electric adult tricycle in new york state

[jason41987]

hey everyone, i have parents that live in new york state, and getting around their rather small town is getting to be very expensive for them, so i was thinking of building them an electric 3 wheeled bike for daily transportation around town...

so, obviously, the first thing i did was look into whether or not it was financially feasible, and year, i can get a nice tricycle, motor, and other conversion parts for a decent price, easily capable of the 30mph city speed limit...

then i looked at state laws, because if i do it, it has to be legal.. and i came across a law saying electric assisted bicycles are illegal... so i looked into the state definition of electric assisted bicycle and it says any bicycle that is able to be pedaled, and can travel no more than 20mph with under 1000 watt motor is considered an electric assisted bicycle... whether its two wheels or three

well.. obviously this doesnt apply to me because i was looking for a 30mph top speed, and also, my parents arent healthy enough to actually pedal, so my idea was to remove the pedals entirely, and make it a straight up electric bike....

so my question is, since this is not an electrically assisted bicycle, and therefor not illegal under those terms... then what is it? what would this thing be considered as, and what kind of equipment am i going to need to make this thing legal... my guess is it would need to have a headlight and turn signals, good brakes (im not sure what kind of brakes are considered suitable for this), and ill probably have to get it registered as a moped, abiding by the states moped laws of a 30mph top speed limit

so could anyone with more in depth knowledge or experience on this subject lend some advice as to if i really would have to get this registered as a moped, and what the criteria for that is? id like to go with a 3 wheeled tricycle, but it would be nice if i could have something with some kind of a suspension to it... i know many modern bicycles have suspensions to them.. so i may consider converting one of these if the trike idea is a bad one

so.. advice? suggestions?

 

[Ykick]

AFAIK eBikes in NYS are technically illegal although in and around NYC they don't seem to bother us much. Read up here:

http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=27651

Trouble with attempting to establish moped status is that you'll likely need DOT approved lights, tires and most likely a VIN.

Perhaps there's a mobility scooter argument to be made for aging parents but a 30 MPH mobility scooter? Good luck!

 

[HAROX]

.

 

[Chalo]

...i can get a nice tricycle, motor, and other conversion parts for a decent price, easily capable of the 30mph city speed limit...

Most trikes qualify for deathtrap status at something less than 30mph. The ones that don't are too low-slung for most old people to get in and out of routinely.

Two-wheelers are better by far for neighborhood street speeds. If that doesn't work for them, think golf cart/LSV/NEV. Something along those lines must be registerable in NY.

Chalo

 

[grindz145]

I would be careful with some of those trike's (eg non-recumbent) and high speeds. Make sure they have a stupid amount of trail, they might otherwise be really twitchy at high speeds

 

[dogman dan]

Best advice, in a place like NY you need to look exactly like a regular bike. This is difficult for regular adult trikes because the easy way to convert one is a very obvious front hub.

Adult trikes are best kept below 15 mph, where steering is still effective. Cornering even slower. Recumbent trikes are different.

Basicly, your plan is screwed. But there used to be Izip trikes, or other trikes that used a chain drive motor on the rear, had slow speeds, and might fly under the radar. It just depends on the local cops. Here, if you ride like a human being instead of a jackass, you'd get ignored.

My guess is that if the motor is not obvious, and speeds are slow and they aren't riding the wrong side of the street, your folks could get away with it.

 

[Chalo]

I would be careful with some of those trike's (eg non-recumbent) and high speeds. Make sure they have a stupid amount of trail, they might otherwise be really twitchy at high speeds

Exactly 100% wrong! Sorry, but this advice is set to hurt someone.

Trail is for single track vehicles. It's the lever by which the bike is able to steer itself back underneath you wen you start to tip over. A good bike does most of the balancing for you, as long as you're moving, and trail is the "handle" it uses to do that.

Trikes, in my extensive experimental observation, need very low trail values. Trail does at least two bad things to trike handling, without being able to do the trick of keeping the trike underneath you (because the trike does not lean). One bad thing is that it causes frame drop when the front end is turned, which supplies an energy source for wheel flop and violent corkscrew turns that will dump you off the outside. The other bad thing is that it forms a lever whose influence is to steer the front end towards the outside of a turn, powered by centrifugal forces.

At any single combination of slope and steering angle, there is a particular speed at which these two evils cancel each other out. But change any of these three variables, and they don't cancel anymore. The result is that you have a vehicle that steers wide at high speed, tries to bite its tail at low speed, radically changes its behavior (not just its direction) as you turn the bars, and basically wants to pitch you off all the time.

About the same time that trail (self steering lever length) diminishes to zero, frame drop also goes to zero. The trike won't self-stabilize, but then it didn't do that before either. The main thing is, it won't strongly self-destabilize. The only reason I avoid going to a true zero trail value on a trike is that uneven surfaces and bumps cause trail reversals in that case, and I'd rather deal with small amounts of positive trail than alternating positive and negative trail, just because it's more familiar to my instincts. But however you do it, the trail has to be small, because that's the tool the trike uses to wrench itself out of your control.

The moral of the story is twofold: Steering trail is good for a two-wheeler but bad for a three-wheeler. And this is yet another reason why trikes are generally not good for going fast.

On a related note (but not closely related, because I don't know anything about the Reliant Robin's steering geometry), here's a bit of comic relief:

[youtube]QQh56geU0X8[/youtube]

Chalo

 

[HAROX]

:lol:

 

[jason41987]

might be easier then to get pay $50 on a moped that no longer works, scrap the drivetrain and make it electric.. then id have a VIN and everything else needed to simply register as a moped, as long as it wasnt capable of more than 30mph, it would be legal

 

[dogman dan]

Or, horrors, just get them a good working gas moped. Surely you can modify it to trike somehow? Maybe even modify the gearing too, so they only have 20 mph speed. Sure the EV is a more aestheticly pleasing vehicle, but a gas moped is still very cheap. I believe you can now get them in 4 stroke, so it isn't mandatory for it to stink and smoke.