The Inaugural Electric Bicycle Race

[woody]

Gidday fellas,

I have been reading this site for a while.

And I looooooove it with a capital O.

I am getting together a wee race in NZ. In Christchurch to be precise.

I had been stupidly chatting in another subject. I truly apologise. That's over.

I will hold it here in Chch, however, it can be global. All honest operator's, with sensible invigilation will be accepted.

We hold the race on the same weekend, and we be honest, and we set the same standards, and we find out what, and why. Cool.

Or maybe I am dreaming. Maybe I should trust no-one. Maybe I should just keep my data secret.

No way. Let's race. Globally without travel.

Any takers?

Some of the categories I am thinking of are,

1. Quarter Mile . Unlimited Category except you must be able to pedal one km on the flat non-stop to prove it is a cycle within a time as yet undecided.

2. 20k under 20k. The first to reach 20km where the total cycle weight = less than 20kg. This leads to different cats, see 3.

3. as 2 but with no pedals and rider weight calc and rebalance.

4. as 2 but costs less than $1K NZD.

5. First to 100km with less than 25kg cycle.

6. First to 500km with less than 30kg cycle.

Lets do it......

Morgan

 

[safe]

Moved From Rewinding thread...

The marathon is always a popular race at the Olympics.

What is racing supposed to mean?

Obviously something like a marathon is not about excitement and speed, but endurance and strategy. Races like the Tour De France do have high speed sections (the downhills) but very little time is gained there. In typical bicycle racing the flats and the downhills do not allow much time difference to take place and it's only the uphills where an advantage can be made.

Most of this is all because of aerodynamics, on the flat you can sit in the middle of the pack of riders and just be pulled along. Now in electric bike racing you have at your disposal as much as 750 watts of power and the ability to not pedal and be in a tight tuck if you so choose. This means that more speed can be had on the straight aways and the downhills get really really fast. There becomes a point where someone who has better bike handling skills can all of a sudden gain a lead and hold it because top speed is not limited by human exhaustion to the same degree. Since we are not bound by classic bike rules there's no reason not to add fairings to the bike since they improve the performance exponentially.

So I think we all need to rethink what an electric bicycle race could mean. All the old logic that went with pedal only bicycles gets thrown out the window as new strategies are going to emerge. The value of maintaining a constant high speed takes on a new importance and the pack bunching tendency is going to get broken up a little more.

Electric bicycle racing has the potential to be more like a true "road racing" event rather than a bicycle marathon. In a sense all the bicycle races (except BMX or Downhill Mountain Biking) are marathon races.

Will Electric Bicycle Road Racing start to resemble BMX and Downhill Mountain Biking or will it resemble classic street racing?

That is the question...

-----------------------------

If you set the limit of power on the motor then things will natually go towards a more BMX and Downhill Mountain Biking direction because once you use the energy in producing forward motion you are going to want to hang onto that momentum through the turns. That means knee dragging excitement. If you place the limit on the battery capacity then it will go more towards the marathon mindset and the skill will be about conserving energy and that (to many) means some pretty slow racing without much passion.

Obviously I am biased in favor of passionate and exciting racing.

 

[safe]

20K

I think 20K sounds like a good distance. Most ebikes can go about that far at full power before the battery starts to run low.

You should go with your New Zealand ebike laws:

"Vehicles with motor output power of less than 300W are classified as "not a motor vehicle". Such electric bicycles must comply with the same rules as bicycles."

...and just race based on that.

------------------------------------

As a practical matter you are going to get two groups of people that show up. There are going to be the people with fairly stock street legal ebikes, then you are going to get those that have tricked their bikes out to be essentially electric motorcycles. I'd suggest two classes:

Stock Unmodified (New Zealand Legal) - Pretty much a legal ebike for your country.

Open Modified - All the crazy contraptions that people have modified so that they no longer resemble the bikes they started as. The only rule should be that the bike had to have started as an ebike somehow. (no Etek motors or PMG132's)

...as the saying goes "Keep It Simple Stupid" (KISS). In general for a first racing experience you need to keep the rules simple. I'd drop all the weight rules, that's just getting too complicated.

 

[woody]

weight

If you limit weight then me thinks you limit nothing but technology advancement.

Limit cost and weight then you make it available.

Just a thought............

 

[woody]

Oh and by the way, I reckon I can win all cats except number 4 with the same cycle..........

Number 4 is the one I want to win though........

I guess life is like that.....

 

[safe]

The highest availability is going to be with bikes that are stock.

By having a purely stock class (no modifications allowed) then that takes care of a big chunk of the riders.

In the modified classes the field is too wide open for setting all sorts of crazy rules. Just let the bikes show up and see what happens. The first races are like testing beds for new ideas, this is how ideas form and evolve.

Eventually there will either be power side limits (circuits) or battery side limits (circuits). With electronics very high precision is possible with custom designed circuits for this sort of thing, so down the road when the race sponsors can afford to make and provide them it will make things more official.

But now is not the time to be laying too many laws on the scant number of ebikers in existance. When you start to get 200 racers at an event then you can start to filter them out by setting rules. Set the rules too strict now and people will give up and not race.

 

[woody]

I guess you won't be racing then?

 

[safe]

I live in the US... New Zealand is on the other side of the world for me. (too expensive to get there)

My bike is designed for the US 750 watt limit.

 

[woody]

The rules are that we hold the race world-wide. Wattage is no issue for me. We can have higher weight if it suits you.

I hold one race here. You hold one there. Someone holds one in Blackpool? etc etc.

We all have fun, don't lie and learn summink?

It will be tough but fun.

If you don't want to, fair enough. But I sure as **** do want to.

Let's get better. Let's share. Let's learn. Let's have fun and kick ***.

Licensed invigilators will ensure fairness. You could be one.


Just a thought.......

 

[safe]

Using The KISS Principle

Well, international racing rules are going to be a little tricky when America has a 750 watt power limit, Canada 500 watts, New Zealand 300 watts, Europe and Australia 250 watts.

The easiest way is with a universal power limitation circuit that the sponsors of the event provide and that connects to your throttle and attaches a sensor to the battery wires. Whenever the circuit reads a total combined power level (volts * amps) above the limit allowed then it pulls the throttle down. I've built circuits that do similiar things like this, but it's a little harder to do the multiplication of volts and amps without needing a microchip.

So the "easy" KISS way to solve the problem is with a circuit.

But that involves some minor investment of money at a time when money is not exactly flowing that well. It makes more sense to set these ideas in motion now and then some years down the road get them implemented.

Motor Limited or Battery Limited?

Eventually one might think a decision needs to be made that divides the motor power limited (fast, exciting) racing with the battery side limiting (strategic, philosophical, marathon mindset) racing.

But maybe not...

In a perfect world you could have BOTH styles of racing at the same event. The speed demons use the power limitation and the endurance people use the battery limitation. That way you could get both styles satisfied. Maybe the speed demons race for 20K and the endurance folks race for 100K, that way the two styles are allowed to demonstrate themselves in their best display venue.

Anyway... I think for the here and now it's just going to be a sloppy collection of ebikers showing up with whatever they have and seeing what happens. You need to build these racing organizations up over many years. Things tend to not happen overnight.