e-recumbent

Chief disadvantage of riding a recumbent is that outside le supermarché some random git sees you as an opportunity to come up and deliver himself of a lecture on:

1. Why that is a handful in traffic

2. What a poor lock it has

3. Not much suspension on the front with that little wheel

4. I'm a farmer, so I know all about solving problems

5. I've been riding motorbikes for, let's see, 60 years

6. Back in 1970 I made an aerofoil for the back of a Ducati

7. I knew the airport traffic controller so I could test it there at 130 mph

8. He waved me off if a plane was coming in

9. That was long before John Britten, puh

10. Oh, you've got electric assist

11. I'm importing electric scooters, platform this wide, they'll do 150 km and 50 kph

12. I'm an entrepreneur

All this rather negates the speed advantage of a recumbent, which is only ever a meagre 5mins in the hour.

 

The electric assist is only throttle-operated, the 36v controller with the torque sensor being broken by an unfortunate trial with the 48V battery, and the 48v controller having no do-dads for a torque sensor. I was riding it yesterday on account of the wind. Had a massive tail-wind going into town, so I used this machine knowing I'd have a massive head-wind going home.  And so it proved.  But e-assist is glorious when you have a headwind.  14mph alleviates the bad feelings of a meaty headwind that you know will have you down to a pathetic 8mph.

 

Incidentally, if anyone does happen still to read this blog, this is what became of the Raleigh whose Duomatic back wheel was sacrificed to the Rain Bike.