morons selling ebikes...

Hi all, I live in a small town ~150,000. I moved here in my early 20's from Rochester NY which is much bigger. I find this town to be an interesting mix of backwoods hicks, college students, retirees, hippies and more. anyway I browse the bikes section of craigslist all the time and I find ads to convert bikes to ebikes. these ads are always terrible. here's a recent example:

Convert your bike to an Electric Bike!

Your bike will be converted with a powerful 1000W 48V brushless hub motor that includes an electric controller, thumb throttle, with battery power indicator.

2 brake pullers and handlebar grips

4 Rechargeable Batteries

Battery Charger

Battery Power Indictor

Wire Basket to hold batteries

26" Front Wheel

Connecting Harness

For only $750 you will receive the above that includes installation! Don't buy a conversion kit on your own! This is not a process you'll want to do alone. Let our experience get you started towards an economical way of transportation.

It will take up to ten business days to complete.

Not all bike designs are compatible with this process.
Thank you for your interest.

Let us know if you are interested in this conversion process.
Thanks.
Robert

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so just for fun I email the guy:

Hi, your ad just says 4 rechargeable batteries. what type and brand are they and what is the capacity???

also what brand motor and controller???

thanks

Dave

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he replies back with a copy of the ad, thats it... so I reply:

now I'm confused. you answered NONE of my questions, but just showed me the same ad I saw on craigslist.
is this a scam? do you speak english??

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and from him:

I apologize for the confusion. I replied too quickly. Please see my answers below:

what type and brand are they and what is the capacity??? The motorcycle batteries are named, "Universal". You can use any 12 volt batteries to run the motor. We have found that using these batteries are better then the Lithuim. Lithuim batteries tend to be unstable and can catch on fire.
also what brand motor and controller??? The motor is named, "Champion". The controller is a thumb throttle. If you want to purchase your own batteries then we can give you a discount.

We have been going "green" for over a year and the electric bike is our main means of transportation. The setup being advertised will get you 8 miles (using the motor with minor hills). It takes approximately three hours (or less) to recharge. Also, not all bikes can be converted. It is better to ask exprienced e-bike converters, such as us, before converting your own bike. Otherwise, it may cost you more in the long run. Can you send me a picture of the bike you want converted? Mainly, we need to see the handle bars.

Again, I apologize for the confrusion.
Thanks,
Robert

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personally I'm shocked at the lack of information. is this guy stupid or does he assume his customers are stupid? should I email him back? do I just have too much time on my hands?

It depends what do you want him to do? What do you want to gain by it?

Highlight his incompetence? Or illicit some humour out of the situation?

You could always go the comic wrote. Say you own a fleet of a couple hundred rental bikes and you want to electrify them all. String him along and see what he is willing to do. How low will he go etc. Offer the bait and keep embedding the hook deeper and deeper.

Now I'm not saying you should do this but rather that you could do this.

8 miles on lead acids for $750? LOL...

I think the stock $400 eZip has better range than that.

Yeah, these guys are bad for the industry. Minus $100 for assembly, test, and a basic 30 day warrantee, he's getting $650 for the parts, so...

$350 for a cell_man kit, and $300 for four SLA batteries...(choke!)

He claims they are "universal" brand motorcycle batteries. This leads me to believe that he is packaging STARTER BATTERIES..instead of deep-cycle electric-wheelchair batts. This is even worse than I thought...

spinningmagnets said:

Yeah, these guys are bad for the industry. Minus $100 for assembly, test, and a basic 30 day warrantee, he's getting $650 for the parts, so...

$350 for a cell_man kit, and $300 for four SLA batteries...(choke!)

He claims they are "universal" brand motorcycle batteries. This leads me to believe that he is packaging STARTER BATTERIES..instead of deep-cycle electric-wheelchair batts. This is even worse than I thought...

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That explains the low range on 4 boxes of lead. Currie claims 15-22 on the trailz, and I've seen one go 22 without dieing on pedal assist, though I doubt it'd make that range with me riding instead of my girlfriend. I wonder if the guy who doesn't know the difference between a throttle and a controller also doesn't know the difference between brushless and brushed motors. If it's really a brushed kit, you can get the currie kit for $300 from amazon (I got mine with a bike attached for the same price at wal-mart.)

Can you send me a picture of the bike you want converted? Mainly, we need to see the handle bars

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All he needs is a picture of your "handlebars".

He must be a lot smarter than all of us, if he can learn anything with only that picture.

Dan

Ouch!

$750 is a LOT for what seems to be offered. :?

I imagine the guy answering the email isn't the installer, or so I hope!

But honestly, I'm not calling you out, but maybe you could meet with him, and show him what a REAL E-Bike is like, and help him to see what he is selling is such a bad investment, I doubt very seriously that he has sold many if any at that price, I would guess he is using something similar to a "hill topper" or similar kit, but if you were to meet with him, and show him "the light" he might realize that he's got a stinker of a product frankly that in the end is going to have unsatisfied customers at the least, and angry ones at worst accusing him of gouging when they realize how much cheaper one is at Walmart.

Anyone who takes the time to google search can at least find that $300 - $500 buys a ride-able E-Zip or other Curry bike from Walmart or Amazon, and even though I wouldn't buy one, I have to give them some respect, because I know of people who use them on a regular basis, and a local shop that sells them and has good success.

Not everyone is as willing to get in and dig for the information that we have found in this gold mine of info that is the Endless Sphere!

I know a guy locally that was ready to invest a considerable amount of money into a 24V system primarily for people living in Peru, and I couldn't dissuade him with trying to impress upon him how weak his motor was (250 Watt) and really low out-put LiFeP04 battery pack that was expected to last 1,000 charge cycles only.

He was of the mind that he needed to keep the price down as low as possible for people in Peru to be able to afford it, and who knows, he might do ok there considering the kits he was considering are much higher quality than what is being sold there now, and you remember that burger joint that was cheap, not so great a place to eat, but hey it was cheap, and if you only had a few bucks to spend ... Mc Donnalds?! They had VERY humble beginnings, who knows. :wink:

He did eventually get a chance to go to Inter-Bike and try out some much nicer set-ups, and is now going for a much more viable 36V 500W system, but I'd say, go meet with him, find out what he's really about, be kind, maybe you can take him under your wing and show him a better investment.

The more people selling decent E-Bikes the better! And if he turns out to be trying to just make a quick buck on ignorant people, he will loose in the end when no one recommends his product to friends.

neptronix said:

8 miles on lead acids for $750? LOL...

I think the stock $400 eZip has better range than that.

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I get 12 miles on just one of my 24 volt packs.

Personally, I'd be inclined to help him see the light, and show him a "real" ebike, as well as introducing him to Endless Sphere. It will help not just him, but all of his potential customers, if he's willing to get into learning about what he is selling (which he probably doesnt' really know a lot about, from the way he describes things).

He might just get mad, or not care, because I have seen that happen when I try to help various people trying to run a business that I can see they could improve a lot.

BTW: It's funny that he says the motor is "champion" brand, as that is almost certainly just the name on the *rim*, like a lot of the various hubmotors I've seen come from China in. There probably isn't a name on the motor, or at least not one he's actually noticed.

yeah I had a guy approach me in a motorcycle rally I went to last year and I asked some very basic questions, such as what you did, like what type of battery it came with, and he didn't even know!!!! All he knew was that it came sealed in a metal box. I continued to ask him some more basic questions about the controller and the type of motor, and I got such basic answers that didn't even make sense.

You'd be surprised how stupid people are out there. I once had an electrical engineer with a phd tell me my battery was wired wrong which was completely false. He had no clue what he was talking about. He was one of those know it all types.

You know, the other thing you could do is just offer better kits in CL, and then you might get a call from this same guy asking how the hell you get such good performance/range. :wink:

Although several of you here are advocates of "showing this guy the light" and improving the kind of ebikes sold with education, I fear its wasted on a salesmen making a quick buck. This ebike ad reminds me of the Chinese scooter ads that started in earnest about 3 years ago on Craigslist. Some of those guys did end up learning something and eventually got into the scooter world in a legitimate way. But most of them were ignorant by choice. They sold crap, knew they sold crap, and were out for a quick buck rather than providing quality much less learn something.

This guy might be the rare exception, but don't get too worked up if he turns out to genuinely care less.

I have no intention of meeting this guy. theres no way... he needs to google "ebike" and read up for about a month straight.