1 month off-road trip in Chile : which ebike ?

Jil

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Just a (vague) project for the moment, I plan to go to northern Chile 1 month for an electric bike trip with my girlfriend.
As much gravel roads and trails as possible.

The idea will be to use very light electrical assistance, being able to travel 2 days in a row without charging (150-200km and up to 2000m D+).
I have made several ebike trips alone, but at relatively high speed with good assistance, let’s say 10 Wh/km.
Here the average consumption should be 3-4 Wh/km max, with 7-800 Wh battery (7-8 Ligo) for each bike. So it would have to be a light and wise use of the electrical assistance.

The goal of this trip would also be to test the (dis)advantages of ebike on long travels.

I have 2 questions:

1/ For such a low consumption target, does an ebike still make sense, or we would better use a liguter classic bike without motor ?

2/ What would be the best combo motor/bike for this ? I already have my Surly Krampus with GMAC. But ideally I would prefer to have 2 identical bikes and motors with inner freewheel (to be able to use them even with empty batteries). I see also an advantage to mid-drive for long and steep hills and offroad use.
—> So my current idea is to equip 2 fatbikes with a BBS02 36V (for example this one : https://silverbackbikes.de/products/scoop-delight, which is suitable for rear rack) to pass easily, not necessarily fast, everywhere including the sandy trails.
—> Alternatively, 27.5+ bikes (full rigid) with Bafang G310.

Your thoughts and advices ? :D
 
So my current idea is to equip 2 fatbikes with a BBS02 36V (for example this one : https://silverbackbikes.de/products/scoop-delight, which is suitable for rear rack) to pass easily, not necessarily fast, everywhere including the sandy trails.

Hm, I don't off the road much myself, but ... would you want to put your girlfriend on something like that and expect her to pedal up a steep trail? (For all I know she may be the stronger cyclist, but I'm just trying to invoke some rational though here.) Huge tires, small single chainring? It might be a good ride for typical off-road (i.e., street illegal) assist, but that isn't what your experiment is about. Of course, neither is it about a plain human powered ride, but in many ways that seems like more fun to me.
 
Sounds like a good adventure but my vote is for #1. Main reason being that if you only can alot 3/4 wh/km into your plan then the added weight of the battery and motor would be a disadvantage as you would probably make just as much forward progress on a conventional bike given it was loaded the same with your necessary to live items.

I find 3" tires to be sufficient for the sand I ride and that wider tires in deeper sand can really effect the wh/km ratio. Given that you are not in a huge hurry walking some sections would be best with or wtihout a motor to save energy.....all this not to mention the complexity of shipping eBikes to a foreign country to begin with.
 
It would be a one-way bike trip for the ebike. as it would be too heavy and costly to ship it all back. Chile people would love to have an e-bike like that as the high tariffs to get Chinese stuff in the country is hard to bear.
okay okay Chile has open shipping from United States that is for personal items that are used and below $3,500 usd so as not for resale don't know or could be like Mexico you can take your car down there but you can't sell it leave it and come back you need to come back in the car you came in.About shipping lithium but you have to ship the bikes ahead of time I would think. do you happen to have a friend or a place you can ship this stuff to then no it's there then bring your batteries on the airplane somehow or even ship your battery I don't know but we have a free trade allowance with chile. Iust don't go over your allowance. I guess.
Clue just don't duct tape them to yourself as in midnight Run with those wires poking out of those Ligo's .
 
Bigwheel said:
all this not to mention the complexity of shipping eBikes to a foreign country to begin with.
That’s why I was thinking about Ligo batteries, which you can pack with you in the plane.
 
Bigwheel said:
Main reason being that if you only can alot 3/4 wh/km into your plan then the added weight of the battery and motor would be a disadvantage as you would probably make just as much forward progress on a conventional bike given it was loaded the same with your necessary to live items.
Even if we limit the use of motors to strong headwind or hills, the ebike makes no sense here from your point of view ?
My experience of a classic MTB trip (400 kms in the French Alps) was tough, moving a loaded bike a steep roads and trails was too hard to really enjoy the ride.
 
If you depend on an e-bike rather than a pedal bike, you will get stranded. Your plan is to use this tech for something it's no good at yet.

So, go for it if that's what you really want. But have a plan for when you get stranded.
 
Chalo said:
If you depend on an e-bike rather than a pedal bike, you will get stranded. Your plan is to use this tech for something it's no good at yet.
Why should we get stranded ?
It’s a matter of reliability and battery management.
The idea is actually to have bikes that we can pedal without battery (motors with inner freewheel), to avoid getting stuck in case of empty batteries.
 
Jil said:
Chalo said:
If you depend on an e-bike rather than a pedal bike, you will get stranded. Your plan is to use this tech for something it's no good at yet.
Why should we get stranded ?
It’s a matter of reliability and battery management.
The idea is actually to have bikes that we can pedal without battery (motors with inner freewheel), to avoid getting stuck in case of empty batteries.

You just named one part ("inner freewheel"/motor clutch) that isn't as reliable as the equivalent part of a pedal bike, and which a Chilean bike shop will not have. Same with the pedal clutch. Same with any number of other parts that will halt your progress when they fail.

Chile is famously mountainous. It won't be in the lowlands that you run completely out of battery energy or burn up a motor; it will be up in some pass with a long hard way to go.

So... have a plan for when you get stranded.
 
The problem here is, that low of an assist will only cancel out the weight of the battery and motor, or maybe even less.

If you do solve the issues of getting the thing in and out of the country, you are just going to use more battery than you are planning on, and need charging plugs more often than you are dreaming of. Its a situation that might make you look at renting a couple scooters or tiny motorcycles. If making the trip green is the goal, you need to sail a boat there. After that flight, you gonna save the world by e biking a few weeks?

But you will appreciate full electric power, particularly in the form of a mid drive, when you get to that steep mountain.

If you go there to live, another thing entirely. Then you could build a bike with the power of a small motorcycle, and range enough for long trips from a home base.
 
It seems to me that you have the tool at hand, your current bike setup, to figure out for yourself if it would work? You already have done some test tripping with your setup at low, 10wh/mi, use of power but load your bike with the amount of weight you anticipate needing for your Chile adventure perhaps and try riding that in terrain you would expect to find in Chile at the even lower wh/mi consumption you are looking for? You wouldn't have to go on a long trip either to find a wh/mi average.

At that low amount you would probably only be using 100 or so watts and I know that through your CA3 you can set it up so that it will limit to that amount so that you don't have to worry about exceeding it. At least that is how Robbie helped me to set mine up at increments of 250w.
 
I found it possible to carry 50 pounds of cargo, 30 pounds of battery, and my 200 pound ass on 250w average. This would be up and over a medium size mountain, but then another 50 miles on the flat, with no wind. But if the ride did not have that long flat spot to make up the average wattage, I would have been at typical usage for a camping gear loaded cargo e bike, 400-600w. This ride never exceeded 15 mph, except on the coast down the mountain. Slow means you can pedal up a lot of the wattage you need. The total watts including my pedaling was around 325, I could not keep up 100w for long.

He's talking about way less power on average. Obviously he's more able to pedal up 100 or more watts than I am, but he's got to put a lot of effort into pedaling with no assist at all, in order to use it up hills and stay with that low a watthours per mile.

Good advice to just do the testing before the trip, then adjust your plans to meet realistic expectations, for you and the cargo on similar grades of hills. One option might be a larger trailer with solar panels on it.
 
OTG get real.
Take her on a real vacation before you get kidnapped with you're expensive eBikes luring in a Chilean man hunter.
 
Stealth_Chopper said:
OTG get real.
Take her on a real vacation before you get kidnapped with you're expensive eBikes luring in a Chilean man hunter.

Chileans are generally less scummy and criminal than USA people. I'm sure you can find trouble anywhere if you look hard enough, but El Salvador it ain't.
 
dogman dan said:
The problem here is, that low of an assist will only cancel out the weight of the battery and motor, or maybe even less.
100 watts of power already provide much more than what is necessary to cover the additional weight and drag.

dogman dan said:
Its a situation that might make you look at renting a couple scooters or tiny motorcycles. If making the trip green is the goal, you need to sail a boat there. After that flight, you gonna save the world by e biking a few weeks?
I have already travelled a lot by motorbike (from Spain to Siberia, then entire Australia), and also with bike and ebike (smaller trips, though !). I like the idea to travel slowly by bike but keeping the ride enjoyable in any conditions (which is not the case on a loaded bike without a motor on steeps hills or with strong headwind). In such case the motor is here only to give some help when needed.
So, yes, renting 2 motorbikes is an option, but not my favorite one ;)
 
Understand, e bike touring can be really fun. I see so much more at 15 mph, than I do on my BMW. But the problems of getting batteries shipped is pretty real. And it will take more battery than you can put in airplane carry on baggage.

Testing will tell, see what riding in mountains takes you for power. What you have talked about won't do much more that cancel the weight of the motor and battery. Bigger battery than you are thinking about, so more weight than your ride around town bike. Think in terms of 20 wh per mile average So a 1000 wh battery that actually delivers 900 takes you 45 miles. Plugs might be much farther apart than that in Chile. But again, load up your bike with everything you need. Don't forget the two gallons per person of water you need, 15 pounds worth, and ride around. See how far you really go, when your route is up BIG mountains. It might be 50 miles all uphill.

Its kind of like pulling the thread on a sweater. Oh, plugs might be 80 miles apart, that means a 30 pound battery. Oh, not much drinking water either, now I have to carry 15 pounds of water. I know you are strong, but at some point it just gets to where if you are that strong, get a good cargo bike geared to ride 3 mph. Save yourself the 50 pounds of motor and battery, and the shipping battery problems.

As for riding around in South America, its a lot less dangerous than thinking, " Hey, I'll ride my bike around Sinaloa Mexico." That's a place to avoid.
 
dogman dan said:
Understand, e bike touring can be really fun. I see so much more at 15 mph, than I do on my BMW. But the problems of getting batteries shipped is pretty real. And it will take more battery than you can put in airplane carry on baggage.

Testing will tell, see what riding in mountains takes you for power. What you have talked about won't do much more that cancel the weight of the motor and battery. Bigger battery than you are thinking about, so more weight than your ride around town bike. Think in terms of 20 wh per mile average So a 1000 wh battery that actually delivers 900 takes you 45 miles. Plugs might be much farther apart than that in Chile.
Thanks for your advices. But 20 Wh/mile seems a lot to me. Fully loaded in mountainous areas, with a good assist and no speed limit (and up to 270 km in a day), I was consumming around 10 Wh/km with my GMAC (so around 15 Wh/mile). I think we can go lower if we limit our speed to 25 kph/15 mph and remain reasonnable with the assistance on hills.
As for the battery, it seems that 6 to 8 Ligo should be possible in carry-on luggages, dixit Grin. But you never know if it will pass or not...
Nevertheless, you're right, we have to test it more extensively, I agree.
Anyways, it's still under discussion, and the Chilean trip will perhaps become a Moroccan Atlas trip :wink: Closer to home, with smaller distances between plugs, and really beautiful (I have done it by motorbike already)
 
If I average just below 24 kph and peddle all the time but not hard. I'm using my PAS at 75w -150w end up with a average of 9w/km. This would count hitting the throttle a few times not very much.

I have had averages as low as 4w/km but that is turning off pas when going below 16 kph on flat ground. Do ride at higher speeds at times and use as much as 20w/mi.

Depends how you ride and hills.
 
Definitely can pedal harder than I can. But you may be thinking of mountains that you climb, that are shorter climbs than they have in Chile. There are some high plateaus up there that look just like the flat parts of Arizona. The problem is, you enter the country near the coast most likely, and only have 15,000 vertical feet of climbing up to that plateau. Few plugs in the places where it rains once a decade. Nobody can live there unless its a mine that can pay to import everything a human needs. Get a ride in a truck or bus on the big climb to the plateau could be one solution.

Morocco would be a lot more doable by e bike. See the more recent Ewan Macgregor tv series, Long Way Up. They rode Patagonia to California on electric motorcycles. They had some good charging places set up ahead of time, but for some sections with big climbs, a bit far apart. Patagonia was the worst, but the big desert was pretty uninhabited.

I still think if your battery is small enough to fly with, its not going to do for tours in huge mountains, and uninhabitable deserts. But out there in the big nowhere, Ewan and Charlie still ran into hard core guys with cargo bikes and no assist. You may be strong enough for that, or strong enough to carry motors around you rarely use. I need assist that lasts to the top of a mountain, 10 to 20 miles long, to ride in the rocky mountains. Tiny bumps compared to Chile. Set up a place to ship a new battery to South America should be your best bet. The bike without battery can fly baggage. Or be built when you get there even. Just fly with the motor system.
 
Would want regen on a ride like that. would recover part of the effort up hill. Power that low would only use it for climbing the rest of the time you would be carrying it.
 
Regen would be great on a trip with a lot of daily up and down, foothills kind of terrain. If it's 10 days always up, 1 day back down ... there might be some value in it anyway.
 
ZeroEm said:
Would want regen on a ride like that.
Sure. But the problem is that if you empty your batteries, you have the drag of your motor to haul...
 
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