Gas "Generator" <pumping> Electric fast "Charger" via electric bike

~~~~~~~ hypothetical situation~~~~~~~~~

if a gas powered generator was being towed on a trailer attached to a highpowered etrike
having a fast charger plugged into the generator and charging the bike while in motion ,traveling on pavement to extend a distant journey .

Is This Possible ?


15kw motor 85v50a battery

plus power consumtion usage onboard taillight for trailer , headlight , tail , and signals both bike and trailer . wattage

You mean like this?
https://youtu.be/qqsdSJXuwp4?t=1024

bangbang said:

~~~~~~~ hypothetical situation~~~~~~~~~

if a gas powered generator was being towed on a trailer attached to a highpowered etrike
having a fast charger plugged into the generator and charging the bike while in motion ,traveling on pavement to extend a distant journey .

Is This Possible ?


15kw motor 85v50a battery

plus power consumtion usage onboard taillight for trailer , headlight , tail , and signals both bike and trailer . wattage

Click to expand...

thx Marks,intreastingly done !

As you see, that works. But the downside is you are towing a trailer with 50 pounds or so of generator on it. So the trailer needs to be real good. One thing not shown is what that rig acts like if the bike lane of a road has a lot of slope on it. Perfect for 20 mph, not so for 40 mph.

He did do one thing exactly right, he did it with a lightweight electric motorcycle with pedals. What I mean is your typical "bike" hub motors can overheat if you get too much wind, or too much slope, towing your heavy butt and a 25 pound trailer, and a 50 pound generator. Same sort of thing applies to hauling a trailer large enough to hold 4 large solar panels. It works, but the bike needs to be a stout cargo bike or small electric motorcycle. At 85v, you are not in the bike category, so try it if you would like to.

When I tried it, with a much louder 30 pound generator, it just wasn't worth it. It was just better to carry 80 miles range worth of batteries, at about 1/3 the weight. I did a lot of charging that huge pile of batteries with the generator, while camped in the mountains.

But as you may have seen in my posts, in the last 5 years or so, I took to riding gas scooters and motorcycles, when I wanted motorcycle performance. I'm too deaf to mind the noise, :lol: And in fact, my biggest motorcycle is as quiet as that generator for sure.

https://www.harborfreight.com/900-watt-2-cycle-gas-powered-portable-generator-epacarb-63025.html
700w/900w/63cc/40lbs/19x15x16"/Output 120V@7A
MW-HRP-600 is 120V @ 7.6A and 40.8 ~ 55.2V @ 13A
MW-HRP-450 is 120V @ 5A and 40.8 ~ 55.2V @ 9.5A which is good for a 48V(13S) battery., 1kwh charge rate

Finding an outlet on a building, usually they are 15A you will get more charging power.
A normal slotted outlet is 15A and the outlet slots with an extra line is 25A but not outdoor, moist rated. See same thing outside, its just GFCI.
MW-RSP-1500-48 is 38 to 56Vdc is 1650W output from a 120V 17A so might work as you DO NOT want to use those chargers when battery is drained.
MW-RSP-1000-48 is 120V 12A and 43 ~ 56V @ 32A
Lots of gas stations around to juice up, though I have noticed the newer built strip malls and commercial buildings are doing away with active, outside outlets which is odd from a building code perspective, knowing residential requires at least one outlet.

That's the very loud generator I used to try it. 500w continuous on that one is a fantasy spec. I had to run 250w (5 amps 48v) chargers one at a time on it. It was a bit much for me to carry on my bob trailer, at 30 pounds it made the bike handle funny. But a more stable trailer like the one I made out of bmx wheels and an aluminum ladder would carry a heavier harbor freight 2000w generator similar to the one in the video. https://www.harborfreight.com/2000-watt-super-quiet-inverter-generator-62523.html For that trailer, I had a custom hitch welded to the back of a cargo bike I built specifically for towing. So no funky kid trailer hitch, I had a rock solid rear bumper on the bike to hitch to.

This one also has a fantasy wattage spec, it struggles to go more than 1000w continuous. I have one to run my RV, but it cannot pull the air conditioner, which takes about 1300w to keep it going. But the bigger generator is WAAAAY quieter, and will pull a 1000w charger. Or two 350w satiators at once.

But I found the best solution was still a crapton of batteries. When I built that towing bike, I made it able to easily carry 48v 80 amp hours, a whopping 4kwh of battery. In practice, what I did was this. I'd carry about 30-40 amp hours of decent newer battery, plus another 30 or so amp hours of old puffed up tired lipos 3-4 years old. If I pulled light on that second old battery, riding less than 20 mph, I'd wring 20 ah from those. This gave me 80 mile range at least. I needed that, since the distance between western towns in the desert is about 60-70 miles, because trains in 1880 needed water every 70 miles or so.

Anyway, all that battery weighed less than the generator, and I did not have to listen to that loud piece of shit run for 6 hours of riding. Plugs were hard to find!, but once I knew of a few, I could ride to nearby towns 70 miles away and know where to plug in. Then a long wait to charge there, sometimes at a city park, or even buying a charge at a campground with electric hook ups.

A typical free range 15 amps gfci plug will pull a 1000w charger. But not if its also got two coke machines and an Ice freezer running on it already. Best to have another, smaller wattage charger on that trip just in case.

I always really liked the idea of using those Meanwell LED drivers for "gorilla charging" of ebikes. As long as you get one of those CC/CV ones that can be adjusted to the right battery voltage/amperage it should be fine.

The advantage to them is that they are waterproof, affordable, and don't have any annoying fans. So you can leave it bolted to your bike. The downside, of course, is that they don't have a automatic shut off like a real charger has.

Or you could get something very purpose designed like the Grin Cycle Satiator.

(How much work it would be to adapt something like that to a real EV charging port? Is Jt1772 the most common? I haven't a clue. Probably not worth it)

And if you have a large enough battery were you don't need to do a 100% charge and powerful enough power supply then then doing a 80% "fast" charge takes a fraction of the time.

If a full charge from 0% takes 180 minutes then a 20% charge to 80% would take about 70 minutes.

For sure, when you are out snagging a charge someplace, its much much quicker to stop at about 85% full, vs sitting there forever waiting for the last 5%, at one or two amps. I'd watch a wattmeter, and when the watts of a 250w charger dropped to 50w, I'd stop and ride off.

Only when charging overnight would I fill completely, and possibly do some manual balancing, putting a bit more charge into a few lower voltage cells one at a time. I could do that with naked lipos. Or help a bms equipped pack balance, by putting it back on charge for 5 min in the morning.

If you are using one of those meanwells, then you could just watch it charge, and using a watt meter, stop the charge when its 80-90% full. As those cells fill up, the charger or power supply will try to put in full wattage. But as that cell fills, the wattage it will accept drops, and that last 1% happens at a very slow rate, very low amps. So why wait in a tiny patch of shade behind the ice freezer at a quickie mart for that last 10%.

Unless you live in the western desert, and the next plug is actually 70 miles.

While pricy, YES, the satiator is very worth the cost. Its got the info you want built right in, and you can just set it to the voltage you want. So you can do a fast charge to 80% so easy, and the thing works fine sitting there in the rain.