Nishiki Electrification

[ArthurH]

Hello, I've been lurking for a while but decided to take some pictures since I had to bring it in for a nasty puncture repair. This is my first functional ebike. I've got a nuvinci hub to go on it when my new rims finally arrive. May strip and paint the frame too.

Frame with some components purchased from The Pedal Depot in Vancouver BC summer 2013. The next summer I swapped the Ezee hub (used) with a friend for a new Rhyno Lite rim, fixed a dead controller (5V regulator failed) and replaced one of the BMC balancing transistors which had failed in a short. The battery pack is not doing so well, I'm getting maybe 6Ah if I baby it.

The rear lights are from Grin Tech. I'm using the turn signal wiring on the outside lights, center brake light power is wired to my ebrake lever (geared front hub means no regen short of some major modification so it's just a brake light for now).



Awesome forum folks, best luck on your builds.

cheers,

Arthur

 

[amberwolf]

Bike itself looks a fair bit like my Nishik-E base bike:
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=33246
which I haven't gotten electrificamotorated yet (custom BB drive or Kepler eboost, when I get around to it).

FWIW, if you have combo brake/shifters you can still use them even with ebrakes, by adding a reed switch to the lever or cable instead (search on Reed and there's a number of threads and posts to show you how). That way you don't end up depending on the cheap (often junk) ebrake lever at some critical moment when you have to pull it really hard. You also don't need to worry about whether the ebrake lever's mechanical advantage is correct for your type of brakes.

 

[BikeFanatic]

Nice build Arthur ! The turn signal are something you wired yourself, home brew turn
Signals? Or did the turning signals come as a kit?
Some times I think I would get more respect on the road if I added indicators.

 

[ArthurH]

@amberwolf Nice Nishiki! I see your front fork matches the frame. I've always wondered about how my fork+handlebar combo came to be on there, I have not seen other Nishiki's with the same setup... I'll be ditching the brake levers and shifters when I get that N360 on there. Will modify a pair of Avid FR-5 levers and post the results.

@BikeFanatic Thx! The turn signals are rejects from a run done last summer by Grin tech. The LED's are orange which is great but the epoxy cured poorly so the surface finish is lumpy and in some spots still tacky/slightly soft. As for the wiring, it's kinda-stock; http://www.ebikes.ca/documents/RearLEDLight_Signal_Wiring.pdf has the details of how it's done, basically there's a signal line on the light, when you get the version that has the long, unterminated wiring harness. (the version with the DC barrel jack has just the power wires coming out of the epoxy-cast body).

As for the effectiveness of turn signals on a bicycle... as they're only visible from behind (for now) I feel silly sticking my arm out and signalling to let oncoming traffic know I'm making a left. I have a waterproof toggle switch on either side of the handle bars to toggle flashing/solid for the respective side. This is about as convenient as it's going to get I suppose. Over the summer I'll have some more time and make molds to cast indicators for the ends of the handlebars so we'll see how that goes. If that doesn't turn out well I could attach lighting to handlebar wind guards...

 

[amberwolf]

There's a lot of types of LED motorcycle and scooter lights out there, some of which are really easy to mount to various parts of a bicycle, with a little DIY bracket-work.

And you can also install LEDs into incandescent types.

If you look at my CrazyBike2 thread you'll see a few different ways I've done them over the years. DayGlo Avenger has had it's own DIY ones, as well as scooter/MC ones, and my Flatbed Kennel Trailer MkIII has some on there that were incandescent MC types, and I've installed Fluval aquarium LEDs into them (and it's using a MC LED taillight).

Others have done much better-looking stuff (check out Kingfish's bikes, for one example).