Since gasoline because unusable after awhile, most cars will become obstacles and block up roads.

So we of course want something that can zip around the roads!

The main advantages I see are:

  1. Peddle when out of juice

  2. Peddling charges the batteries, so in an emergency you can turn on the battery

  3. The batteries can reasonably be charged by solar panels that a lot of houses have.

  4. Gets around all the blocked roads.

  5. Generally easier to repair.

  6. The distance travelled on a full battery is absurd

I don’t expect any movies to put their heroes on an eBike, but they should!

IDK just thought you’d appreciate my dumb thought XD Any other reasons why during an apocalypse you should find an ebike?

  • @[email protected]English
    5•2 months ago

    It’s not common, but it does make sense to do! No, not in charging the battery but in braking. Regen slows down the bike without wearing down your brake pads, which is extra important with a heavy bike. I cannot even manage 900 miles without changing my longtail’s pads. I have yet to replace the pads on my regenerating e-trike.

    The extra 20% range is nice but I’m more happy about the money and hassle I’ve saved in not replacing brake pads.

    • @magiccupcakeEnglish
      3•2 months ago

      You can’t slow down with regen without putting the energy somewhere, and that’s the point of brakes, they convert kinetic energy into thermal to slow you down.

      The point of regen is to not waste the energy and put most of it back into a battery. At the scale of an ebikes, the additional components electronics, battery thermal management, and so on for regen are more expensive than just adding 20% more battery.

      Unless you wanted to make an expensive, super efficient or very light ebike, it just doesn’t make sense at the moment.

      That will not likely always be true if we ever use different battery chemistry and the cost of regen electronics goes down.

      • @[email protected]English
        3•2 months ago

        I agree it doesn’t make sense to pick regen for extending range. Just buy a bigger battery if that’s the biggest issue, say a rarely used bike but long ranged when needed.

        To me it’s the brake pads that add up. Replacing two pairs of pads every few hundred miles is way more expensive than the system and any additional battery wear. $500 isn’t that many sets of pads.

        Considering I don’t charge my batteries much beyond 80%, yeah, there’s plenty of room to put that extra energy early in the ride. I’d rather charge a battery than to grind pads into dust.

        • @magiccupcakeEnglish
          2•2 months ago

          Honestly I’d wonder if the wear on brake pads could be cheaper than the additional strain on the battery.

          • @[email protected]English
            2•2 months ago

            I have 1400 miles on my non-regen bike which has burned through three sets of pads (1.5 mm currently left). I’m slowly trying better/harder pads which won’t eat rotors and don’t cost as much. $25 every 500-ish miles isn’t great (10k miles is $500 in pads) . Suggestions are welcome!

            I think a key difference is my neighborhood is quite hilly. I’ve never smoked and glazed a set of pads before moving in. That was a quick learning experience for me.