A year in the life of an E-trike

[voyager]

Hi Folks

In search of a near perfect E-Trike

The voyager e-trike is just coming up to a year old , This was my first real attempt in building and designing my own trike after nursing the gravel rash from the voyageur recumbent bike I built . The Voyageur a 20" front 26" rear long wheelbase recumbent had a few problems being 9 ft long it had the turning circle of an ocean going liner and the awkwardness of an extended ladder to move around the workshop , The bike rode nicely but it had to go
The seat angle was changed and to make the trike more stable the plan was to get the seat under 12 " off the ground with a shorter wheelbase and wider track to give good stability at speed , this coupled with direct drive ehub and front disc brakes gave a trike with excellent handling and good stopping power .

This was one of the first Photos of the trike on the first of the test rides down to Shoreham Beach . .
The trike is unusual as the cross boom has been dropped and the whole trike lowered by 2 inches as previously stated to get the centre of gravity as low as practical , so much so that we had to incline the front boom to eliminate heel strike with a 34" track and a 45 " wheelbase its handling can only be described as excellent
We went a little overboard on the gearing using a Thun quad chainset on the front and a 14-28 7 speed on the rear this gave us gears from 22" up to 90" and it is pedalable up to 30 mph .
The Trike was sprayed red with black trim and black seat and the original voyageur decals that I had ordered were adjusted to read voyager .
Less than a week after this photo the trike was winterised with mudguards and lights and bigger panniers..

The trike was a great success from the start but had a few niggles which were sorted along the way more of which I will describe in later posts .

So a year on the trike is still my daily local transport

more to follow

regards emma

 

[Panter]

That is absolutely stunning! Very much looking forward to reading more about it

 

[raleighnut]

Very nice, kinda what I am thinking of for my N+1. I've been looking at the KMX and then fitting it with a 7 speed 250w rear drive (Cyclotricity)
I put my current () uprong together for about a grand but I also swapped the handlebars, seatpost and forks and ended up with a better trike than the £1600 models sold commercially (for me anyway)

 

[numbnuts]

Very nice well done

 

[welsh dragon]

That looks very nice indeed. Not sure if I would like something like that though. I would think it feels a bit odd being that low to the ground, but it does look like it woild be fun. I look forward to to hearing more.

 

[steveindenmark]

Thats lovely, but it must weigh a ton ;0)

What distance can you get out of the battery?

 

[voyager]

That is absolutely stunning! Very much looking forward to reading more about it

Thanks Guys for the compliments

That looks very nice indeed. Not sure if I would like something like that though. I would think it feels a bit odd being that low to the ground, but it does look like it woild be fun. I look forward to to hearing more.

Believe it or not cars do give you a wide berth as the are uncertain about a trike

Thats lovely, but it must weigh a ton ;0)

What distance can you get out of the battery?

Here lies another tale , 12 v 12 AH batteries are unfortunately Heavy and this put the finished bare weigh up to 110lb about 53 Kg with a range of 12 miles as the 1 hour discharge rate of a 12 ah battery is ONLY 7AH and the motor setup was power hungry and the battery weigh was OVER 12 KG or 26lbs , Pedalling the beast home with a flat battery was not the easiest of tasks especially on a long hill ..

As the first weeks went by a few little niggles were audible and visible , A ticking from a front disc ( I dont like these "bumpy " discs and prefer round discs) and the brake calipers are standard MTB ones which means the mounts are different left and right unlike the later trikes that use pit bike handed calipers and the pannier bags wernt stiff enough and could make a ticking noise as the touched the spokes after a few high speed turns ..

A pair of home made mudguards were made up for the front wheels using a heat gun and formed with a piece of waste water pipe with headlamps fitted to the mudguard arms

The article on the E-Trike build was posted in the Feb 2014 Atomic Zombie Newsletter " In search of the near perfect e-trike "
The newsletter with the original article can be downloaded from here http://atomiczombie.com/NewsLetters.aspx

By the end of February I had a bit more money to throw at the project and I purchased a Lithium 10 AH battery pack and a pair of circular disc rotors

This cured the ticking disc which turned out to be a poorly manufactured disc with several burrs and the trike shed several pounds in weight , as if it had been on an superfast diet and workout when the Lithium batteries were fitted , Leaner, meaner ,faster, greener and cleaner at 82 lbs still a heavy weight but a quick , and awesome looking trike with a range of 16 -18 miles without pedalling , The only drawback is the Direct Drive motor saps a little power when the trike is under pedal power like a constant dynamo rubbing on a tyre .

( hence the 20/20 e-trike project was starting to form in my mind ) still the mods were carried out I wanted a trike that I could lift into the back of the car and take on holiday with me , and use a geared motor so the " overheads were reduced " .

With the gearing and despite being the wrong side of 60 I could still get this beast to over 29 mph ( 46kph ) on the flat , The search for the near perfect e-trike was over , Still I wanted some smaller and better , that story can be read inn the other thread.

So as Summer approached the trike was running well and joined by the newly converted AZ street e-fox for my partner a modified streetfox with disc brakes and USS .

Both trikes were now fitted with lithium packs marathon tyres , the voyager running as an everyday trike with Mudguards and lights in its winterized guise .

Summer brought out the triker in both of us and the limitations of the 20/26 trike meant we could never take the trikes on holiday with us , The new project was starting to be born

Well that's enough for now I need to dig out a few more Photos , but there are lots of info in the link above if you are interested in the build .
( sorry no photos of the gravel rash )

so Far that the first 4 months of the year and the trike having done about 500 miles without any real problems . more will follow later

regards emma

 

[voyager]

As you have probably realised by now I contribute to the Atomic Zombie Bike builders form as well as here and During March Danny came down from Essex as he was intrigued by the idea of an electric trike ( Currently he is building a trike from round tube with drum drakes ) and I met up with another Zombie
John who lives locally .
Danny came down for the day and we went out for a ride and discussed the idea of a Summer get together .

Down by Shoreham Lighthouse and the lifeboat station , Danny made the most of the trip down here and enjoyed meeting John and myself .

The idea of a camping weekend on trikes was born and in July it came to fruition with 5 of us on trikes staying in a relatively local ( for us ) campsite
The weekend was great despite a thunderstorm in the night and high temperatures during the brilliant sunny days all in all a brilliant weekend

So we have reached an abridged version of the first 6 months iin the life of an e-trike or maybe the thread should have been a year in the life of a bike building e-triker

The first two trike are mine and are the voyager and the original 20/20 , Sandman's marango and Tuula's streetfox with Danny's original streetfox on the right .
all are home/hand built trikes


regards for now emma

 

[Panter]

Fantastic, thanks for sharing those
It's done absolutely nothing to reduce my wanting of a recumbent trike though

 

[voyager]

Hi Folks
Well its July now and the 20/20 trike as you could see in the last post ( red with cream upholstery ) was finished with its original Specification and Ken enjoyed the weekend with good food , wine , and company , Ken had brought along his Guitar and played in the background both evenings .
This weekend proved that without a trailer it was not possible to take the big trikes away but the 20/20 trike fitted with ease in the back of the Mondeo .
So in August the second of the 20/20 ( all three wheels are 20" ) trikes was built and the original 20/20 had a few upgrades ,
The red 20/20 was fitted with a q100 BMS 327 rpm motor and kept its existing bottle battery but the new " stealth trike (Painted matt black and with gloss black lettering) had the original bits from the red trike , This trike even had the SLA batteries from the original voyager but weighed ina heavyweight at 100lbs and between us we could not lift it onto the roof of the car . once we fitted the spare bottle battery it lost 25 lbs and became light enough to go on the roof (, lifting a trike to head height was no mean task for two 11 stone sixty something year olds .

By now all the quirks were sorted out on the Voyager and it was running like a dream and was still

my daily runabout in the Brighton to Shoreham area being used as a car replacement and if necessary towing a trailer . .

In late August we booked our late holiday thanks to a carers grant and extra cover to allow me as a 100 hour a week carer for my mother who is in her 95th year , the second 20/20 was finished off and checked over to eliminate any problems but as most of the running gear came from the other trike the build had gone smoothly.
Both 20/20 trikes were coming with us and a caravan on the back with one trike in the boot and the other on the roof it looked like we meant business getting a few odd looks by other road users on the way ,
The 20/20 red e-trike spends a lot of time in the boot of my car now as I have run out of space the Streetfox is now " in the way" as we are using the other two trikes most of the time , I hope to sell that later on , the specification is rather specialised and requires that special type of rider that likes that sort of power. , anyway back on track the weeks holiday we had was great , with 2 e-trikes running around the quiet town of Selsey with so many comments and cheers of cool , awesome and I want one everywhere we went , The week finished so quickly it was a shame but we had to go home
Martha Reeve and the Vandellas were on at the Holiday venue the weekend we were there and we really did have a great time with really nice weather.

The English Channel on the background this is the most southerly point of Selsey Bill the pub just up the road of the same name unfortunately had closed down to become next year a supermarket so we were forced to ride on to find another Pub

After we got back Ken asked the question how easy would it be to make a dismantable trike that would fit either inside the caravan or go inside the estate along with the other one , Now that is yet another story .

Fantastic, thanks for sharing those
It's done absolutely nothing to reduce my wanting of a recumbent trike though

Why not build your own ?

regards until after the weekend for the final parts of the year

emma

 

[Panter]

Why not build your own ?

regards until after the weekend for the final parts of the year

emma

Sadly I have absolutely no DIY skills whatsoever. I struggle to make a mess by myself let alone anything constructive!

 

[ufkacbln]

That looks very nice indeed. Not sure if I would like something like that though. I would think it feels a bit odd being that low to the ground, but it does look like it woild be fun. I look forward to to hearing more.

The problems with the height are a myth that can only be disproved by riding one

 

[voyager]

The problems with the height are a myth that can only be disproved by riding one

I must agree there Remember a trike is much bigger than a council wheelie bin and people don't keep running these over in the road

Ride and see for yourself

Continuing


So now we have come to the end of September , During the holiday we sketched up a few Ideas and came back refreshed and read to start again ....... ,

The Transportable had been designed a little while ago ( but not as a totally dismantable trike but had the ability to remove the front pedal boom
BUT ( l like a but sometimes ) it was not without its little opportunities but with a few mods the new trike was rideable in October Now with Under Seat steering and disc brakes all round . , Well we could add a electric motor was the next idea , but that comes later, ( I must admit it would be sensible to add a motor , with my health not being 100% ( I am a diabetic with high blood pressure and I have diverticulitis which flares up without warning )
an e-assist is a sensible option .

Still there is still a month left in the year ...

The thread on AZ on the trike is ....
http://forum.atomiczombie.com/showt...antable-transportable?highlight=transportable

Having lost an hour of Daylight the voyager was refitted with Cree front lights and a single rear light on a repaired bracket that I damaged whist reversing the trike into a fence and is still in use with over a 1000 miles of fun in the past 11 months .

more to follow

regards emma

 

[voyager]

Hi Folks
Before we conclude the final month of November a couple of more photos
The e-shopper project was completed in October and the Cree Lights were fitted on the voyager , from the photo you can see its much the same as last year with its lithium battery upgrade and circular disc rotors

The e-shopper project was a quickie project thrown in for good measure , The hubs were on special offer at chain reaction for under £35 delivered

and today the first of November after Lunch we had a ride on the e-trikes from Peacehaven along the busy A259 dropping down to the esplanade and along the underpass to the Cafe at Ovingdean for a well earned cup of tea ( we had been working hard today chopping wood and tidying the garage all morning )

and home before the darkness descends on us at 16:45 .

 

[voyager]

Hi Folks

As you can see a lot has happened since the design of the Voyager , I sold my original T rex tadpole this was due to a number of reasons that could just be described as a bad design , The trike had an awful design for the wheel pivots and having rim brakes did not stop and would have taken more time to modify it than build another

The Trex I owned for 8 months and despite all the little opportunities it was my first tadpole , I fitted the e-conversion after a few months as my health was not good , The e-assist allowed me to use the trike as everyday transport rather than the car and slowly my health improved .

The T rex gave me the background learning experience I needed to build the Voyager removing all the bad points and adding disc brakes and under seat steering . Fitting pannier bags even helped to reduce the centre of gravity making a " leaner , meaner , faster and cleaner , greener trike the almost perfect e-trke and adding mudguards to stop the high speed water wash that came off the uncovered front wheels in a turn on wet roads .
Originally these were made from sliced pieces of waste pipe reformed using a heat gun but later as they distorted due to the internal stresses of thermal plastics were replaced by the mudguards from an old 20" shopper bike and sprayed matt black.

In the background is the streetfox built from the Atomic Zombie Plan before we modified it for electric power fitting Under Seat Steering and front disc brakes

So what have I learnt so far , The choice of the DD motor was not the best choice that I have ever made, the geared motors are more human power efficient and lighter . You sometimes make mistakes to learn but overall I am happy with the trike and its performance.

The BMS range of motors and batteries are good value for money but the carriage costs are high if you order a complete wheel .

The 20/26 trikes are smoother to ride than the 20/20 although I love them both I find the 20 /26 more fun to ride . So what is next for the rest of the month ,

That we are going to have to wait and see . Things are on order and the next few weeks depend on what arrives first ......

regards emma