Cop proof throttle

andreashb

10 mW
Joined
Jul 21, 2017
Messages
24
Hi,

I have tried to find answer to this problem for a long time.
In my country I am not allowed to use another throttle than a PAS sensor. Using something like a twist throttle would be seen as using a moped (the bike can only provide motor power when you are pedalling.).

Here is my plan:

I will use a pas sensor which is limited to 250w with a potentiometer, when I flip a switch a throttle can be used which will give 3000w power. I have solved the problem with a hidden switch, but now I have to hide the throttle in a way. I am thinking of having a thumb throttle where I can remove the throttle switch which will only leave a "box" on my handlebar (I don't know if this is even possible), then I can just pull out the throttle if a cop stops me and he won't notice it. I am also thinking of having some kind of throttle lock for twist throttle. It would stop the throttle from moving, and it would seem like an ordinary grip if I want it to (except from the cables running from it, but I will hide those as best as possible.

Does anyone have a way to solve this problem? :D
 
remote controlled twis trottle.... LIke the one for the Boosted board.
Hide it in you sleeve and connect it to your thumb with a wire.

Or take something like a gearshilf and wire the cable to a hidden throttle or something.

Or simply hide small a potentiometer somewhere on you bike....

I've been wondering at about a solution like that too. I`m in NYC and they will possibly make PAS bike legal here, but not thumb throttle...
 
Matador said:
remote controlled twis trottle.... LIke the one for the Boosted board.
Hide it in you sleeve and connect it to your thumb with a wire.

Or take something like a gearshilf and wire the cable to a hidden throttle or something.

Or simply hide small a potentiometer somewhere on you bike....

I've been wondering at about a solution like that too. I`m in NYC and they will possibly make PAS bike legal here, but not thumb throttle...

What do you mean by: "Hide it in you sleeve and connect it to your thumb with a wire." ?

Using a half twist throttle and modificate it using a gearshilf aint that stupid! That way it won't look illegal at first atleast.

Using a small potentiometer is not that safe unless it is spring loaded. My bike has max speed of 72km/t so you wont feel safe using one arm and turning the small potentiometer back and forth :lol:
 
Alan B said:
Another option to consider is using force instead of motion. Strain gauges can measure pressure or force on things that don't move.
Can you give an example of a use for this? I think like pushing a button hard would make riding it worse
 
It would be fairly easy to make a grip shifter into a throttle so it still looks like a shifter. Maybe same with a paddle shifter.
 
One example that has been done was for braking rather than throttle, I recall Arlo doing this. A brake lever is blocked so it cannot move. The strain gauge is applied and the harder the brake is pulled, the more regen/electric braking current is applied to the motor.

On a regular hydraulic brake the adjustment is mostly force rather than motion. There is a little motion, but it is the force that determines the braking rather than the movement.

Strain gauges have very small signals, they are basically very small resistors that change value with tiny motions from the material bending slightly that they are epoxied to. A strain gauge amplifier takes the small signal and makes it into something useable. For example electronic scales use them to measure weight.

To use it for a throttle one could measure force on something being pushed by the thumb. It could be part of the mounting for a brake or a bell that looked like nothing special and did not move. It would measure thumb pressure and generate a throttle signal. Full throttle could be a fairly low pressure so the thumb would not get tired, similar to that of a regular thumb throttle's force.

A twist force measuring throttle could be made. It would be like a regular twist throttle but nothing would actually move. The strain gauge would measure the twisting force on the tube. With the right design one might be able to measure twisting force on the handlebars themselves but it would be easier if the twisting forces were separated from the other handlebar forces. To measure twisting force in the handlebar itself separately from forward/back/up/down cantilever forces would be tricky.
 
as you know, on legal EU bikes (same for the US I guess), there is a walk assist mode which allow the motor to run up to 6 kph without PAS engagement.

So, another solution would be to leave the throttle in place but have the ability to reprogram the controller on the fly to limit throttle engagement & max speed to 6 kPh to act as a "proportional :lol: " walk-assist button.
You could also at the same time set a current limit & max assist speed to be fully legal.

The only thing missing would be the road certification of the vehicle, but I bet most cops don't know that...
 
If I had to do something stealth, I'd go the hall route.

Glue/sew/epoxy a magnet inside some "special riding" glove(s) in between the web of your finger & thumb, glue a hall sensor inside a dummy grip shifter. The shifter is a good excuse to have what looks like a cable or hose coming out of it, you would be using a 3 conductor so more stealth.

Figure out exactly how far away the magnet can be and still effect the hall. Setup the glove to work when your hand is right next to the grip shifter and when 1" further away the mag has no effect.

After a few tests clocking or rotating the hall sensor hidden in the grip shifter should give you one comfortable spot where your wrist is flat and the hall is producing a nominal safe cruising speed. More or less speed from there would just be a twist of the wrist in either direction.

It will only work for your specially made glove and for the most part is wireless and has no visible switches.

The same could be done with a mag on the end of your thumb as well.
 
andreashb said:
Alan B said:
Another option to consider is using force instead of motion. Strain gauges can measure pressure or force on things that don't move.
Can you give an example of a use for this? I think like pushing a button hard would make riding it worse

I'm pretty sure F-16 flight stick controls use a strain gauge. While there is some motion in the stick, the input varies mostly on how hard you try to force the stick.
 
2WheelsMovesTheSoul said:
If I had to do something stealth, I'd go the hall route.

Glue/sew/epoxy a magnet inside some "special riding" glove(s) in between the web of your finger & thumb, glue a hall sensor inside a dummy grip shifter. The shifter is a good excuse to have what looks like a cable or hose coming out of it, you would be using a 3 conductor so more stealth.

Figure out exactly how far away the magnet can be and still effect the hall. Setup the glove to work when your hand is right next to the grip shifter and when 1" further away the mag has no effect.

After a few tests clocking or rotating the hall sensor hidden in the grip shifter should give you one comfortable spot where your wrist is flat and the hall is producing a nominal safe cruising speed. More or less speed from there would just be a twist of the wrist in either direction.

It will only work for your specially made glove and for the most part is wireless and has no visible switches.

The same could be done with a mag on the end of your thumb as well.


Best idea yet. A hall sensor glued somewhere and a magnet in your glove. Can't get much more stealth!
 
I like this idea very much, it would be easy to use the same gloves each time ...better yet have two sets of gloves one for warm weather and one set for cold weather.

I would do it a little differently, I would not use the motion of a throttle since that puts strain on your wrist as it is now.
How would you design it so that the magnet is on your first finger and the closer it comes to the sensor the faster the speed, the further away the slower the speed until you stop, this has the benefit of when reaching for the brake the motor slows and when your hand is at/on the brake lever , the motor stops.

I would like to see example of this.






2WheelsMovesTheSoul said:
If I had to do something stealth, I'd go the hall route.

Glue/sew/epoxy a magnet inside some "special riding" glove(s) in between the web of your finger & thumb, glue a hall sensor inside a dummy grip shifter. The shifter is a good excuse to have what looks like a cable or hose coming out of it, you would be using a 3 conductor so more stealth.

Figure out exactly how far away the magnet can be and still effect the hall. Setup the glove to work when your hand is right next to the grip shifter and when 1" further away the mag has no effect.

After a few tests clocking or rotating the hall sensor hidden in the grip shifter should give you one comfortable spot where your wrist is flat and the hall is producing a nominal safe cruising speed. More or less speed from there would just be a twist of the wrist in either direction.

It will only work for your specially made glove and for the most part is wireless and has no visible switches.

The same could be done with a mag on the end of your thumb as well.
 
I do not think there is any law that forbids to use a grip that can be turned, but does not do anything. Add a secret switch or a jumper that disables the throttle function, so that only PAS is left to activate your motor. Tell the cop that you used the throttle grip to test the motor in your basement where you installed it, as you cant pedal there obviously. But when the testing was finished, you disconnected it. That was last week, and you have not found the time to remove the dysfunctional throttle grip yet.
I don't think you will go to jail for that.
 
andreashb said:
Does anyone have a way to solve this problem? :D


They sell grip mounted pressure switch throttles that could be mounted on the underside of the bars / grip for stealth and activated by finger pressure
 
There are pressure-sensitive potentiometers available for a few bucks. Here's an example:

https://www.adafruit.com/product/178

Adhere it to the handlebar next to the grip, hook up your 3-wire throttle cable to it, and you can control your speed with your thumb. You can also replace the original 3-wire throttle cable with a white or black 3-wire flat ribbon cable glued to your rear brake cable to make things harder to spot. Use a bit of epoxy or bondo to make the sensor and flat wires flush to the handlebar surface, apply some paint to match the rest of the handlebar, and it will be nearly impossible to see your modification. As with the above hall-sensor solution, when you grab the brake you'll automatically be off the throttle. Plus there are no "special" gloves required - a definite plus on those hot summer days!
 
I think it would be fun to gut a bicycle bell and replace the innards of the bell with those of a thumb throttle.
 
wturber said:
I think it would be fun to gut a bicycle bell and replace the innards of the bell with those of a thumb throttle.

That's actually a pretty good idea. You could even drill a small hole in the bars to hide the wire. If done properly, it could still function as a bell too.
 
The bell is a great idea! It would be really simple to use an optical encoder or strain gauge with some signal level conversion to output the required 0-5V control signal.

I should voice this concern that the cops won't be looking for the throttle as grounds to cite you. If a cyclist is riding 20 mph or better on level ground without pedaling like mad, it's a reasonable assumption they are not using PAS. You probably should keep pedaling, even while using the throttle.

In California the law requires pedal assist only from 20-28 mph, so I normally run with a 20 mph cap. But with the flip of a switch I can disable the cap - I still use the throttle, and with a high-ratio gear the pedaling is effortless.
 
JimOkam said:
The bell is a great idea! It would be really simple to use an optical encoder or strain gauge with some signal level conversion to output the required 0-5V control signal.

I was thinking more on the lines of just relocating the innards or a thumb throttle to the inside of a bell. But sure, whatever works for you given your particular technical capabilities and curiosity.

And I agree. I suspect most cops will be more interested in rider behaviors than bike configurations.
 
How about using a momentary push button? There must be a way to hotwire the signal wire with the positive 5v wire on the throttle. I do have a bike which uses this type of push button to activate the motor. It only runs on 24 volts, so it max speed is not an issue, as it would be if it were a high powered bike.

The other method probably would be to turn on cruise functionality somehow.
 
https://www.electricbike.com/lightest-bike/

I'd really want to see the inside of that bell !
 

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In most countries that strictly enforce the 250W EN 15194 standard where the throttle is not allowed, there is nothing you can do to get around it.

The second and if not more important part of this standard is having a 250W motor or a motor that is expected to be around 250W expected size and weight, so you have a 3000W motor that is going to be more obvious than a little throttle on your ebike.
This also applies to the battery size and the weight of the entire ebike.
The EN 15194 standard encompasses all these rules based on destroying all these sneak ideas people try to think up from the very beginning, the EN 15194 standard was thought up by engineers in the first place to void the ability of circumvention, they knew folks would try this kind of sneak stuff.

In other words, if the cops want to get you and punish you for having a non-standard EN 15194, there is absolutely nothing you can do to avoid it.
This kind of notion doesn't really fool them anymore.
ZomboMeme 27082017224114aaaa.jpg
 
I don`t think the point is thread is to try to hide a 10+ kW motor with pedal. Just to be able to use throttle only mode with a small motor. BTW Even a 1000W can look as small as a 250W one, but the 750 added watts make a big difference for speed and torque.
 
You can always use aero wheel covers to hide a big hub motor. Probably gain a few mph in the process too. Mine is covered by a rear mudguard and panniers. But if you really need to get around faster than the 20 mph limit all the time, perhaps you'd be better off with a motorcycle or scooter?

I think this is more about the jurisdictions where throttles are banned. Government should be allowed to set standards for public safety, but stay out of the areas of personal choice. If you can pedal to achieve 20 or 28 mph, you should be able to use a throttle.
 
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