And we have a very cool looking electric bike here. unfortunately. Um Anthony who did it is? uh, not here. But M our electric uh, car and electric bike Guru is going to tell us all about it.

Hopefully? Yes. I certainly will. Um I assisted putting the bike together well, gave instruction anyway. I didn't actually have to do too too too much Anthony was very capable.

Cool. Um, it's an electric bike. the Uh I'll start at the back I guess the business end MH Uh, we've got a Uh 200 W uh. electric motor here 36v battery.

It's a brushless motor. The speed controller is internal to the hub, which is kind of neat because it means you don't have to find space for it anywhere else on the bike and it keeps it really well self-contained Is there anything on the right? Okay, so it's the wires. come in the other side and they're just cable tied up to the frame. I See it in the middle of the frame here.

He's built a burglar alarm or an anti- theft alarm I Guess it is for a pushy built up from a project. Um, you can see the ablea batteries there to power it when the Uh bikes. um, not being powered by the Uh by the main pack. Yep, oh it's a short circuits.

it's it's a JC Car thing. Yes, it is right. Uh, there's a tilt switch on the back of the battery pack. Uh, a Mercury switch.

So if the bike uh with the bike tilted as it is at the moment I think you'll find the switch is just tilt it a little bit in the off position. If you stand it up, the Mercury rolls to the other end and it uh and it closes a circuit nice and there. Where's the uh buzzer? Where's the screamer on it? Does it have a screamer? Dave I Don't know. Does it have a screamer or does it just not work? It just not.

It just doesn't under the seat? that's right seat I Remember now. Oh there we go. There's the screamer. There it is.

Yeah. I Love it. Anti- theft electric bike on the front. We've got a um Ole 10 wat LED 10 watt.

Nice. It's really really bright when it when it's on and you look at it, you've got stars for hours. So do you know what brand that is? Is it a Cre? Is it a one hung low cheapy from China Is it a I Suspect it's the one hung low cheapy from China right and that's powered through a little step down. Yep.

Converter here a switch mode converter. So it takes uh, anything, up to 50 volts input and steps it down to 12 vs. ready for the LED Got it. The LED has a constant current Source in the back of it.

How hard is it to take an existing bike and actually modify it to get a fully electric bike? Well when we um when I went to Dave's house to start assisting in the project, they had already started pretty much pulling the bike apart and I think he was riding by about lunchtime. Wow. really? Um, so it doesn't take very long. What does take time is tidying up the wires and making it look nice.

Got it? Um, my own bike is the same design and uh, I think I've had it apart about twice because I wasn't happy with how the wires were run right. Fussy about the details? huh? Yes, Yes, yeah, because you know, like you've got uh, tubing and all sorts of stuff along here. So I guess you want to, you know pride in your work? You'd want to. That's right, you know, could you hide it inside the tubes or something? Do people do that well? This bike has a few extra WI for the lights and and the alarm.

Um, mine just has I think two or three running from the front so they just run parallel to the brake cables so they hide quite nicely under the frame. Yes, you could, uh, drill holes in the ends of the tubes and push the wires through y That would look quite nice. I Don't know what it would do structurally well might not be so clever, might end in tears. What's what's the legal requirements in Australia for Electri Watt: 200 Watt 200 WT Anything over 200 WTS It's classified as A.

It's not classified as anything. Actually, you can't make it legal. and it's not legal to ride on public places. Wow, You can't even register it as a motor, electric motorbike or something.

That, that's right. it doesn't comply with the appropriate Australian design rules. Great! So so anything above that is in no man's land, right? Interesting Segways are in the same position. They're not legal on public places either.

Oh okay, so technically you're not allowed legally allowed to ride a Segway That's right in. Australia That's right. Fail government, Another government Fail. Yes it is.

Yes, it is. Boy kill. Joys Yeah, so how much performance can you get out of a 200 watt legal limit at B 200 watt legal limit bike. This one will goes about 32 km an hour, right? Okay, so it's not super fast Hills and stuff like that.

Um I live at the top of a fairly steep hill and uh, I have to give it a little bit of assistance up the hill, but not much. Okay, so you can do combined Pedal Power as well as you have to. you have to. you have to.

I Love it. And how long would you? you usually get on a a battery pack of that size and weight? How? what sort of it's on a flat? You know, a reasonably flat. Yeah, if you believe the website I think it says something like 50 or 60 kilm on on the website. Um in reality I've been riding uphill in down Dale Um Sydney Terrain y It's realistically more like about 30 right? About half the yeah? figure.

Yeah, which makes sense. Yeah, some. um if you put lower or slicks on y of course that that helps pushing tires around. Yeah, that's right, cuz these are like mountain bike tires, right? So if you get low rolling resistance tires, you would.

What is interesting about these tires though? they are quite worn. Oh, he's got a is that? Uh, if he had full tread on here? Um, you've actually got almost continuous contact with the ground anyway. So if you're riding up and down, your rolling resistance isn't too bad. And what's the market like for these bikes? Are they selling commercially? Are they selling well? commercially? Do you know? CU You can buy commercial electric bikes fully? Yes you can.

There's been quite a few, um, little shops pop up. some disappear. Yep. Um.

but they are specializing in an electric bikes. There's uh, a plug a mat's business name is Gloworm Bicycles. please do bicycles. com.au probably probably in in Sydney Um, uh.

so there's little businesses and industries popping up around it. There's also kits available online from on. eBay Where all good and bad come from? Yep, and from this manufacturer here, which is Golden Motor. Okay, so this is a Golden Motor.

It sounds very. uh Chinese One hung Loy certainly is. They've got agents here in Australia now or distributors in Australia now so hopefully you can save a little bit on the on the shipping right. and I'm sure their competitor is called Golden Lucky Happy Motorco I'm sure.

Beautiful! Are there any other uh uh things people need to know about building and electric bike? Not a whole lot. Well, I'll I'll Um I'll start at the start at the front now. Um, in the kit, you get a few different things. M You'll get uh two brake two new brake handles.

Being a brushless motor, this one does have regeneration and what's really neat about this is you can program it as well. Um, dial up how much or little you want. Um, there's a switch on each of these brake levers. What it will do is in the case of a brushless motor and controller.

Like this one, it will turn on the regen and turn off the throttle. If it's if it's on Mhm and it will, uh, on a DC type bike, it'll um, just cut the speed controller because you don't want to be fighting the speed controller with the brakes. Um, the mechanical brakes are all the same. The throttle is hiding under here.

Got it? I Prefer a thumb throttle like this one? Yep, because if you're pushing your bike around up and down stairs like I do to get out of my backyard, invariably end up twisting the throttle and the bike takes off on you, right? So it's actually quite a good. SA I Find the safer right? Yeah, that that would be embarrassing wouldn't you? CU if you are moving the bike around I Can imagine you would accidentally twist the throttle. and yes, it goes, especially when you're not used to an electric bike. Um, so we've got the throttle, the brakes.

yep, and the battery pack here that slides off the back and has a little charge port on the side of it, right? Oh okay, so you can take it away to charge it or remove it off the bike. Cuz really, the charger is probably worth the batter. Is Wor RCA connector? It is actually it is an RCA connector. How many amps can you get through an RCA connector? Well, I think it's about one or something.

Um, there's a Anderson plug on the front of the battery pack. Um, which is a nice quick disconnect. Yep, sweet. And you can slide the battery off the carrier off the back for charging or storage or just to prevent theft because it's probably the most expensive single component.

Sure. I Think this one will be a 10, 10 amp, 30, 6 Vol I've already talked about the Hub motor having the speed controller built in. That's one of the advantages of a golden motor. Otherwise, you have to figure out where to put it.

Maybe down here or under here. Thats how physically big would a speed controller. The speed controllers are usually about right that yay big and that so they're not too hard to hide, but it just makes it a whole lot more compx. Sure, if it's built into the Hub and what about? uh, how hot would one of those get? What about Electronics Reliability in there? Would that be an issue like that was a concern? I Guess with the earlier models, but this Uh brand has been around for a long time now.

Okay, a few people have blowing up controllers for various reasons I don't really know why, but uh, but yeah, they're good. They're on to the next version now and they're still keeping the speed controller inside the Hub so they're obviously not having trouble with heat dissipation. And what happens if the controller blows? Do you buy a new one? or does it? Yes, it's um, it's a bit of a mission to pull the Hub apart from what I hear because you're fighting the magnets and the coils and everything inside. But once it's apart, it's um, oh, you can could service it in theory.

you could service it, pull it out, and replace it, and in fact, the circuit board on it is physically identical to the one that's external in a box. so you could order it as a spare part and refit it or Y or just delete the controller all together and use another one so you can use it as pretty just a normal bike. Do you have to disengage the anything? You can ride it as a normal bike so you just leave it switched off. Yeah, you just leave it switched off.

Um, with a brushless motor like this, there's always rolling resistance. Yeah, so it's a bit of a challenge to Pedal Okay, so it's fairly significant in ter ride if you don't use it. so there's a penalty there if you have an electric bike and you want to do it the old fashioned way. Yes, that's right.

That's one of the advantages of the little DC Hub Motors that are about that big. The little Motors spin quite fast through a planetary gear reduction and they also Freewheel so you can p it a lot easier. Got it? They do. They automatically free whe? or do you have to disengage? No.

yeah, they automatically nice and these you can't really disengage it can you? Not at all. It's all. it's all built in. It's all there.

it's one piece. And how much would a it cost to make a electric bike cuz you you built yours from scratch? Yes. Much like this. I Bought a frame from cheap frame from Big W It was expense right to have streamers and all on.

Yeah, right. And the little clicker thing in the spot Um, and and the um so the was cheap. but the the kit I think at the time was about 1,200 shipped. Wow, Okay, right.

so they're not. It's not insignificant, right? Still, cheaper than buying at a shop right? And how much would they cost in the shop to get a fully built fully tested? I Haven't actually looked for a long, long time? Okay, look up Glow Bikes website Gl.com most likely or Google Thank you very much M My pleasure Dave.