Long bike rides!!

USAEBIKECO

10 kW
Joined
Jan 29, 2009
Messages
944
Location
Philadelphia, PA
This spring weather is great. I'm going to do a long 20 mile bike ride along lake Michigan today. Anyone else excited to break out your ebike to go on long rides? Where will you ride?
 
We also came up with a great day, not expected, Ocean Shores WA. I did 15 miles today all at 12 to 20 mph. A great spring day.
 
I rode my ebicycle all winter long. Last night I laced my hub motor with new sapim spokes and a new rim, then I fixed the hall sensor wires and gave wires and motor and rim a clean.

Today I rode the ebike down to the train to go downtown and I got a pinhole leak with the brand new tube, so I walked with bike to Mountain Equipment COOP to buy Rim Tape, Tube, 5 speed freewheel, Tire Protective Wrap for the inside, walked it back to the train to go home and called for a ride.

Once I got it all fixed was about to ride when I saw my half ass red+ and black- sense wires broke while I was doing the tube change. The others I soldered then elec taped, but I didnt know which one of the + - was which, both are black wires, the rest green. So I did a loop tie for ground and will just twist it together and tape it, then maybe one day I will solder and heat shrink it, maybe one day ;)

One thing I found out is that the 7 speed freewheel I had on there previously was too wide, I used a washer so it wouldnt bind on the gears, worked good for a year or two. Wheel itself was off center by an inch. With the new 5 speed freewheel its pretty much centered now. Note on that 7 speed deal, it started failing, washer got squished and I was having freewheel freely spin issues, chain kept coming off the crank.

AnyWHO

The snow is falling good today plus its not too cold. But its the kind of snow that camoflauges ice so I ride slow. I kinda dig it with the fog 'n all. Wish I was rich so I could buy some $125 each, studded tires. Perhaps I will be rich come Friday when I win the Lotto Max $25,000,000

As for long rides, I can get about 18-20km on my pack right now. Which is not considered a "Long Ride" in my books. That is a half of casual cruise. When I think of LONG RIDES, I think of 50+km. Which I am still pondering whether to do my 2500km trip or not. I may just buy a 500W generator to recharge my battery packs as I ride and buy some more Makita power pack battery packs. I am pretty sure I will follow through with my plans for 2500km round trip.
 
I too rode all winter long, which isn't saying too much as it tends to be quite warm but rains every day. Sometimes, we have periods of cold dryness where the moist pacific air rolls in as ice fog and condenses on the roads for a skating rink quality veneer of black ice. I used to avoid these days but I was lucky enough to score some ridiculously low priced 35c schwalbe ice spikers off of chainreactioncycles last fall and rode them through the worst of it this winter.

Today was supposed to rain hard, but it was unexpectedly nice and the cherry blossoms were out for a very enjoyable ride. Sadly, I haven't much time for recreational riding with work and family obligations, but my work commute is about 20 miles there and back, so I guess every day is a long ride for me. Most days, the drivers are polite, but today I had a yob in a pickup truck who saw me approaching and pulled right to stop and leave me 6 inches clearance with the side of the road. When I veered around his left side, I heard "use the bike lane!" I didn't care. It was a nice day and I was enjoying my ride so on I went (on the road because there was no bike lane) He had no hope of catching up anyways, as traffic can be quite backed up on this route..

Tomorrow's forecast is for 50+ mm (2 inches+) of rain, so out comes the goretex and the ghetto plastic battery cover that have faithfully seen me through a year's worth of inundations. My ride is set up with rainproofing in mind because here, if you don't ride in the rain, you simply don't ride. So far, I've rusted out two cranks and the head tube assembly over ~12K km of commuting, so I am surprised that my ebicycle electronics have survived nearly two years of these frequent drenchings unscathed.
 
I'm still off the bike for medical reasons (more caution than any real impediment at this point). Looks like I may get the OK in three more weeks. It's killing me not riding. The weather has been fantastic here.

In the meantime, I've been thinking about doing a long ride from the Phoenix area (Fountain Hills) to Los Angeles (probably Playa del Ray to be precise) and back. It is something I thought about doing long ago on a regular bike, but maybe I'll try it on an e-bike first. I'll have to do some near 100 mile days first to prove the concept. I'm thinking Fountain Hills to Wickenburg (about 80 miles one way) and back with an overnight in Wickenburg since that would probably be the first leg of my trip to the coast.
 
here in Calgary , Canada I rode 51 kilometers on Saturday.
With my 11S Nissan Leaf cells battery I dont have to worry about how much charge is still left.
 
I wouldn't consider anything under 100km/60mi long with an ebike. Maybe long in time, but not long in terms of exhausting.
30km is long however with a regular bike.
 
miro13car said:
Warren can you spare me the search and give link to your Leaf cells build?
Do you ride on 31Ah or 41Ah Leaf cells?

58.80 Volt, Lithium-Ion
Seven, 2s2p modules from a wrecked 2015
Leaf. Running a 14s BMS from EM3ev, 10
amp (charge), 60 amps (discharge)

http://www.evalbum.com/5173
 
miro13car said:
here in Calgary , Canada I rode 51 kilometers on Saturday.
With my 11S Nissan Leaf cells battery I dont have to worry about how much charge is still left.

I am in Calgary as well, what part of the city you in?
In the spring/summer/fall when I cruise around I can usually do 50km in a day.
 
Warren
your pack is built from old type of Leaf modules - 4 cell for module.
new Leaf batt modules use 8-cell modules.
Nissan introduced them in 2016.
 
markz
I am in Riverbend
everybody who walks or ride by Southland off-leash grounds regularly must have seen me for sure - yellow fenders.
I am sure there is only one such ebike in Calgary.
 
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