BUILDING A MOTOR and Axel Borg - SAFE?

Hey Yall,

I'm a Uni student looking to make an electric motorbike from scratch - One of the most promising leads I'm sniffing right now is an ebook made in 2010 by Axel Borg - an 161 page book on making a ~7kW Axial Flux Motor.

I'd try purchasing the book from its website, but I don't want to risk $19 on an ebook with no reviews, discussion, or even a reference anywhere online in the 9 years since it's publication. The website isn't secure either, and I can't seem to reverse-search its ISBN number.

Does anyone have either a confirmed purchase or form of verification on this book and it's content? Better yet, if anyone has a thorough written source on making a motor, that would be amazing.

Respectfully,

X

If you're looking to scratch build a bike then $19 shouldn't even register on the list of expenses.

If you really want to make your own motor from scratch (not to even mention the rest of the bike), you're going to be spending quite a lot (hundreds of dollars at least, possibly thousands) on R&D experiments, machining, tools, lathes, etc., so as pointed out above, $19 is nothing.

But you should first try reading the various DIY motor threads here on ES. There's a number of them that have good info, and one ongoing right now that already has one functional motor and is building a second....

If money is really an issue, you'd be better off buying a used electric motorcycle (Zero, etc) and "improving" it as you have time and money, if you find it needs it.

Or buying someone's old unfinished conversion, and finishing it.


FWIW, its' quite likely that the author of the book you're looking at is a member of this forum. You'll find him when you look at the DIY motor threads.

Thanks guys - I understand this is going to be more costly than I anticipated. I'll see whats available with unfinished conversions and Used parts. I suppose building up a workshop isn't a bad place to start, though it is a little disheartening to learn my road is a lot longer than I thought. More fun to be had though!

My intention is more to do with the validity of the source; I'll keep searching.

Fingers crossed! Best of luck to the both of you.

The task isnt' impossible, but it is a lot of work to literally design and build a complete vehicle from scratch, especially if you don't have experience doing so, and most especially if you don't yet know the details of why various things are done the way they are, for specific uses.

There are hundreds, if not thousands, of really bad bicycle designs because the designers don't actually know anything about bicycles. Thankfully, most of them never get built and sold, but kickstarter and the like are full of such things.

Motorcycles there's less of that, because they're a bit more regulated in many places, for safety reasons, but there's still some bad designs out there that don't ride well or aren't suited for the purposes for which theyr'e sold.

I've been building my bikes/trikes experimentally, with a little knowledge gleaned from existing designs and sites that explain stuff, but I make quite a lot of mistakes that I find out about only after riding....

Xanderfish83 said:

My intention is more to do with the validity of the source; I'll keep searching.

Click to expand...

Then I'd recommend a quick google of the author's name; you'll find his videos / etc., and then that same name is here on ES if he doesn't respond to you on the original sales site or any other site.