November 17, 2021
Electric Bike Fridays! A Tale of Twelve Batteries.
A typical touring e-bike battery these days will be 400 to 600 watt-hours (wH). There is a lot of power - potential heat energy - in something like that. After all, it should be able to assist you up hills for a whole day of cycling. Consequently, airlines will not allow such batteries on board, whether in checked or carry on luggage. But there is a "loop hole", created because lithium batteries are so much a part of many things we consider essential for daily life - notably laptops. A typical laptop battery will be about 50 wH. The "loop hole" is very generous considering this, because it allows in carry on batteries of 100 wH or less.
Of course 100 wH is no help to the cyclist, because no bicycle uses a batteryu that small On the other hand, there is a way through because it also seems that up to 20 100wH batteries can be carried by each person. That is actually a bit frightening, but no more so than thinking how the 400 or so passengers could easily be carrying a laptop and/or tablet or ipod or something. There could be 8000 wH trooping on board with all those people and devices!
The cyclist's angle on this could be to carry 4-6 100 wH batteries, if only these could be joined when it's time to cycle. This is kind of an empty plan when you consider that almost all touring, commuting, or road ebikes are slick looking affairs with 400-600 wH batteries carefully integrated into the downtube, seat tube, or maybe on a rear rack.
This is where an innovative Canadian company from Vancouver comes in. It's called Grin Industries, and was started by Justin LeMire Elmore, an electrical engineer from UBC. Justin came up with 98 wH batteries that clip together like Lego. He calls them LiGo. If you mate LiGo batteries with your favourite regular bike, you're in business!
There is a happy synergy between Justin's innovation and Bike Friday. There is little that is slick or built in about Bike Friday, and though small they should be relatively easy to fit out with LiGos. To see about that, check the next pages, where we report on how the retrofit was done and how our first test ride worked out.
But wait, before we start madly retrofitting, how sure are we really that this junque is going to be allowed on board? Well, the CATSA site says this:
Oh, so they say 100 wH is ok, but you need to check with the air carrier. Yes but, how do you do that? and if someone at the air carrier says something, how far will that get you while standing in security? Just as I am writing this, I am on hold with Westjet to ask them this very question. I have been on hold now for two hours and sixteen minutes. I'm hanging in there, mainly to see just how bad an airline can be. (Pretty bad, at 2 hours and 57 minutes the line dropped.) But I have found the following statement, apparently from them, online:
Suspense will mount over this as our day at airport security approaches. And if by magic we get to Yucatan with our bikes and batteries, will we get back? That's the beauty of a real time blog. You, and we, have to wait to find out!
Bonus, Christmas in Ligoland!
Like most ebike batteries, a LiGo has five lights that indicate its state of charge (and other stuff, like when its mad at you for improper wiring, or when it is going into deep sleep). When its charging, the LiGo will flash its lights in sequence, up to the one that indicates the current maximum state of charge. That's a little different from a Bosch or Shimano, which will light the "charged parts" and flash the bit its working on. But more than that, Dodie and I each have 6 LiGos, so between them they have 60 lights. And while they charge they each work to their own rhythm. That's a 60 light random choreography. In short, Christmas!
(Thanks to Andreas at Fairfield Cycle for recording our LiGos' charging ritual).
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2 years ago
Pre-electrified Grampies used to average 5 mph. Now we do blast along at 7 mph or more! Still no match for the the 20+ mph young men on carbon bikes who we get tired of dealing with on some bike paths.
We find that using ebike may increase your speed a certain amount, but the real effect for Dodie is to keep her from having to walk most hills. In so doing, she says, her ebike has returned joy to cycling for her.
2 years ago
Trikes are definitely nice from a balance perspective. More rolling resistance with that extra tire and they can be tipped if you take a corner too fast. They also are a bit of a pain if you have a dirt trail with a grassy berm down the middle or have rumble strips to avoid. Essentially there is no perfect cycling situation. Everything had its drawbacks. I’d love to zip uphill on a speedy road bike, but my neck and back and wrists and shoulders would never forgive me. Even before I was rear ended multiple times in my car my body couldn’t handle a standard bike so I just accept I will be slow uphill and am grateful that a bike exists that I can handle riding all day.
But e-assist for a boost uphill.... Tempting.
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