E-bike update

E-bike sales are booming, Giant bikes expects to sell 600,000 e-bikes in 2019 up from 500,000 in 2018. That’s just one bicycle maker. There is also Merida, Lekker, Gazelle and a slew of other makers with increasing sales. Reports of the future of transport is often touted as being all about electric vehicles (cars), I think many miss that this is already happening, but those vehicles are bikes. Here in Australia most media follow the usual script of bike hate, so they blissfully ignore the positives of bicycle travel.

I enjoy bike riding, so much so that I’ll go out most weekends for a ride and also ride to work during the week. I’ve got my own bike that I’ve put together using a Bafang 250W mid-drive motor and an off the shelf battery, a 36V 11.6Ah unit that uses NCR18650PD cells.

The bike is a bit of a mix of all the things I wanted in a commute bike, wide tyres, handle bars that allow upright sitting position for slow riding and also allows aero tuck for faster riding, handles well and is comfortable. It does a great job of taking on my 64km round trip to work.

This bike has done 5400km so far on the Mondia battery and still going strong. I haven’t done a full range test with this battery, since it takes me to work with reserve left over, it hasn’t been that important for me to find out. I have however taken out the 9Ah version of the battery and it takes me 77km on a relatively flat course.

5400km and going well.