Cycle9.com » Electric Assist

Super Bright Ebike Lights – Go By Bike Episode 42

elise — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 18:16:46 +0000

New ebike headlights are in!

Part of my ride home is over dark country roads with no overhead lights, so having a bright headlight is key. We recently got in new ebike headlights that are powered directly from your ebike battery and are SUPER bright. Check out this new video showing the new light.

You can find this light in our online store at under the Electric a-la-cart section

Ride On!

-Elise

Go By Bike is a daily video series that talks about how to be green by riding more and using your car less, including electric bikes, electric kits, cargo bikes, bike safety, and getting motivated to bike

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Don’t Sweat the Heat! Go By Bike Episode 39

elise — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 18:28:21 +0000

It’s Summer in the South!

We’re well into summer now with scorching hot 90+ days, humidity, afternoon thundershowers and the like. Are you still biking? Here’s one thing I was thinking about (and very grateful for) on the last 100 degree day….

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The Stoked Big Dummy – Go By Bike Episode 18

elise — Tue, 11 May 2010 01:33:58 +0000

Up close and personal – the Big Dummy with Stokemonkey

Now together again, two classics of the cargo biking world: Surly’s Big Dummy cargo bike and the Stokemonkey from Clever Chimp. Both of these products first emerged on the cargo biking scene in spring of 2008. Both sold out by mid-summer and were unavailable for awhile, building anticipation. Now both are available in new and improved forms.

Check them out here for an up close and personal view of how the stokemonkey works with it’s friend, the Big Dummy. If you’re in our area, come by the shop for a test ride – we have one set up and all ready to go.

- Elise

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The BionX Ebike conversion – Go By Bike Episode 16

elise — Wed, 05 May 2010 15:31:34 +0000

BionX kit “reads your mind”

In this episode of Go By Bike I show the BionX ebike conversion kit and talk about how it works.

Find the BionX hub motor kit here:

http://www.cycle9.com/c9store/electric-bicycle-kits-c-5/bionx-pl-350-rear-hub-motor-kit-p-48

-Elise

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Does your battery have a memory? – Go By Bike Episode 10

elise — Tue, 27 Apr 2010 18:37:29 +0000

How do you take care of a battery?

In today’s episode of Go By Bike, I talk about one of the most common myths of ebike batteries – the idea of battery memory. How do you take care of a battery and is it necessary to discharge it all the way sometimes? Listen in for an important lesson that could help you avoid costly battery damage.

-Elise

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E-Madsen is now my car – Go By Bike Episode 1

elise — Wed, 14 Apr 2010 15:56:26 +0000

Introducing my Daily Video Series – Go By Bike!

Today is my inaugural video of my NEW daily video series – Go By Bike! I started this series to talk about how to ride more and use your car less, including electric bikes, electric kits, cargo bikes, bike safety, and getting motivated to bike. Using your car less reduces your carbon footprint, saves energy, helps the environment, keeps you healthy, and makes your community a nicer place to live, so overall most people would agree it’s a good thing.

In today’s episode of Go By Bike, I show you how I set up my bicycle to carry 3 kids on my morning (and afternoon) commute. This may seem like a lot to carry, but I keep it fun, easy and practical. Check out my daily ride below…

What’s your daily commute vehicle? Post a comment and let me know.

Over and out…..

-Elise

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The electric mountain!

Morgan Giddings — Tue, 16 Feb 2010 18:15:20 +0000

Recently I got hold of a new e-bike drive system to test out on my cargo and kid carrying Surly Big Dummy.

The motivation is that for myself and many out there using cargo/sports utes, we sometimes have big loads strapped to our bikes, and in a place like Chapel Hill, big hills to climb with them.

That taxes the standard electric bike hub motor system. Some can handle it, but constantly pushing their limits may ultimately lead to failure. ( the same can be said for one’s legs – which is why I use a an electric assist on my cargo bike).

One solution to this problem has been the Stokemonkey. Instead of a hub motor, it uses the bike’s existing drivetrain – and gears. So, when you’re climbing a hill with it and you shift into a lower gear to give your legs a break, you’re giving the motor a break too. This increases overall system efficiency, and motor/battery system longevity.

But there have been two limitations to the Stokemonkey: limited supply (it is produced in small batches by our supplier in Portland, Or), and it only fits on Xtracycle-style cargo bikes.

A few brave designers have tried to crack this same nut with a system that doesn’t require an Xtracycle style frame.

The first was the Cyclone. I don’t have any experience with that system, but have heard certain things that have put me off from trying it – mainly that the installation is very involved.

Now comes the Electric Mountain Drive from the folks at Ecospeed (also from Oregon!).

The Electric Mountain Drive system

It is another electric assist system that uses the bike’s own drivetrain, benefiting from the gearing on the bike to reduce motor strain and increase climbing ability.

I’ve been using it for about two weeks now, so this review is only preliminary.

Here are some benefits of the system:

Because it uses the bike’s drivetrain, it can handle steep hills without strain (if I shift into the right gear)
It mounted to the frame in a relatively straightforward manner
It uses a standard electric bike brushless motor controller, so when the first one died (a note on that later), I was able to swap in an Infineon controller we had in the shop
Using only a 36 Volt battery with a controller consuming 20 amps, the bike can achieve powered speeds of up to 25mph+ (depending on headwind and hills). Most of the hub motors I’ve tested – even the high speed ones – can’t do this on only 36V 20A system. For me those would top out around 22mph on the flats, pulling maximum amps.
Its installation wasn’t too difficult, and the instructions were very detailed.

For certain kinds of applications such as steep hills to climb on a cargo bike without a spot to put a Stokemonkey, this appears to be THE solution.

But it does have a few drawbacks to be aware of:

It is somewhat noisy. It is not louder than the cars on the road – but not a lot quieter, either. I like to operate in “stealth” mode on my local bike path so as to not get any of the other users upset that I’m using electric assist. It is hard to do with the EMD, unless I just entirely leave the electric off. That’s fine… except for that I’m usually in a hurry (note: I never, ever use the electric assist to exceed 20 mph on the bike path, and I always slow down for other users – doing otherwise would not only be rude, but would likely land me in trouble). Also, the way it mounts on the bike makes it more obvious that the bike has some kind of motor attached.
I found the overall system efficiency to be disappointing – which means that I can’t travel as far on a single battery charge. When I used the eZee hub motor, I typically got 18 watt hours per mile or better (at 36V). That meant I could do a 20 mile roundtrip with my 10 amp hour battery. With the EMD system, I’m getting at best 24 watt hours per mile, reducing the range to around 15 miles. I think there are three factors causing this: a) It uses a chain/gear system with a oneway clutch that may loose energy; b) Some energy may be lost in my Nuvinci continuous variable transmission; c) it is easy to go too fast with the system, which always sucks down juice very fast (any speed over 20mph on an e-bike is usually quite inefficient). I’ve tried to keep the speed low, and still had poor efficiency. At some point, I’ll try it out on a bike with a regular rear transmission using cassette and derailleur, to see whether that makes any difference.
The first controller fried within only 1/2 hour of operation. It turns out that the motor and controller are made by BMC. BMC makes decent motors… but their controllers have a not so good reputation for reliability (we won’t sell them anymore after a failure rate of over 50%). We replaced it with an Infineon, which has worked well so far (an is in general a very reliable controller). To their credit, Ecospeed did send us a new controller right away, and it is a different design. But it is still made by BMC. I think I’ll keep the Infineon for now.
It requires a bike with a circular downtube – the tube from the handlebars down to the pedals (many bikes these days have ovalized downtubes). And, once installed, it does protrude down a bit.

Another attribute I noted that is neither plus nor minus is that to optimally use this motor, I had to get in the habit of shifting the bike appropriately. This requires letting off the throttle a bit, doing a rapid shift, then getting back on the throttle. At first it was a bit clunky for me – but just like learning to drive with a clutch and gearshift, once I picked it up, it worked well. I have come to enjoy the challenge of shifting properly through an acceleration cycle to get up to speed.

Bottom line: The EMD will be a perfect solution for people who have big/long hills to climb, and provides a worthwhile alternative to the Stokemonkey, especially if the latter isn’t available or if it won’t fit on your bike.

My assessment is that hub motors will be better for the person who has moderate hills, long distances, or is concerned about noise. Since I fall in several of the latter categories, I’m likely to return back to a hub motor system at some point.

3 Mistakes in Ebike Purchases

elise — Fri, 05 Feb 2010 19:59:48 +0000

Finding an ebike or kit can be a challenge in today’s environment. Everyone claims their kits and bikes are great, but how do you really know? If you research ebike kits on popular forums, like endless-sphere or V is for Voltage, you’ll get a wide variety of opinions, often conflicting. These forums are great and have a lot of useful information, but trying to sort the wheat from the chaff, so to speak, can be a real challenge!

When I was researching electric kits, I know how much work it took and how difficult it was to know who to trust. That’s why I decided to have an open door policy on questions, and make sure we provided the best information and answers we could, not just representing one vendor or brand of ebike or kit. I’ve had people ask all kinds of questions, both people buying their first kits, as well as those buying a second or third kit. Here are 3 common mistakes or misconceptions I’ve found many people to have.

1. Putting a front motor on a suspension fork

This is usually a big mistake. Most suspension forks are made out of cast aluminum materials. The aluminum is strong, but not flexible, and can be brittle. A rotating front hub motor puts a lot of stress at the fork dropout – the little U shapes in the fork that hold the wheel to the fork. Under this kind of stress, the drop outs can crack and break, causing your wheel to no longer be attached to your bike. You can imagine the consequences of this, especially if it occurs at high speed. If you are thinking of converting a bike with front suspension forks, it is recommended to go with a rear wheel motor.

Fortunately, steel is a more flexible material and less likely to break under stress. So putting a front motor on a steel fork is perfectly acceptable. I recommended adding a torque arm to these forks, which translates some of the rotational force to the fork arm, and not just the drop-out. With a steel fork, torque arm, and proper installation, a front motor is often a great solution, and results in a bike with “all wheel drive”.

2. Assuming a pre-built electric bike is higher quality than an electric kit

Many people in the market for electric bikes often assume that a bike that is made as an electric bike at the factory will be superior to an electric conversion kit. While ebikes are great solutions for some people (which is why we carry them), for some people, an electric kit could be the best.

The main differences between ebikes and ebike kits are in performance and style. Ebikes have the advantage of being designed around the electric system, so often come with built-in battery compartments, and low-profile, stylish designs. The ebike kits, however, are not integrated into your bike, so batteries are often carried on a rear rack in a pannier or bag, which some people don’t like, and there is additional wiring to run along your frame. One exception is the Bionx kit, which is well designed to fit very cleanly and look great on bikes with a triangular frame.

Another main difference between ebikes and ebike kits is in performance. Because ebikes are sold as a complete unit, they are often powered on the low end to comply with any potential laws about bike speed, and also to protect the companies from a liability perspective. Most ebikes top out at 15-18mph and provide pedaling assistance on hills, but won’t be able to propel you and the bike uphill on their own. Many riders can achieve 15-18mph under their own power, so the electric assist only helps on hills. (Sometimes that is all we need!). Ebike kits, however, are often higher power. Many of them have a top speed of 20-30mph, and have more climbing power. These kits are better performing for the rider who is looking for speed or who is carrying a heavy load.

And lastly, for some of the less expensive pre-built ebikes, the non-electric bike components are often of low quality, just like you would have on inexpensive regular bikes. This might be fine for the user who only rides the bike occasionally, but if you’re planning on using the bike regularly, you don’t want to pay a lot of money for a bike, only to have it start breaking and having to have parts replaced after a year of use. If you are in the market for an ebike, make sure you check out the bike component quality as well as the electric system, and be prepared to pay a little more to get something quality. Or consider converting a quality non-electric bike using a conversion kit.

3. Buying a kit that is overpowered

Because most people do not have a chance to ride an ebike or ebike kit before purchasing, I find that many people want to get the highest powered kit that is available. When you aren’t sure if you can get up that particular hill you have in mind (which might be steep or long), it is natural to want to get the most powerful kit to ensure you have enough oomph. However, in many cases, the most powerful kit is overkill and you end up spending too much money and carrying around more battery or motor weight that is necessary.

An illustration of this phenomenon is what we saw with our BMC motors. First, BMC had a V1 motor (a “400watt ” motor) which is internally geared and has great hill climbing ability. Compared to pedaling up a hill without a motor, the V1 makes it so you can pedal moderately, as you would on the flats, and still climb up the hill. This was great and many people were excited.

Then along came the V2 motor, which was even higher powered (“600W”). This motor is for people who want high speed or high torque applications. It’s main advantage is being able to handle more power. This was fabulous and everyone thought it was “top of the line” and the best motor for xyz. The high speed motor is capable of speeds over 30mph even (that’s FAST for a bike). Everyone was happy until…

BMC comes out with the V3 motor, which is supposed to be a 1000W motor. Now everyone is asking about this motor – is it better than the V2? Is that what I need? The problem with these higher powered motors is that in order to take advantage of the extra power, you need a BIG battery. Because they tend to be battery hogs. And big batteries are pricey and can be heavy. And most batteries simply don’t last as long when putting out the high currents needed by these high-power motors.

By all means, if you are looking for very high speed, carrying a cargo trailer with 500 lbs of gear, or climbing 30%+ grades, then go for a high powered motor that can handle these applications. But if you are commuting with yourself and a 20lb briefcase, then you might not need to fork out that extra dough. The standard eZee kit at 36V, for example, is an incredible performer, and will easily tackle just about any hill, even on loaded cargo bikes, and is relatively lightweight. If you compare it to riding your bike unassisted, you’ll be blown away by its performance. (If you compare it to a sports car, however…well then you might be disappointed. )

If you have a chance to ride an ebike or ebike kit before purchasing, that is by far the best way to get a feel for performance. If there is no store in your area carrying ebikes, check out some of those forums (endless sphere, V is for Voltage) and see if there is an ebike enthusiast in your area that might offer a test ride.

Hilton Head – Bike paradise?

elise — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 12:50:33 +0000

I recently returned from a trip to Hilton Head Island, in South Carolina. Hilton Head is located at the very south part of South Carolina, close to Savannah Georgia, and is a very popular beach vacation location. My parents, who participate in the condo swapping programs that have become popular lately, had a week to spend there and invited us to come down. I’m not usually so big on this kind of vacation, but the beach is really nice on the Island, and the kids love the beach. Plus, the island is populated with tons of bike paths, which make it theoretically easy to get around (more on that later…). So we decided to go for it.

The Electric Madsen was perfect for the beach

After a very long and tiring drive, punctuated by changing a flat tire on the side of I-95, in the dark (of course) we arrived at Hilton Head. The island is built up with lots of resorts and expensive homes, grouped into “Plantations” – really just a fancy southern name for parts of the island. Maybe it had to do with the original plantations on the island back in colonial days, I’m not sure. Now, each Plantation has it’s own cache and level on the hierarchy of perceived wealth. The resort where we were staying is owned by the Mariott group, and was located in the exclusive “Sea Pines” Plantation. To access this Plantation, you must go through the guard checkpoint, where the guards collect $5 from you if you are not a “guest” and enforce a cadre of rules designed to enhance the exclusivity of the place at the expense of common sense. I think they just don’t like anything that does not conform to the aura they want to project.

For example, we brought along with us a sit-on-top kayak, in case we wanted to explore some of the area via water (it is an island after all). Well, apparently, the Sea Pines homeowners have a prohibition against any kayaks or surfboards being “displayed” in the open, on top of a car, etc. They are supposed to be kept in a building out of view at all times. The guard at the gate determined by sight that our kayak was too big for our resort to handle, and almost didn’t let us through the gate (what were we supposed to do with the kayak?). But after lengthy argument, he agreed to let us go to our resort and see if they could find a place to store the kayak out of site. They did (fortunately, the Mariott people were very helpful and accomodating) and sure enough, the guard’s supervisor came to check on us 15 minutes later, just in case we decided to ignore this prohibition.

Anyway, I’m digressing, because after that original incident, the rest of the vacation was actually pretty nice.

The island is great for family riding

So, since we had all 3 children with us, we decided to bring the Madsen bike to transport the smaller ones, and my older (5-yr-old) daughter’s kids bike, and a third bike to get everyone around. While the roads on the island are narrow, there is actually a very good network of separated bike paths that run along the sides of the roads, so you can get from your accommodation to the beach and back via bike.

Because of this network of paths, a large industry of rental bikes has been built up, and many people rent bikes for the week. Most of these are beach cruisers with one speed (the island is totally flat, the only hill being the bridge over the inlet) and appear to be fairly low quality bikes. I discovered the reason for this right away, when we rode past a rental place with a sign “$20 rental for one week”. Now, the last time I rented a bike was when I was in Moab, Utah, and rented a mountain bike. It cost me $40 for ONE DAY. Similarly, a bike rental in Boston, to get around the city, cost even more than this. So obviously if you only pay $20 for an entire week, you get what you pay for.

Well, we did quite a bit of riding while we were there, in fact we didn’t use the car at all (except to go to the tire place to buy a new set of tires that is!). My daughter could easily ride safely on the separated bike paths, and we didn’t have to worry about her getting caught up in traffic. She rode over to the Children’s museum and back with her grandparents, rode to the beach, even rode ON the beach. Riding on the beach is very easy and fun when the tide is low. The beach there is very flat, which makes for great sand for riding, and you can go the whole length of the island, several miles.

Enjoying the swings at the playground

One day we all took the trails and rode up to the harbor, where there are lots of yachts, (many of which are very, very large), a great playground, and some little shops and restaurants. We took a round-about way on the way back, having to stop and examine the bike path signs that are dotted around the intersections here and there. The signs were a good thing, because it was pretty easy to get lost with everything looking the same (the uniformity mantra works!). In fact, I was not sure we were on a different path until we rode past what appeared to be a heritage vegetable farm, which I didn’t remember from the way out. Hmmmm… well, it was a nice day and we weren’t in a hurry.

Occasionally while riding, we would go past a little “borrow pit”, where we spotted some small alligators. (I wonder where they take them when they get too big?). A borrow pit is where they’ve borrowed some soil to fill in another place, such as where the road is. It’s common in areas that were swamps and wetlands at one time. They just move the dirt around and make them ponds and berms – easier to travel around. The kids all enjoyed seeing the alligators and the herons. We never saw the alligators move much. They have a way of making you wonder if they really are alive….just so you might come a little bit closer….and closer….

As we rode around, we encountered many other people on bikes, some of which probably did not ride a bike except for once a year, at Hilton Head. This was evidenced by several near-crashes I witnessed involving curbs and pilot error. One couple almost colliding with each other while getting started. I thought the fact that these people were even out on bikes was pretty cool though, because here is an opportunity to see that one can actually get around by bike. How great! The side paths really were important in making people feel safe to ride a bike and not have to deal with traffic. It was obvious that the investment the Island had made in bike paths really did help people get around while they were on their vacations, and hopefully relieve some traffic and parking problems at the beach.

But at the same time there were some gaping holes in the infrastructure when it came to actually using the bike to go anywhere except the beach. This was especially true because if you had to go somewhere there wasn’t a bike path, the roads themselves were very busy, narrow, and populated by heavily traffic.

For example, we decided to go one day to get some Gelato at a great little Gelato place called Pino Gelato. The Gelato place is in a strip mall Hilton Head style – that is, the stores are arranged in a semi-circle, and there are trees in the parking lot. It’s on the north side of the main highway that transverses the island. The bike path is on the south side of this highway (no path on the north side). Fortunately, there was a stop light at the entrance. But to cross at this stop light required navigating a 4 lane highway with right and left turn lanes and turn arrows, no crosswalk or pedestrian signals. We had the Madsen bike with the 2 little kids in back, my 5-year old on her little bike, and 3 other bikes. We decided the best strategy was to cross en-masse, so we waited for the cross light to change, and then walked our bikes quickly across 8 lanes, avoiding right and left turning traffic. At least we were a highly visible group all together. It was not an easy crossing, but everyone made it safely and had their gelato. Of course we had to repeat this in the opposite direction.

The thing about it that was most annoying was there was absolutely no provision for any kind of crossing at that light. So if you were a pedestrian, you would also face a pretty big risk just getting across the street. And once across there is no shoulder, sidewalk, or any other way to travel down that side of the street if you needed to go to the next establishment, for example. The way it is set up, the only way to easily access any business on the north side of the road is by car.

More Beach Riding

The other time we ran into a similar issue, although this was not quite as bad, was our trip to the grocery store. With the Madsen, we were able to do this easily without the use of the car because it is SO easy to load that bike. (Take grocery sacks out of grocery cart, pile in the bucket, return grocery cart, off you go!). Again, there was no way to access the grocery store strip mall except for traditional car routes, so we negotiated traffic and a convoluted parking lot with a lot of cars backing out of spaces, turning, etc. There was actually a small bike rack at the grocery store (better than I’ve seen in many places!). This traffic negotiation was not a big deal for us, having ridden in traffic a lot and being very comfortable with it. But for these people who can barely negotiate the ramp up the curb to the bike path, there is no way they would ever access this store by bike.

The other strange thing I found about the bike infrastructure was that there was a lack of bicycle racks at the public access points to the beach (also a lack of car parking). As you approach the public access point, there are signs on every fence stating that bikes locked there will be removed. But I didn’t see any actual legitimate place to park your bike. I guess you are supposed to take it with you onto the beach? I think this has more to do with this idea of exclusivity and keeping the “rif-raf” at bay. Don’t provide any parking of any kind, and this discourages beach use except for the people who have actually paid for ocean-front accommodation.

So, overall, my reaction to biking on Hilton Head island was mixed. On the one hand, the island has a great network of paths to get you around most of the places you need to go. There are periodic signs that show you a map of the network and the island so you know where you are. And the paths encourage bike use by many, many people who would otherwise be driving around and clogging up the streets even more than they are.

But on the other hand, the infrastructure falls short when it comes to using the bike as an alternative to the car for practical purposes, such as groceries, or even other shopping. Those parts of the island are still heavily dominated by the car/strip-mall pattern of development, although with a flair to make it seem not so ugly. I found this to be a disappointment, because with just a few changes, it would be possible to greatly expand the way people could get around.

Because you have to have a sunset photo in any discussion of the beach!

But at any rate, I still think that most cities could learn a lot from the Hilton Head model and this kind of investment in alternative transportation infrastructure would really pay off with reduced traffic and higher quality of life.

Electric Bikes Don’t Give any Exercise (ha ha)

Morgan Giddings — Fri, 21 Aug 2009 15:23:00 +0000

On Wednesday evening I dusted off my poor road bike, a Lemond Buenos Aires, to take her out for a ride. I hadn’t been on her for 6 months or so. The tires were flat, and the chain needed a serious lube. I got her going, and went out in the popular Dairyland area North of Chapel Hill and Carrboro, NC, for a pleasant ride in the rolling hills (some would say these hills are more than rolling).

Starting out, I thought that I was going to suck wind on this ride, since it was my first ride in so many months on the road bike (which does not have electric assist!). In fact, aside from my electric assist Big Dummy, the only other bike I’ve been on in the past six months is my 29er mountain bike – exactly 3 times. My life is way too busy right now for regular recreational rides on the road bike or the mountain bike. The only bike I have time to ride is the one I get to and from work on and do errands on – which has an electric motor that some folks tell me they consider “cheating”.

I have a cycle computer, and being somewhat of a geek, I like to keep track of my stats when I’m on my bikes. But, for my road bike ride, I didn’t want to look at my average speed during the ride, because I figured it would be so slow. Instead I just kept the distance displayed. I noticed many times that my instantaneous speed was hovering around 20 mph, and a few times that it dropped down to 14-15 mph on a big hill, but I thought I was doing ok. Well, except for the time that a pack of hard-core racer types – all guys – whizzed past me going 23-25 mph. I held them off on a hill, but once we got to the flat stretch, they were gone.

Anyway, after my 21.4 mile loop with 1,043 ft of climbing (plus 7 miles to/from home), I stopped and checked the average speed: 18.91 mph - very close to 19 mph. This is not Olympic level riding – but neither is it slouch riding. Even back when I was training on the road bike regularly, I rarely would average much over 19 mph when riding by myself (and often 22-23 mph or so in a group for this hilly area).

There goes another nail in the coffin of the myth that “electric bikes don’t give you exercise” or “electric bikes are cheating”. I couldn’t have pulled off that kind of speed if I hadn’t been riding almost every single day on my electric cargo bike. Some days on my electric bike I don’t pedal very hard, if I’m feeling tired. Other days I pedal a lot to get the exercise. But I do pedal, every day – because I feel goofy riding the bike without pedaling.

It reminds me of a customer whom we’re going to profile soon on video. She bought an electric eZee hub motor kit from us last year. She put it on her commuting bike, and logged over 2,000 miles on it in the past year. In the process, she lost 90 pounds! She recently brought her bike in to have us take the motor off, and to put that on a cargo bike with an Xtracycle for her. She is in such good shape now, she no longer needs the electric assist for her regular commute on the regular bike. I don’t think her 90 lbs lost and all those car trips saved are “cheating” – exactly the opposite.