my hands. I wind up thinking about riding my ebike rather than riding it. Lastest mental challenge is a balancing act.

The challenge...ride my ebike to a retirement party at my wife's office.

study topography and map out a route. The direct route has the worst hills. The route wih the least hills stretches a single battery pack to the limit. Round trip will be 4.25 miles close to the limit of a 12 ah pack.

So why not take both packs, well my wife works for the county welfare office and the party is in her conference room. So if I do that my bike and batteries will be in the parking lot alone. I can secure the bike with a chain but I have no way to secure the batteries. I plan to take my portable battery pack inside with me. I could even take the battery charger with me and plug the pack in while I visit. It won't have enough time to get a full charge but even a half hour charge might be better than nothing. Does anyone have an opinion on whether a small charge is preferable to no charge at all.

Then of course I have to have a return route. The flattest route is also the one with the most traffic. Of course it is.

Well that's today's project.

 

[deacon]

Well it's time to get serious about the Ebike... Today I am going to clean up my old junk car and put it in the yard for sale. I have to empty a couple of years of junk from it, and then I have to fix the battery. I have a problem it wouldn't start yesterday. I think the connection is bad but even if it is the battery, I have a darn good charger. I can put some beef in it in a couple of hours.

So in a couple of days I will be car less in High Point. At that point I will be taking the Ebike very seriously. I have a second bike ready for a motor so If I need to buy a second propulsion system I will do so. I think the small one is the way for me personally to go, but maybe I will change my mind later.

 

[deacon]

file under the perversity of all things mechanical

The two rear windows on the car I am going to sell from my yard have not worked or over a year. As a matter of fact one of them was stuck in the down position. Every time I went to the store the cold wind or the rain blew in.

I have not tried to close it in months and months. Today after I cleaned the car out, I figured I would try to force it closed. It might make less difference when I said that the rear windows don't work if they were closed, I reasoned. So I turned on the ignition switch held the power window switch up. When I tugged on the window,
up it went under the motor's power. Not only that the second window moved up and down als well. Time had mysteriously healed the broken window, just in time for someone else to enjoy. As a matter of fact both rear windows now work just fine.

Mechanical perversion number 1001...

 

[deacon]

The car lasted less than one hour in the yard. So now I am carless. The first thing I did was to build a permanent battery box to hold both my battery packs. It is 24ah limit so it should do about ten miles. I will see how it goes. I have to have something I can ride around at least eight miles.

I am saving the money from the sale of the car to buy either a lith battery, a larger motor, or both. I definitely will not be buying a gasoline kit. I don't think I need a bigger kit to be honest, I think I can even get along with these batteries a while. I might spring for a bike with gears. It might be time to lean a little about those. Then again what would be the advantage of gears with a hub motor. I might need a larger rear wheel though.

I do plan to build an experimental pusher wheel for the bike. That is the next plan. At last it is at the moment.