10th Dec: Melbourne Australia ride and social chat

[Samd]

Eek! 10mm of frequent showers. Let's start to discuss here on thursday about whether to cancel.
if it still looks that way on Friday morning I will be rescheduling to January...

[adrian_sm]

Yeah, I would probably be a no show if rainy. Don't mind it commuting to work with a warm shower at the end, but not for a social ride.

Let's see what it says closer to Saturday.

P.S. My wife will be pissed if it is cancelled, I made her change her return flight from Perth, to get her back in time so I could make it along.

[adrian_sm]

I did a quick ride along the Capital City Trail that we are planning on taking today, as I had never ridden a lot of it before, and need to go for a decent ride anyway.
It was pretty slow due to a lot of bends, quite a few stops, and traffic. There were also a set of stairs people will need to get their bikes down at one point, and a detour onto some roads in another.

So it should be a fairly leisurely pace for those worried about battery capacity. I only averaged about 25kph.
Including my ride in from the Eastern Suburbs I managed to only use 270wh, for about 40kms round trip. But I do tend to pedal. : )

Here are some of me GPS stats so you can see the sort of speeds I was doing.

Here's hoping the weather stays good for a little longer.

- Adrian

[Kepler]

Looking at the weather pattern, it looks like the morning will OK with showers and thunderstorms in the afternoon. Perhaps we should consider bring the start time forward, say a 10.00am start from Fed Square. Not sure if that works for Samd with him coming in from Ballarat but this would give us a better chance of staying dry.

[Samd]

Awesome research Adrian.

Yeah, I can be at Southern cross at 9.30, and Fed Square for a 10am kickoff, no probs.
Does this work for the others? Let's see who responds by 9am tomorrow (friday) and then decide to lock the new time in if they can.

I guess if anyone doesnt see the new time they can still chose to take a ride!

[adrian_sm]

10am start @ Fed Square sounds good.

If the weather starts to turn, I may head home from the Zoo or the Convent rather than doing the full circuit.

Kepler, Did you still want to ride in together? I am in Surrey Hills, pretty much on Whitehorse road between Union and Balwyn Rd.
If you still plan on heading up Canterbury, I can meet you @ cnr of Balwyn & Canterbury @ say 9:15.
That should give us heaps of time to get in to Fed Square and have a chat before others rock up.

If anyone else is in the area feel free to join us for the ride in.

- Adrian

[ElectricEd]

10:00am at Fed Square sounds fine to me.
See you there.

[Kepler]

10am start @ Fed Square sounds good.

If the weather starts to turn, I may head home from the Zoo or the Convent rather than doing the full circuit.

Kepler, Did you still want to ride in together? I am in Surrey Hills, pretty much on Whitehorse road between Union and Balwyn Rd.
If you still plan on heading up Canterbury, I can meet you @ cnr of Balwyn & Canterbury @ say 9:15.
That should give us heaps of time to get in to Fed Square and have a chat before others rock up.

If anyone else is in the area feel free to join us for the ride in.

- Adrian

Just thinking how much LiPo I need to carry for 70 to 80km. I might just drive to your place and go from there. Lets me run a bit lighter and have less distance to pedal if its a wet ride home.

[adrian_sm]

Fine with me. I'll PM you my address in case you don't have it.

I only used 270wh from my place to do most of the trial, but ended up pedalling a far bit since it was so slow, and at first I wanted to conserve batteries. But you have an extra 2x 11kms to get to and from your place to mine. Plus I just joined the trail at the closest point to me, then went around, on Saturday we have a few extra kms to the meeting point and back.

I'll just run my 5s20Ah pack. I may throw a spare 6s5Ah pack in my backpack just in case.

[Samd]

I've had a lot of buy in on the new time.
With one person committed to go come hell or high water, here is the (new) final plan:

9.40 Depart Southern Cross from the location in the google link posted earlier (may just be me.)
10.00 Depart Fed Square from in front of the big screen, along the north bank of Yarra, 13km leg to Abbotsford (heaps of time)
10.45 Meet for a bite at Abbotsford Convent. Anyone out of batteries can get the train.
12.00 Depart Convent. 9km leg to Melbourne Zoo
1.00 Meet Melb Zoo (next to Royal Park Train Station). Anyone out of batteries can get the train.
1.15 Depart zoo for another 9km leg to Docklands.
1.45ish Meet up for a drink at James Squire Brewhouse in Docklands or shoot through. I will be planning at least one beer by then before getting the train back to Ballarat later.

I have pm'd my mobile number in case they don't let me on the train down to Melb - I will catch you somewhere downstream!

Anyone know clear spot where the trail meets the zoo in case we split up? No biggie.

Anyone know a good spot in Docklands with bike room to meet up after? Or we can wing it.

If you want to print a copy of the route notes here you go:
http://www.bv.com.au/media/vanilla/file ... %20map.pdf

[adrian_sm]

The best place to meet at the zoo would be directly in front of the Royal Park train station, near the back entrance to the zoo.
The bike track crosses the train tracks here, and anyone lazy and training or driving in to catch up will find this easy enough.

I don't know docklands that well, but have been to the James Squire Brewhouse. Vaguely remember there being an outdoor area under cover. Should be able to find enough room to stash the bikes there or in eye site. And I don't mind the Squire's Amber Ale.

Ah, found a photo. Should do as a meeting place at the least.

[Samd]

Those photos make me thirsty! Let's do it. Have amended the plan to officially include beer. Which feels good.

[adrian_sm]

[Samd]

Stop it! Just took a ride to Aldi with the wife (bought a nice pannier set and bags for 39 bucks). I am thirsty and could drink a whole bakfiets of beer...

[adrian_sm]

"bakfiets" ? I had that look that one up

[ElectricEd]

That's a triple bypass in a plate!

I'll take the ale.

[adrian_sm]

We are in Victoria. I had to post a "Parma and Pot"

[Timbo]

Looks like I won't be able to make it this time. Please keep in the loop for future rides. I hope the wet weather holds off until later in the day. Enjoy!

[Samd]

1033 watt hours all charged and ready to roll. Looks like the forecast is showing a bit more rain than this morning, but I'm gonna get on the train and go for it...
See ya then.

[adrian_sm]

See ya @ Fed Square.

[Kepler]

I am ready to roll. Stand back, 500W of vicious friction drive power ready to roll. Got 360 W/hrs onboard and a raincoat.

[ElectricEd]

A big thanks to Sam for organising a great ride! A fantastic itinery which included an early lunch at a former convent which had really good ale. There were a few detours due to works so we had to not let the thread between us get too stretched out. What is it about bike tracks? They seem to be designed to confuse. Soon we were past the zoo and before we knew it we were going along the tollway and almost back to the start. eBiking on the flats is a breeze.
The range of ebike designs were extraordinary. Adrian and Kepler's minimalist RC friction drives that really packed a punch , brushed dc motors with chain drive, Bafang geared motors done in the most discrete way and my old 408 with an in-your-face humungous battery box.
It brought it home to me that I should really get out more. The inspiration to be gained from seeing other designs is invaluable.

The ride finished at Fed square followed by another ale. Wonders, will this ebike socialising thing be bad for the liver?
Thank you all for a great day. We must do something like this again.

[adrian_sm]

Yeah. Great day. The rain managed to stay away, which was nice. In fact I got a bit sunburnt, must remember to slap on the sunscreen next time.

It was great to put faces to names, and see all the different types of motors:
- direct drive hub
- geared hub
- geared through the cranks brushed
- friction drives

And different batteries:
- SLA
- LiFePo4
- LiPo's

It was a very leisurely pace, to keep everyone together, which made for pretty efficient economy stats. I ended up only using 240wh including ride to and from the meet up point. I had the video camera rolling as did full-throttle, so we should be able to splice together something that doesn't bore everyone to death.

Thanks again Sam for making the effort to get our lazy arses out on the track together.

Let's do it again in the new year.

Adrian

[adrian_sm]

Oh and dirtying didn't get a chance to say goodbye AussieRider.

[Kepler]

Very enjoyable social ride around the perimeter of the Melbourne CBD. Great to meet some new faces and catch up with ES friends previously made.

I really liked the diversity of equipment and a chance to compare the various bike's characteristics in a group situation.

The Aprilia and Wheel chair drive setup were very interesting to see as I had only read about these previously. Ed's 408 equipped bike was nice a solid build and simply got the job done without fuss.

Full-throttle and Ben were both running light weight geared hub motors on around 48V. Both these bikes were quite minimalistic in the way they were setup which I really like. These geared hub motors are really hard to beat when it comes to the type of riding we were doing. Great range of speed, excellent efficiency, and together with their free wheel ability, still easy to pedal as a normal bike.

And finally the two friction drives. We might have had the most stealthy setups but there was no hiding when under power . Very pleased with how the friction drives stacked up against the other bikes in the group. I found I was a bit slower in getting away off the mark. Also negotiating some of the bridges and switchbacks meant that pedal power only could be used. However, on the open flowing paths, the little friction drives really came into their own with plenty of speed and efficiency on tap.

My economy wasn't quite as good as Adrian with me using 360 w/hrs for a total of 55km. I think I did a bit less pedalling though.

Thanks Sam for organising the day. Had a great time and look forward to doing it again in the near future.