Why is the UK at war with e-Bikes?

[ingenieur]

I've had my e-bike a long time. It's a converted mountain bike which I've owned since I was 14 (as a normal bike). I converted it myself.

Before the authorities started clamping down on e-bikes I used it every day to commute into central London. 7 miles in each direction with two enormous hills. Thankfully no longer living or commuting in London so my bike is mothballed, leaning against the wall in my garage.

I'm aware recently of a great tightening of the enforcement of e-bike laws. (below 250w / 15.5mph / only assist with pedals) - Officers watch the street and when they see one pass they pounce on it.

My bike was probably always illegal but I've done many thousands of miles on it without giving it much thought. I used it every day for 4 or 5 years.

I was curious to see how much it would cost to insure for road risks if I wanted to use it on the road legally as an electric motorcycle but you can't get insurance for it.

Some of the information I read also suggests these bikes may soon be banned for offroad use as well.

They can't be that unsafe as I used mine for 1000s of miles and didn't die. So is it just safety or is there some other reason the authorities are so down on e-bikes?

For me, I saved £1000s on rail fares even after the cost of the upgrade parts to build the bike. It paid for itself many times over and even if electrically assisted I'm sure it is better for your health than sitting on public transport. It was also much faster than public transport.

I shared my office with two very enthusiastic cyclists who used to wear all the gear and shower at work, cycle on the weekends, go on cycling holidays and all that kind of thing... but they couldn't stick to the commute despite their fitness levels. This is where the e-bike comes into its own. It's a practical form of transport for anyone regardless of fitness levels. The trouble is if you have huge hills to climb 250w isn't enough to get you up.

Generally speaking would people be generally upset if the law was changed to make more powerful e-bikes road legal? I can't see the problem.

[ingenieur]

sjg said:

250W (which is averaged over a time period, peak can be more) is plenty to get up hills, especially the London ones.

Did you try it?

[ingenieur]

Vasco said:

There's far too many idiots on these e-bikes and scooters. No insurance, no registration, no tests. They may well be practical but most seem to be illegal for one reason or another. They are a menace to pedestrians and other road users.

Same as when those people get into cars.

This gets to the heart of the question I think. Why are people on e-bikes, scooters, no tests, no registration... going about their business causing relatively little harm to others (remember licensed, registered, insured drivers also cause problems so the paperwork is not the issue).

[ingenieur]

POIDH said:

I'm happy that my household has a legal pedalec ebike. It's brilliant and we can adhere to highway code and the law.

I'm happy that if someone wants an electric motorbike or scooter, they can buy one and be licensed, mot'd, insured, trained and can then adhere to the highway code.

I'm not happy for someone to use a electric motorbike or scooter on pavements, footpaths or cycle lanes. I'm not happy that someone can ride a vehicle capable of higher speed and so higher consequence when the accidents do occur. I'm not happy that someone homebrews a powerful battery and electronics risking fires, no limits on speed, no standards on brakes or strength, and components generally designed with lower loads and lower forces in mind.

I'm interested OP - how fast should an electric motorbike be able to ride on shared paths and cycle routes?
How powerful should it be before a rider needs training, license, insurance, MOT etc?
What about the risk of dodgy electrics and unproven power outputs?
At what age should should a child be allowed to ride a homebrew electric motorbike?
Should we change current laws around ice motorbikes and scooters, so that they can be ridden on cycle ways, shared paths etc by a youngster?

Where should the line be? Or should there be no rules?

How fast on shared paths etc? Doesn't seem to be a problem for cars? If you own a Ferrari do you drive it at 150mph in a 30 zone?

How powerful? I would advocate no power limit is necessary. Power limits make use for delivery vehicles difficult as 250w will get you nowhere if you've got 50kg of deliveries onboard.

Risk of dodgy electrics. My kit was plug and play. I didn't have to wire anything myself. Same as any other import of electronics from the far east.

Children on bikes has always been a bit of a dodgy one. I could do 30mph down a hill on my bike before it was converted. I don't see what you can really do about that without legislating against gravity or whatever.

Perhaps the delineation between e-bike and full scooter would be tyre size and overall vehicle weight. Maybe that's where the law should be drawing the line rather than setting a low speed and wattage.

[ingenieur]

MB140 said:

hidetheelephants said:

Oh no! The Man's sticking it to me! I have to pay a whopping £25 a year! Get a grip.

Go on then I will respond once.

Tel me how you run a car for a year and only pay £25 a year in fuel duty and tax’s.

Even if you run an EV your paying taxes on your insurance, VED (from April), VAT on your electricity bill if charging from home (and don’t expect with all these smart chargers to be able to continue using cheap rate electricity to charge your EV forever, that lovely smart charger is going to be used to charge you tax on your electricity used for your car .

So come on then tell me how you do it for £25. An e-bike I recon I could charge from solar with the use of a power bank I already have for days when the solar is less. There might be the odd time I have to plug it in to the mains so I suppose I would be paying the reduced rate vat on that.

Either way I could be doing 20-30 miles a day fuel duty and tax free.

I used to charge mine at work. That solves that particular expense.

[ingenieur]

hidetheelephants said:

MB140 said:

Go on then I will respond once.

Tel me how you run a car for a year and only pay £25 a year in fuel duty and tax’s.

What in the wide world of sports are you on about? An e-motorbike costs £25 to tax, or rather will from April.

But in my particular case my entirely viable homemade e-bike cannot be taxed or insured because it hasn't been lactated over by someone from the government. So even if I wanted to use it legally I cannot. I've not used it for years BTW. It's sitting in my garage and I no longer live or commute into London. I looked into the possibility of using it for leisure purposes but apparently it's not possible.

[ingenieur]

hidetheelephants said:

They can travel at the same speed as a decent cyclist, just not with electric assistance. Want to go faster? Get a licence and an e-moped or e-motorbike.

They can't. 15.5mph with 250w is not enough power or speed to stay amongst a pack of MAMIL.

Mine does not a smidge over 30mph (I wondered if that was a software limit) and I found most high intensity cyclists would cruise around the 22mph mark but could get up to 28mph in a sprint.

The problem with peddling above 15.5mph is both the weight of the bike and dimensions of it. Most hybrid conversions are on mountain bikes with smaller wheels and shorter cranks (I've not seen any racing bike conversions) and with the best will in the world you ain't sustaining a speed of more than 15.5mph after the bike has become so compromised. Without the battery and motor working it is almost impossible to ride.

[ingenieur]

ecs said:

30mph on a bicycle is pretty damn quick and I really don't think ebikes should be assisted up to those speeds. I used to commute on an electric Brompton and it'd easily buzz along at the 15.5mph limit while pedalled a little bit, it needed a bit more effort to go up hills which is where 250w can be a bit limiting.

I always wondered if there was a way that acceleration could be limited and peak power could be increased. 250w is fine for a little commuter bike in a lot of confitions, but when it gets hilly or you're on something like a cargo bike you can run out of assistance pretty quick.

Final thought is, these are the sorts of vehicles where effort should be put into getting the legislation right. There's really nothing environmentally friendly about a +2.5 tonne EV being used to cart around 70-80kg of cargo, where as there are some pretty impressive developments in the electric bike and cargo bike space coming from the continent.

If the government wants growth it is things like relaxing the regulations to allow someone to start producing cargo bikes with a decent payload using the cheap far east components. That wouldn't do it in itself but many things like that would get the wheels turning again.

[ingenieur]

I don't know what you mean by cycling infrastructure. They tried creating little channels for bikes to use in a lot of urban areas of London and the cyclists use the roads instead. What they did was all BS we didn't want to get involved with like special crossing places for bikes which force you to stop rather than just carrying on straight with normal traffic.

[ingenieur]

Sporky said:

ingenieur said:

I don't know what you mean by cycling infrastructure.

Have a look at how the Netherlands do it.

Also, Netherlands is flat. So not a great example.

[ingenieur]

Supposedly the 4th flattest country in the world. That's pretty flat.