Aussie 200 Watt Limit Thread

On Friday the 14 th of December, NSW made the regulatory changes to allow Pedelecs meeting EN15194 to be used on NSW roads; NSW Road Transport (Vehicle Registration)

Amendment (Power-Assisted Pedal Cycles) Regulation 2012

Under the Road Transport (Vehicle Registration) Act 1997

QLD is also a go.

So now your stealths are road legal..... or something :lol:
 
t3sla said:
So now your stealths are road legal..... or something :lol:
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I think they're firmly in the "or something" category ! :lol:
They can stick their extra 50w and pedalec/no throttle rules, I'll keep to my lowly 200w ebikes thanks :p
There are a few good points that would give us much more freedom but they are outweighed by all the other rediculous constraints and requirements. I'd like to see someone checking my 18ah 30C lipo battery for compliance with the EN ruling. Go ahead fellas, short out that battery that can happily deliver 500+ amps until the cows come home. I'll just wait over here... :lol:
 
What are the EN rulings for battery packs?
 
The whole document is here if you have a spare few hours.

http://www.vae-enov.com/fiches_2010/norme_en_15194.pdf

It's quite comprehensive and I can see why the govt has adopted these guidelines. Someone's probably taken one look at it and said "yeah looks like someone's put alot of work into this, we'll just use that" :|

Relevant battery tests that would end in tears for most bikes:

4.2.2.2 Test method
1) Battery terminals are short-circuited with the batteries in a fully charged condition.
2) Motor terminals are short-circuited; all commands are in ON position, whilst the batteries are fully
charged.
3) The EPAC is operated with the electric motor or drive system locked up so as to fully discharge the
battery or until the system stops.
4) The battery is charged for double the recommended charging period or for 24 hours depending upon
which is the longest period.


4.2.3.7 Mechanical strength
EPAC shall have adequate mechanical strength and be constructed to withstand such rough handling that
may be expected in normal use. Compliance is checked by:
 applying impacts to the battery pack mounted on the EPAC by means of the spring hammer as specified
in IEC 60068-2-75. The battery pack is rigidly supported and three impacts are applied to every point of
the enclosure that is likely to be weak with an impact energy of (0,7 ± 0,05) J. After the test the battery
pack shall show no damage that could impair compliance with this European Standard;
 detachable battery packs are submitted to free fall at a height of 0,90 meter in three different positions.
After the test the battery pack shall show no damage that could lead to emission of dangerous substances
(gas or liquid) ignition, fire or overheating.
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megacycle said:
What are the EN rulings for battery packs?
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For starters there is a drop test, so that would easily and hilariously not end well for most..

Think super troops, meow is this road legal?
Drops battery from one meter test high.
Guess not.
Puts back on aviators.

BTW that test is for EN accreditation, not field compliance validity.
 
Im imagining a falconev triangle bag, with that spring loaded hammer sideways flattening a lipo flightmax pouch pack, first blow :shock:

Some of these rule makers need the hammer test to the head, Don't mess with the law, the law messes with you.
 
Most of these issues could be engineered out fairly easily, except for the 2.5kW motor were the 250W should be :p, ohh forgot about the sticky label :p
 
There was chatter about portable dynos being made for NSW police to carry in the boot of their cars, that was awhile ago now don't know what became of it if anything ?

CA limiting should work fine, you can also limit some controllers directly
The Ifineons for example can be programmed for several power settings,
A low and legal power set-up along with a high speed :: cough:: "offroad"
Setting accessed by the flick of a "hidden" switch, or better yet a remote like a car alarm could be used, actually spoke with Lyen about doing this on a controller IIRC he said our
It's doable...food for thought ...

KiM
 
AussieJester said:
There was chatter about portable dynos being made for NSW police to carry in the boot of their cars, that was awhile ago now don't know what became of it if anything ?

CA limiting should work fine, you can also limit some controllers directly
The Ifineons for example can be programmed for several power settings,
A low and legal power set-up along with a high speed :: cough:: "offroad"
Setting accessed by the flick of a "hidden" switch, or better yet a remote like a car alarm could be used, actually spoke with Lyen about doing this on a controller IIRC he said our
It's doable...food for thought ...

KiM
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Wow thats a fair bit of work and training for the NSW police to bring the dynos around with them. Are Electric bikes that much of an issue in the scheme of things though? Its the only thing I can see that is

In the back of my mind I am thinking of selling my chopper due to the attention it draws, but at the same time I wouldn't want to ride around in anything else. Eventually I may need to get a 250w 36v rear hub system. 25km an hour is so slow though :( Technically is the setting on the CA a reasonable solution if it was pulled over or would they request that it had a 250w motor? Its a lot of work to find one in my wheel size (and very expensive) so i'd prefer to get something a bit higher powered and restrict it.

I think I need to get my pedalec system on eventually too (maybe that could have a switch too lol)

I'm also curious how the dyno that they use will suit the varied amounts of bikes available. How do they test it with a pedalec system too I wonder.
 
AussieJester said:
There was chatter about portable dynos being made for NSW police to carry in the boot of their cars, that was awhile ago now don't know what became of it if anything ?

KiM
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Yeah, It was me who explained that an aquaintance University graduate Engineer had taken on a job with the NSW RTA in designing the prototype dynometer for ebikes. He left that job before the prototype was completed so I have no updates regarding what has happened since then.
 
Be interesting from a lot of perspectives to know what's happening with that dyno.
 
Its self defeating to limit say a 750W motor to mainly run at 250W.
 
megacycle said:
Its self defeating to limit say a 750W motor to mainly run at 250W.
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That is very true, it would be nice though to be able to 'adjust' when required.

I'm in 2 minds atm with getting attention. I'm thinking of getting a mountain bike in the hopes to draw less attention, but then again anything going faster than the average bike would pick up attention.

Its interesting that I haven't seen many stories of people being pulled over on here, yet there are quite a few of us electric enthusiasts.
 
chopper_elec said:
Its interesting that I haven't seen many stories of people being pulled over on here, yet there are quite a few of us electric enthusiasts.
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And as long as we don't get drunk drivers hooning around at 80km/h in 3kw+ bikes, I think it will stay that way. If police start catching on that people who have lost their licence have moved from the 50cc motors to electric motors, I think we'll all get a bit more attention. That, and possibly one death in the media will do it.
 
Go for a beach cruiser still has the rexlaed form factor. Rev bikes has one, works a treat.

NSW are the most active state when it cones to ebike policing, in the end it could probably be just one person spearheading a crusade against ebikes...
 
Sunder said:
chopper_elec said:
Its interesting that I haven't seen many stories of people being pulled over on here, yet there are quite a few of us electric enthusiasts.
Click to expand...

And as long as we don't get drunk drivers hooning around at 80km/h in 3kw+ bikes, I think it will stay that way. If police start catching on that people who have lost their licence have moved from the 50cc motors to electric motors, I think we'll all get a bit more attention. That, and possibly one death in the media will do it.
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Yeah it wouldn't take much unfortunately. I still find myself preferring to ride the chopper bike than something else, i'd even go to the extent of sticking with 250w and pedalec than riding something that drew less attention that had a different feel.

I am so relaxed riding on the chopper bike, its such an awesome sensation being so low to the ground. I think the inclusion of pedalec would remind me to pedal.

My biggest problem at the moment is the gearing on the Chopper bike means that anything more than 30-35km an hour means that I get to a point where the bike is moving so fast that I physically couldn't pedal any faster (3-4 Revolutions a second). So for me to even be able to pedal at that speed I look absolutely rediculous. I might need to get either a new crank or freewheel. I think I am limited to how small I can get the freewheel. I think its as small as it can get. At the same time I couldn't run a bigger chainring as it would start touching the chainring cover.
 
chopper_elec said:
My biggest problem at the moment is the gearing on the Chopper bike means that anything more than 30-35km an hour means that I get to a point where the bike is moving so fast that I physically couldn't pedal any faster (3-4 Revolutions a second). So for me to even be able to pedal at that speed I look absolutely rediculous. I might need to get either a new crank or freewheel. I think I am limited to how small I can get the freewheel. I think its as small as it can get. At the same time I couldn't run a bigger chainring as it would start touching the chainring cover.
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I just ordered a 48T Front, and a 11T rear. This is up from my 44T front, 14T rear.

My old top speed was about 40km/h and that was pedaling furiously. Hopefully this will be good for up to 50km/h.
 
Sunder said:
chopper_elec said:
My biggest problem at the moment is the gearing on the Chopper bike means that anything more than 30-35km an hour means that I get to a point where the bike is moving so fast that I physically couldn't pedal any faster (3-4 Revolutions a second). So for me to even be able to pedal at that speed I look absolutely rediculous. I might need to get either a new crank or freewheel. I think I am limited to how small I can get the freewheel. I think its as small as it can get. At the same time I couldn't run a bigger chainring as it would start touching the chainring cover.
Click to expand...

I just ordered a 48T Front, and a 11T rear. This is up from my 44T front, 14T rear.

My old top speed was about 40km/h and that was pedaling furiously. Hopefully this will be good for up to 50km/h.
Click to expand...

Oh wow thanks for that. I might look a bit less crazy this way haha.

Could I ask where you got the 48t and 11t from?

I appreciate that heaps :)
 
chopper_elec said:
Sunder said:
chopper_elec said:
My biggest problem at the moment is the gearing on the Chopper bike means that anything more than 30-35km an hour means that I get to a point where the bike is moving so fast that I physically couldn't pedal any faster (3-4 Revolutions a second). So for me to even be able to pedal at that speed I look absolutely rediculous. I might need to get either a new crank or freewheel. I think I am limited to how small I can get the freewheel. I think its as small as it can get. At the same time I couldn't run a bigger chainring as it would start touching the chainring cover.
Click to expand...

I just ordered a 48T Front, and a 11T rear. This is up from my 44T front, 14T rear.

My old top speed was about 40km/h and that was pedaling furiously. Hopefully this will be good for up to 50km/h.
Click to expand...

Oh wow thanks for that. I might look a bit less crazy this way haha.

Could I ask where you got the 48t and 11t from?

I appreciate that heaps :)
Click to expand...

The 48T was bought from www.bicyclestore.com.au, mainly because of shipping. They're local, and all of my kit together weighed a fair bit. They didn't have a screw on 11T though, so I had to get that elsewhere.

The 11T was bought from ebikes.ca. They were a bit more expensive than a lot of the other places, but I knew it was a place I could trust.
 
If you're not short of cash get yourself a schlumpf. With the 1.6x gearing they're the bees knees for pedalling at high speed.

And yea I can't really see the whole portable dyno thing catching on. If they're going to go to those sort of lengths then back it up with a sensible additional moped class (and use the dyno to enforce it)
 
Hyena said:
If you're not short of cash get yourself a schlumpf. With the 1.6x gearing they're the bees knees for pedalling at high speed.

And yea I can't really see the whole portable dyno thing catching on. If they're going to go to those sort of lengths then back it up with a sensible additional moped class (and use the dyno to enforce it)
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The costs behind the infrastructure would outweigh the benefits 10 fold, considering each dyno would eventually need to be calibrated and serviced. Also finding a power source would mean that every vehicle would need this to be installed.

In the scheme of things in my weekend rides and daily, I do see the odd Electric BIcycle but they are so subtle (especially with no noise being made) that it always will be a hard thing to govern when compared to Petrol powered versions which could be heard by just putting down your window in the car (or sometimes even up).

Personally I always have it in the back of my mind, whether my "250 watt" motor will end up pulling 250w when required doh. But at the same time its like that Police car that I went past that didn't pull me up as I crossed the road, I was pedalling with human power and it looked very obvious but I was technically not doing anything wrong at the time.
 
All this stuff about dynos kinda has me thinking... I'll bet there are some whizz bang bicycle TRAINERS out there that a cyclist can clip their bike into jump on n peddle away and get readouts on power...

I am considering hunting one down cos personally n from a business perspective I am dead keen on knowing what power is put out at the wheel of various builds I do or come across...

Now I know that our top olympic sprinter has been dynoed at 2kw plus, and truth be told, an appropriate load running off a set of trainer rollers, say something like a pully driven generator dumping current through a bath heater... with known paramaters will give some kinda good power indication... but dont get me started down that route cos I can always make something wierd scienc that you tell power output via measuring a raise in tmmperature of a bucket of water... BUT... I would much prefer it if I could get Power output readings from a dinky little roller cycling trainer thing and I would be well surprised if they are not out there...

They'd be real portable and easy to put in the boot of a car... and the boys in blue only need to show that you are greater than Xwatts (assuming adoption of Jay's Moped class) and if you are within certain tolerances of the cycling trainer, definately off scale, well alright fella your bike is impounded and we can get it tested properly... yaddah yadday three months waiting yaddah costs yaddah...

Hmmm wonder if I "advised" the Transport Authority on an "easy portable way to test the output of an e-bike" and they became adopted as an idea whether that makes me some kinda pariah worthy turncoat traitor...On the other hand... landing a gov't contract like that I could have Pies WITH Sauce every night and I would be KING!

(and rule the world Mwahahahaha!)
:D
Joe
 
Pies with sauce. Yeah nice. Meanwhile we can just walk home? Lol. I'm going for the legal limit power switch atm and when I get my ttl USB cable to upgrade firm ware in my CA v3 I'll set that up to change mode at the push of a button so it will be like the situation of : most cars can break the speed limit but its only ileagle if they do. My ebike can rak the power limit law but how can they prove I was? And I am pretty fit so that would make my argument easyer to win
 
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