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Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by jandrese on Thursday January 23, 2025 @12:13PM (#42805827)
That's a quite a look, looks a bit like something from the Fallout universe. I'm a bit surprised at the "pedaling charges the batteries" bullet point. That's extremely rare in the e-bike world. 25,000 mph top speed seems somewhat optimistic however.
Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by speerer on Thursday January 23, 2025 @12:18PM (#42805877)
This made me smile, but I looked it up anyway and it turns out it's a non-SI abbreviation for kilometres per hour.

https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/kmph

Not common in my country, the UK, but maybe in India? I know the Indian language numbering system has different number groupings, so why not.

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by joseda-hg on Thursday January 23, 2025 @12:35PM (#42806008)
I mean, miles are so rare for non English speakers, that it didn't register to me as weird
Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by bryanlarsen on Thursday January 23, 2025 @12:40PM (#42806061)
The correct abbreviation is "km/h", so kmph is closer to the correct one than kph. kph seems like a measure of insane acidity.
Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by Y-bar on Thursday January 23, 2025 @03:39PM (#42807834)
If it's about bikes it's obviously about pressure of the tires: kph means kilo-pascal hours. In other words, accumulated pressure over time.
Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by lostlogin on Friday January 24, 2025 @03:44AM (#42811534)
This sounds like the opposite of my bikes, where the pressure vanishes suddenly, too often.
Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by aarroyoc on Thursday January 23, 2025 @12:41PM (#42806064)
> I assume it means 25 kph top speed, which is on the slower side for e-bikes.

This is the maximum speed for an e-bike in many European countries

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by masklinn on Thursday January 23, 2025 @12:44PM (#42806103)
slightly more nuanced, it’s the maximum speed for assistance to be classified as a pedelec.
Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by netsharc on Thursday January 23, 2025 @12:45PM (#42806117)
25000 meters per hour would be 25 km/h...
Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by moffkalast on Thursday January 23, 2025 @02:17PM (#42807061)
0.25 ki-lakh-meters per hour
Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by 1024core on Thursday January 23, 2025 @02:00PM (#42806897)
In India, it is common to see "kmph" as an abbreviation for "kilometres per hour". "kph" is also used, of course.
Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by Saris on Thursday January 23, 2025 @03:15PM (#42807614)
>I'm a bit surprised at the "pedaling charges the batteries" bullet point. That's extremely rare in the e-bike world.

For the most part it doesn't make much sense for most e-bike users that have power easily available, the time required to charge a battery is a lot (average person puts out about 100-150W) and the average e-bike battery is 500Wh or so, 4+ hours to charge it by pedaling.

A normal mid-drive has clutches specifically to prevent this from happening so you don't get drag from the motor while pedaling without the motor running.

In countries where power is not as readily available it makes a lot more sense.

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by askvictor on Thursday January 23, 2025 @03:34PM (#42807783)
I would be more interested in a bike where braking charges the battery.

For commuting, every traffic light is wasted energy, and cycling on the flat doesn't need much once you're at speed. A commuter with regenerative braking could probably have a much smaller battery, making it lighter too.

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by wigglewoggle on Thursday January 23, 2025 @04:25PM (#42808237)
Regen braking is a thing for ebikes. I can't speak to OEM ebikes, but check out grin at ebikes.ca. They offer all the parts.

There are some cool features too like setting a speed limit after which Regen activates, so coasting down a hill will recharge you and add resistance to keep you at a safe speed.

The caveat is it doesn't make sense on mid drives because they freewheel when coasting

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by Saris on Thursday January 23, 2025 @04:33PM (#42808317)
A hub motor ebike can do this with the right controller, assuming the hub motor has no clutch in it.

But you don't gain much, there's not a lot of weight to slow down with an ebike so regen gives you very little back.

You do lose the ability to efficiently climb steep hills with a hub motor, and they add a ton of unsprung weight if you have rear suspension which ruins its performance, so if that's your kind of terrain they're a bad choice.

Would save on brake pads though.

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by ronancremin on Friday January 24, 2025 @12:26PM (#42815329)
> But you don't gain much, there's not a lot of weight to slow down with an ebike so regen gives you very little back.

But by the same token there's not a lot of weight to accelerate either, right? So while a moving bike has much less potential energy to recoup than a car, it needs much less to get back going again also.

So IMHO regen on a bike should be as useful as it is on a car, no?

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by Saris on Friday January 24, 2025 @01:02PM (#42815643)
>But by the same token there's not a lot of weight to accelerate either, right?

Right, most of the energy is used pushing air out of the way, which you don't get back from regen. Say you ride half a mile before stopping, the time to accelerate to 20mph is pretty small compared to the time you spend cruising at 20mph pushing all that air out of the way.

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by askvictor on Friday January 24, 2025 @03:47PM (#42816767)
> Right, most of the energy is used pushing air out of the way

That's certainly the case once you're at speed (above 20km/hr is about the point where more energy is spent overcoming wind resistenace iirc). But I'm taking about taking off from the lights. Even to get you to 10 km/hr for free (or cheap) would be a bit boost for a commuter.

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by dachris on Friday January 24, 2025 @01:21AM (#42810936)
A friend of mine has an e-bike with regenerative braking using a rear hub motor.

It seems to have a recovery efficiency of about one third.

We once went up about 1200m in altitude difference, where it was completely empty. After having gone down again, it had recharged enough to work normally for the remaining 20km of our trip, driving in flat terrain.

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by aucisson_masque on Friday January 24, 2025 @04:19AM (#42811662)
> cycling on the flat doesn't need much once you're at speed

You need around 200 watt to hold 25kmph on a flat road without wind with a standard bicycle like the one in the video.

With moderate wind, it is between 350 and 400 watt.

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by askvictor on Friday January 24, 2025 @03:50PM (#42816803)
> You need around 200 watt to hold 25kmph on a flat road

Most non-lycra cyclists I've observed seem to cruise at around 20km/hr; my personal experience is that 20km/hr is pretty easy once you're moving; 25 is a noticable bit more work. Also, for commuting where there are traffic lights involved (based on my own experience), you rarely have a chance to do more than 20, and if you do, any time advantage is killed by the next red light.

Re:Turn Any Bicycle Electric by ForHackernews on Friday January 24, 2025 @05:26AM (#42811919)
You might be interested in this: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bLu6H-K4L2Y

The video is long and the innovation is subtle, but once you understand it it's like a lightbulb moment - IMHO a really brilliant example of elegant engineering, and designed by someone who had never ridden an ebike.