Marty You got to come back with me back where Back to the Future quick get in the car when this baby hits 8.8 M hour. You're going to see some serious and no, it's not. Marty McFly it's Malcolm fade hey Malcolm hi how you going uh Electric Car Guru extraordinaire. We've seen him on the blog before and you're the proud owner of two two Sinclair C5s Tada look at that.

Tell us about them. Well they were made in 1985 by Clive Sinclair same year as Back to the Future oh okay y there you go. the um the uh Infamous English invention. the uh, they were nicknamed uh, Hedgehogs Hedgehogs.

Why? Because people get running them over. They had some safy issues. They went to huge lengths to try and make them safe, but unfortunately it didn't uh didn't work out. and I don't think you'd want to be riding one in a blustery winter.

Uh, winter cold either. They fitted big flag poles to them at one point Didn't They too so that you could see them from. Cars You'll see those shortly. Oh okay, you'll see those later.

Excellent. Um, so how about we do. Just a little walk around walk, show you what they're all about and we do have it all torn down folks. so this will be a tear down as well.

What there is to see? So okay on the back here is usually covered by a boot. Even has storage like this one down here and it looks pretty funky actually. There you go. This one has um or they all have a control box like this.

The lower part's covered up. There's not much to see in the lower part. it's only a only, a relay and a few opamps right. The upper section here has a few connectors and fuses.

The speed controller consists of a relay so it's either on or off. B Binary Speed Control Binary Speed control All right. Pwm at human speeds right? There's Um. On the left there's the electric motor made in Italy 250 W Motor continuous Um.

Took one for a run the other week and came back up the hill toward my house and it was got very toasty right? so we won't be doing that today. Unfortunately, it does have two temperature sensors in it. They actually went to a huge amount of trouble to ensure that it met with the English specification for a bicycle right and also that it wouldn't self-destruct in the case of over temperature. Unfortunately, the display monitor or they call it the display pod wasn't working particularly well so I didn't get the early warning on the over temperature, but if it had have overheated too much, it would have cut out through a a secondary sensor.

anyway. The right hand wheel fre Wheels normally Y and has a small drum brake. It looks like a disc brake though. Yes, there's a big heat sink on the back of it so it doesn't heat up too much.

It's an interesting design. Unbelievable. So it's it free Wheels on the right hand side, that's right free Wheels in both directions. Yeah, the left hand side free.

Wheels Normally However, if the motor is driven drives a synchronous belt and a larger pulley which drives through a oneway bearing so it fre Wheels normally forward and then only drives when the uh when you press the power button and that is a tooth pulley and you can actually make that slip, can't you? Yes, the uh. the output shaft on the gearbox on this one's a bit worn, right? So it does slip from time to time, so you have to Pedal at the same time as you drive if you're under heavy load. Otherwise, it goes clunk clun clunk and wears out even quicker, right? So there's a lot of people who think this was purely an electric well car in uh, quote marks, but it was actually a bicycle. It was a electric power assisted bicycle.

You could call it a human hybrid human hybrid, right? Yeah, the if we move around the side under the handlebar rubber here, there's a Go Button just consist of a micro switch. Yep, very highte. Oh yes, and that gives you your binary Speed Control Binary Speed Control 12v battery sits here. This is a little larger than the original Factory one right and it sits.

sits back here and gets strapped in so it doesn't go floating when you slow too. Standard sealed lead acid. That's right, this one's 55 a I've put Anderson connectors on here Mhm. the they originally came with these quick disconnects.

Um I didn't have any of the battery mating part of that, so replac them with Anderson and you could put a second one over the other side I guess as well. Yes, there's a little little indentation in the floor to accept another battery, right? And in fact, there was a second battery kit available as an option, right? And what sort of range are we talking about? I've never been brave enough to find out, right? Cuz you know, well, you can always pedal home. Yes, you could up the hills around here I wouldn't we can pitch your ma just Towing it back with some rope over the shoulder. Come on you bastard.

that would be easier. the Um I can't remember, to be honest. have to have a look on. Wikipedia I think about 20 mi or something like that, so quite some distance.

It also depends on how hard you pedal and what the terrains like on the trip, right? What gradients could it go up? Not much I would imagine. not very much. You'll experience it a little later. You have to ped up the up my street and you'll get an idea of how steep that is, right? we've got.

Uh, we've got the pedals. Yep, Oh, can't see in there folks. All right there we go. So they, uh, that's the.

uh, that's the other half of the system. Yep, and there. Oh, look at that Sinair branded branded. There's a lot of Sinair badging on the Plastics and molds and things.

Well, we'll take a look at that. It's hard to get in there. but this A09 number 879 879 manufactured by Hoover and Hoover In fact, with the service agents as well. Unbeli if anyone doesn't know.

Hoover They made vacuum cleaners. Um, very famous for making vacuum cleaners. but there there it is. made in the UK That's right.

the um. the body on it was I think it was it was injection molded and I think it was one of the largest at the time in in the UK Oh, the largest injection molding. Physically very large, right? It was designed uh, or at least the aerodynamics was designed by Lotus. Oh, there you go.

You could argue that, uh, that I'm driving, you're driving a Lotus right? Excellent. The mirrors were optional extras, optional extras. but I do find them pretty essential, right? They you can't see behind you, you can't turn around easily to see if there's anything coming, so they're pretty worthwhile. It has some indicators yep, over one on the front, one on the front, one on the rear.

They were also optional optional indicators, optional indicators. Unbelievable. What was the original list price? It was like 400 or something. Wasn't it 300? 400? 300? I Think 299 right? perhaps? And it's got one large headlight on the front, one large headlight.

It's largely ornamental. It's got a little 5w light in there so it doesn't do a more to be seen rather than to see. I've replaced one of them with an LED and I'll replace them with some really good LEDs at some point. Yep and we have here an original front wheel.

an original wheel which is also if we can get the sink C branded as well. So fantastic. But that's not the original Tire though that's right, that's a tire off a pram right pram. tires and Council cleanups are quite, uh, quite prolific.

Um, the original Wheels tended to melt if they were underload. Ouch! uh with a little just a little caliper brakes like brakes on Kitty bikes which were which we can see up under here. yes you can. There it is.

there's the the brake calipers. This has got some UB $7 PS instead of the Cheapo $4 pads. You spared no expense there, Ma? absolutely. And these sto 10 times better I Have to say original pads were woful to the point of dangerous right? You can see the Uh chain the Uh gear chain up in there.

there. it is a very long chain when people replace them they by two and together right? the Uh I've replaced the front wheels with steel wheels from prams once again right? the to eliminate the possibility of the of the rim melting and it's got a heads up display as well. yes, kind of dashboard or display it tends to be called. It consists of a bunch of LEDs oh very night ride alike.

Yeah, the right hand LEDs indicate voltage right, the left hand motor load and in case of over temperature they they blink which should work now that I fixed them. I'll put the power in and if there's uh, enough light there, you'll be able to see the LEDs Come on. Yeah, we can see them. So voltage here, current here.

If we turn the motor on, we'll see the current display. Whoa. Yep, there we go. Oh five graduations and they didn't think to label that at all well.

I Guess it becomes self-evident once you're going once you go in here and this is a true recumbent bike so some people are probably wondering how did it You fit your legs under the handlebars? Well, M is going to sit in one and we'll see exactly how that works. The easiest way to get in is to climb in and over. Here we go and your pedal and hold on like that like that. Do your legs get in the way at all? Or um, it's okay, right? It's okay, he's he's not too confident.

I'm Bing Backwards, my feet tend to tip the plastic here right and the bottom of your carves do tend to press the handlebars which can stop you from turning the sharpest corner you might ever want. Oh goodness, were were any people killed in these things that you're aware of? I've never read of it, right? I'm sure there were some the um, there's a really interesting little movie called The Microman about Clive Sinclair Ah, yes to watch I've forgotten the other guy that created Acorn Ah That's a really fascinating movie. Not so much about C5s, but um about Clive The Man and you get some insight into how tenacious he was with his inventing. Um, there's another documentary BBC One um about English inventions which covers the DeLorean uh yes and the C5 which is uh, which is on YouTube in multiple Parts which is worth a watch as well.

So it gives you some insight into the design and testing. The testing they did on these was unbelievable. Get it with Lotus breaking? uh with uh, brake testing, load testing, getting The Thermals thermal management of the motor, right? The gearing it was. It's surprising because it's so simple and almost toy like you could say.

I Guess it's probably not fair, but it's you know. Yeah, it's not like a you know it doesn't have the refinements of a normal car, but it was like a couple hundred. PB Yes, it was. it was built down to a price yes and you see that when you're fixing them.

I've been restoring these two over recent months and you pull something apart and you think yep, I can see why they Ed That part because it was cheap right? But in other areas they really really put the engineering in. but the production was was obviously to a to a price point cuz there was a rumor that they used a washing machine motor. Yes, which is just that. a rumor.

The I believe the company in Italy that made the motors also happened to make washing machine motors. Got it? These were made for the job. Yep, and how much does this thing weigh? We fitted out batter answer to that. the battery alone weighs about 15 kilos and and the C5 itself I think it weighs almost 30 so you can almost pick it up yourself and put it in the back of a boot.

Yeah, that's right. You pick one end up, put the other end, pick the other end up and your right. They are very light for what they are y very light. the um the plastic body in housing is incredibly strong and Incredibly light.

It's a really neat design. it's it's well done and it's so. it's a pure injection molded plastic. It's one large piece of the white is one big yep part and the gray underneath is is another part and they were heat.

They were plastic welded together so they're really quite a simple uh Beast I mean there's nothing complicated at all I mean we've just got you know, regular one regular bike brake on the Uh front and just a simple drum Brak a cable driven drum brake on the on the back which tended to lock up right? Yes, you'll discover that later as well. Oh Yay! when you pull the pull, the rear brake on the rear wheel will lock up if you pull it on too quickly. and because the other cuz one wheel is Brak and there's no brake on the drive wheel over here you you you would spin to one side. Yes, it pulls to the right a little bit if you pull only the right hand.

Brak on it's best to pull the front and the right on at the same time, right? They have been known to break brake cables, have cables snap, snap and which is which would be a very bad thing. So it's just as well. There's two, but I wouldn't want to be lying on one and it looks like you've got a crack in the shazzy down there. Yes.

I Guess it's been been used and abused so it's um, showing some size signs of age that when that's not going to affect its structural Integrity Too much? Is it not at this point? Not for the amount and it's gets used right? It's more of a collector's item. Yep, now yeah, you wouldn't use it daily would you? No, that's for sure. If you. uh, if you lived by a beach or by a flat area, you could have have some fun every weekend and tole around.

But and get strange looks. but um, it's not really a viable alternative to to Local transportation. and is this thing street legal in Australia yes is is is tell us about the is the um the power limit for a bicycle used to be 200 WS Mhm. Um I think they've up that to 250 y with pedal assist.

No ped sensor on this. It's close enough to road legal I Think you'd be have to find a cop having a pretty bad day. You got it? Yeah to? Well, they probably pull you over. What the hell is this? of curiosity more than anything else, exactly? Yeah, Oh, you never know.

You might be lucky today. Oh excellent. Great. The um.

The laws as they currently stand for bicycles are a little bit rubbery as well because you can specify 250 wats average, but your Peak maybe 2 and 1 12 Kow Got it? Yeah, it's a little bit hard to hard to judge I believe it's 250 Watts MH average Going continuous all day every day, right? So invariably riding around you don't always need that much power, but you could have more. and then you could always claim no officer I wasn't using the motor I was pedaling? That's right. Yes, Yes. Oh goodness.

So do you think these things would have been practical I mean this was Clive Sinclair's vision of the future, right of the future of personal transport. At the time, it was developed, it was a little bit too weird. I Think right? Um, yeah, it was the ' 80s. It was.

well, yeah, let's say no more about the 80s. Yeah yeah. Bad hair, good music I'm sure you had a mallet, didn't your ma I Can pict a M with actually? Oh fantastic. a picture of my one of my high school photos I Put an afro.

oh can we get that photo and stick it in at it into the blog later? Negative: So, but what about today? Um I think Actually, people could be more accepting of something like this today because people have a more. Greener Outlook Mhm Electric bikes are more prolific. Yep, people. It's questionable whether people enjoy riding unusual vehicles or not.

but uh, with kids, scooters, and things, the um, people have become more accepting of really unusual bikes and scoters and skateboards and all sorts of things. So who knows, maybe it could be. Well, and of course, recumbent bikes. Are you know it's not unusual to find recumbent bikes around these days.

That's right, see them around. so no, it barely resembles one. Oh yeah, well, you know it's a a similar thing. you're sitting down and and uh, you know.

So yeah, who knows, maybe they could take off Clive Talked about reintroducing it, didn't he? He's there's a website I think it's clear research. Don't quote me. Um, where he talks about a a bike push bike called an X1 which is kind of an inclosed two wheeler with electric assist. Mhm.

Um, there's a few YouTube videos and it's under Perpetual development, right? Yes, Okay, that's an interesting thing. and he claims that this was the biggest selling electric car up until a couple of years ago. Didn't he? Yes, that's right, and it was. It was.

until in Niss and Leaf in 2012. 201 electric. Of course, we don't count hybrids, do we? They're not real electric cars, so that's right. That's right.

And they sold what? 17,000 of these? Yeah, something like that. How many do you reckon are in Australia I know of four four and you've got two five and you've got two of them. You've holder corner of the market actually one I've got to give back to the guy I'm restoring it for so one technically belongs to me and one to him. Got it? Got it? Uh, and what is the story behind these? Cuz these are quite low serial numbers I wouldn't have expected those to made have made it to Australia The gentleman that uh, brought these in who brought three in um I think just bought them secondhand sometime right sometime in the '90s or naughties or whatever.

whatever. So anyway, when he uh, immigrated to Australia brought brought them with him as you do, how did you acquire these? Um, well, uh, one still belongs to him right? and I get the other one in exchange for restoring the first one. Nice deal. Oh good work.

It's very good. awesome And there's a third one around that we'll use for parts at some point because uh, some of these are a bit shabby in places and need a that have work. They look okay on the outside, but I know there's some false so do you plan to show these off in any uh electric car shows? like just drive up and well I'll take them both to Newcastle There's an electric vehicle Festival up there, run by a sustain I Think it's a sustainability group in Newcastle um and there's a uh, electric push bike? Marathon I guess you would call it it's um, the pedals are locked up and it's it's who can travel the farthest in an hour. Oh okay, which is an interesting race.

Um, so I'll show them off up there. we'll get a demonstration run of the of the go-kart track they're using. There'll be these two and hopefully one in Newcastle one that sold on eBay recently. Go-kart track? Yes, doesn't sound too promising.

Yeah, the steering Lock's pretty wful so we'll see if we can make it around the corners in one. Oh goodness, good luck. Here's the boot or luggage and compartment. Put a couple of tubs of ice cream in there I suppose yeah, you could.

A few tools and and a JC Car receipt obviously be parts to Yeah? I think that was for the LEDs that I bought right and that just snaps in place. Does it? Yeah, with it's a bit of a fiddle, but yes. all right. just like that.

Ah, and there it is and it's once again sinkle mold badged molded into the thing. Now, these aren't adjustable, Are they the pedals? That's right. Makes it a bit hard for kids to ride it. Yeah.

and in fact you and I will be having to reach forward a little bit for the pedals at full extension as well, right? But um, it was made to try and fit most people and I guess we're we're below average height. Oh well, not for England Perhaps full of dwarves. so was that like a design oversight you think? Or they deliberately just had to compromise or they had to make it somewhere right? Yep. so I guess they took the demographic of people's leg length averages and yep, went with that right? Interesting statistic I should say and we can have a look at the um Electronics in here cuz there is some Electronics isn't there m yes there is.

We'll pull it apart and take a little look. Excellent. There we go. That's the it's just a A.1 in uh pin header there which then connects to the cable Harless which comes up the conduit.

There, it's all bit how you're doing, isn't it? It's yes, it's made to a price point. As we said, Yeah, exactly. We'll discover that As well when we look at the quality of the circuit board. Oh okay, let's have a look at what Uh Sir Live came up with.

and Ma's just got some variable frequency drive boards around here and check out this power resistors with what sort of cover is that? It looks like fiberglass fiberglass mesh, matte insulation mesh with crimped, uh, metal rings around the end. That is bizarre I've never seen that before. they may be pre-charged resistors I haven't actually looked, but um I guess they do get hot and uh, that's to either protect the surrounds if they do fry or perhaps, um, just to keep the heat in. I'm not really sure H And here it is.

Tell us about the main board, Ma Well, the uh, the reason I had to fix it is because the little dual single in line header here was had. um, corroded, right? So I replaced it with a wire wrap socket and uh, you can see I've snipped up a wire wrap socket and pulled one of the pins out for the index. Yep, Um, this little device here is a bit interesting. It's called a Ula uncommitted logic array which contains um, an A TOD I believe some comparators.

Uh, uh, a D2a made up of a I think it's an R2r L, right? It's only three bits I Was going to say there's not many resistors there to make it up. the um, the output of that D2a changes the gain of an opamp back in the control box and it's part of the current sense and temperature sense circuit, right? The right hand display displays voltage the least or the lowest LED should come on at about 12.5 volts mhm and the left hand displays current and also flashes in case of over temperature on the motor. H I Don't know, it's the current's not exactly calibrated. it's just an indication of load, right? And you can download the full schematics for all the the whole thing, can't you? Yes, there's a document called The Unofficial Sinclair C5 Service Manual and it's in part authored by some of the designers which makes it uh, makes it very useful because it goes into the detail of a lot of the testing and Analysis right? and the why.

Various design choices were made throughout the production of it. and who actually uh, uh, who actually designed it? Which group was it were they working for Sinclair research or I don't know or did they subcontract it out to somebody? I Don't know to be honest I don't know, but you can see the circuit board is um, yeah. a fairly lumpy screen print. Yeah, single sided, huge screen print on that.

Yeah. Massive. I Guess it's classic 1985. Sure.

Technology? Yeah. brilliant. Are you going to make any upgrades to this mail? Got any ideas? Well, one of them doesn't have a LED display? Yep. So I've ordered a 12vt volt and current meter off of Deal Extreme so that'll be a good start anyway.

Five bucks including postage. Exactly something like that I think it was four. Four bucks for LCD right? LED meter? Um, the one of them with the dodgy gearbox. If that gets too bad.

I'll look at putting a hub motor on the front right and uh, all the way from China where all good things come from. Um, a 250 watt motor 24 volt running at 36 volts should give about 500 and something Watts which should make make it quite capable. That would be very yeah. You'd certainly get up the hills.

Yeah, well, that's the hope. but is that ruining the original of your C5 Well, the price of a replacement gearbox is hundreds as well, right? Okay, so yeah, I know and you really want it to be a bit more practical, especially around hilly areas which I I live to of the Hill Yeah, Exactly. So awesome. And you could like uh Mount You know you can have battery monitors and all sorts of uh uh whizbang headup display monitoring stuff you could even have like a GPS or something like that and uh, tracking your speed and and distance and battery charge.

and uh yeah, there's a guy that's made a touchscreen LCD weo add on for it, add- on for it cuz he didn't have a pod right? it's quite thing. Um so yeah, you could go to town with it and do all sorts of interesting analytics on your on your journey and for authenticity. just to make it complete, we'll put the front y on. Oh, that is so futuristic I think back Rogers would be envious.

Oh, that's fantastic. Oh yeah baby. look at that. No wind resistance there baby.

Aerodynamics: Because the aerodynamics was a huge deal, Wasn't it? Yes! I Read somewhere that uh I think at 20 mph, 90% of your energy goes into pushing air on a normal bicycle. 20 M an hour which is pretty quick, right? Well, what's the top speed of this thing? Oh good Question: 12 I think or something 12 milph Um, the I should have done my fact reading before before you showed up. the Um. So that's why they put so much effort into the aerodynamics of this Y.

So it's not just for the aesthetic, that's why they had um had Lotus do the body engineering on it that is so futuristic. That is great and is is that the original uh stripe on it? Or maybe maybe I replaced? it's been replaced on the other one I say on this one, There we go, We're going out for a spin all right, and it's a nice day to drive around the northern beaches here in. Sydney isn't it? Ma Fantastic! It's a glorious day and there's our C5s. Woohoo! let's go.

We do struggle to get them up a hill a bit but uh, you've got a you got a pedal but uh, first time I've ever ridden one and they they're quite nice I Rather like it. Yeah, very smooth, very relaxing as long as you're not ping too let's hop in sh who it's Sor right? These are actually uh, pretty good. I don't mind it at all a bit rough. sorry about the camera.

uh shaking there, it's not much I can oh how do I Oh there we go, but these actually like going on a smooth. uh Road you feel pretty darn good in these. Let me tell you. I'm impressed I want one to uh, go to the lab with that'? be great.

We just uh headed for a cafe here and uh yeah, the um camera is mounted on a uh visor. It's mounted on the uh visor of this thing in M's parked there we go and we will park nicely. Here we go. Excellent Taada! Yeah, we're quite impressed.

These handle really well. M Yes I love them. Good fun right? W See you Yeah this is actually uh, quite smooth. sorry about the audio and video but I really, uh rather like this.

it feels and well, apart from getting run over by somebody, it actually feels really safe and and stable. and uh, it is a bit of work going up the hills here, but uh, you just pedal and use the motor at the same time and we're headed back to M's place. All right. Wooho! C I Don't know how anyone survived without the rear viw mirrors on this thing, but they truly were.

uh, optional extra? Then that's just crazy. Here he goes. What a speed demon! Woo yeah, you have to have the mirrors. they're and it really does pull to the ride.

If you just apply the uh right brake, you've got to use both brakes. You've got to use both brakes at the same time. Otherwise, it's uh, it really does pull to the right a lot now. I'm going to have to Dish you for the for the $2 multimeter, but we've got a little impromptu, uh, troubleshooting session.

What was the problem you think? Ma Well, while you were riding it, it thought it had run out of power and started beeping. It started beeping and in fact it was telling the truth. Oh there you go, because it should start beating beeping if it gets constantly about less than 12 1/2 Vols Which it is. So there you go.

That's the Sinclair C5 and I was quite impressed. This thing actually goes quite well. Yeah, it's not fast, but it does get you from A to B and it's a very interesting um form of Transport. Maybe some somebody should do a Kickstarter and uh, get these, uh going again.

What do you think? Mal Well, they could certainly try. They'd be more accepted in warmer climates than the UK that's for sure, right? Yeah, But these things are really quite neat. I Can fit all my bag of all my camera gear and tripod and everything in the back. Not a problem.

So there you go. I Hope you enjoyed that look at a rare look at the classic Sinclair C5 There's only like you know, less than a handful of these in the country and we were able to take two of them out. so thank you very much. Ma Catch you next time.