Peddling charges the batteries, so in an emergency you can turn on the battery
This is generally not a thing.
Generally easier to repair.
Generally no. DIY ebikes from good components are easier to repair but not without spare parts. Good luck with that during an apocalypse. Cheap factory ebikes as well as expensive factory bikes with mid drives aren't repairable. Finding parts is a problem with the former (today, not in an apocalypse), the other can only be repaired by authorised shops due to parts and DRM.
As others mentioned, batteries may not last too long depending on the make and chemistry. A LFP based DIY would likely last the longest. You have to keep a few spares of all parts - controller, motor, computer, and a spare battery.
Regen is a fairly common feature in ebikes. It doesn't work while you ride, other than as a brake going down hills, but as most are hub drive if you lift the rear wheel off the ground you could use the bike as a generator and charge the battery by pedalling.
However, it would in no way be energy (food) efficient compared to just using a bicycle due to the losses, but if you needed it for emergencies or for powering something else, it could be used.
It doesn't make as much sense to do on an bike, mainly because regenerative breaking requires more expensive electronics and stresses the battery more.
My family has 7 ebikes, all different models and none has regen.
I design and build DIY ebikes. I'm aware of what common systems are available and I don't know any that is capable of this. The only thing that comes close to this description is regen braking which isn't engaged while pedalling because it creates enough resistance as to make you stop. On a DIY you could theoretically turn regen on while riding at low rate to charge from your legs. Wouldn't be very practical because you can just use the same energy from your legs to ride longer. To be clear, there's no free charging where you just pedal normally and the battery charges. If you engage charging the battery, like turning on regen, it will make pedalling harder. The difficulty will be proportional to the energy you put in with additional 10-20% losses. Say you ride at 15kph, that generally takes about 60W. You know how that feels. If you charge with 60W while going at 15kph, your legs will have to produce about 130W. That'll feel as difficult as riding at 25kph.
I like ebikes, but I lean towards the comments promoting plain ol bicycles as the optimal option. Simply put, a bicycle's only requirement is a reasonably-flat surface. If nature had provided roads, it's entirely possible for evolution to have devised wheeled creatures. For the same energy consumption, a human moves roughly four times faster or farther on a bicycle. That's a lot of advantage for zero extra energy.
Obviously, much like a game of Catan, the horses and bicycles of the world are not evenly distributed. So if you're going to acquire something solely to put in the bunker for a doomsday scenario, I'd suggest not putting a horse in there; they won't like the dark.
You dont need a charge controller. They're more of a safety and battery longevity feature.
If you just need to get enough juice into this thing to outrun the next horde of zombies, any dc voltage source a couple of volts jigher than the nominal charge of the battery can do in a pinch. Cracking the pack open and charging individual cells is also an option if you can't find one with a high enough voltage.
I absolutely dont recommend this under normal circumstances, but electrics are far easier to repair from scrap than combustion engines.
That's an impressive way to turn lipo type batteries into bombs. Lithium batteries require you to control the current, not the voltage. If you give them too much voltage, without current limiting, they will draw in as much as your supply will give. This will rapidly destroy the cells, resulting in them discharging via heat.
The plus side is that most decent batteries have circuitry to protect against exactly that. Many also have the charge controller embedded. This massively improves their safety, but not all batteries have this built-in.
The batteries will wear out eventually and lose capacity. Even if you have an unlimited stock of spares, the cell chemistry will eventually break down a few years after they left the factory.
IRL or in the apocalypse? I mean in either case you have to not be using power while it charges. A dead e-bike is way more work than a regular bike. There would also inherently be a fair bit of loss in the mechanical>electrical>mechanical conversion.
Nah. No offense, but give me a Surly Trucker over any e-bike. If I was not so messed up with my back, I'd still be good for 200 miles plus in one day on a couple of Snickers bars. Even in my rough shape, I can manage 30 miles daily as is and ~50 with consequences after.
Even without roads, I'm nearly as fast on a carbon 29'er hardtail like a Cannondale Flash and if I was in shape, I would want to cut my own trails anyways.
I'd probably look for a way to move to a makeshift belt drive and single speed. I could probably rig up rubber belts from cars and stuff for far longer than I'll be able to source chains. I'd eventually be able to do a leather belt drive to stay running for awhile. The hard part will be what to do about wheels in the long term. Wooden rims were standard long before aluminum. I bet I could still salvage enough heavy canvas, glue, and scrap rubber to make my own tubulars. Yeah, I think I could be riding for many decades.
How are you at reverse engineering circuits and rewinding motors? I've wound my own transformers before, but a stator is a whole different beast, especially with brushless. That ~30 mile range, battery lifespan, and monstrous dead weight without power would drive me mad.
I've put 12000 miles on my trucker and love it, but i still think in an apocalypse I'd want a nice steel single speed (bonus if belt drive). The less maintenance and parts the better.
Ebike is another way to refer to electric bicycles. It's the new transportation mode people are absolutely loving as an option for city living. This is due to the emphasis of cities becoming walkable to reduce their impact on climate change.
They know, they're saying ebikes would suck in the apocalypse. I agree. They're too heavy and the batteries don't last long enough to be useful without power access. If you had that kind of power access an emoto would be better.
I agree that bicycles generally are the vehicle of choice for a post-apocalypse scenario, but I'm not convinced an eBike specifically would be the ideal choice.
Quite insightful! I wonder if the sheer number of bicycles compared to horses would make bicycles more like passenger cars, and horses like light trucks?
I'm going out on foot. You can get into, out of, over or under, just about anything. And I don't want to draw attention whizzing down the road.
Also want to be able to hide quickly and you can't just bop off the road and into the woods dragging a bike. Even left on the road, that's a clue someone is near.
It's an interesting idea and have some merit to it, but it can never outbest and outlast a normal bicycle. Still, it's significantly better than a car or motorcycle and depend on what sort of apocalypse we're talking about.
2)Peddling charges the batteries, so in an emergency you can turn on the battery
To actually charge the battery you need a voltage higher than the battery itself, and to charge the battery using the motor you will need something with regenerative braking, and to crank these motor you need higher energy than you normally do and put in to overcome the resistance in order to generate enough power to charge the battery. Even with regen braking in normal situation, i don't think it's enough to charge the battery. You'll be pedalling a significantly heavier bike in the end because of all that resistance.
3)The batteries can reasonably be charged by solar panels that a lot of houses have.
This is the true benefit of ebike, but you have to be in an apocalypse in a place with plenty of solar panel.
5)Generally easier to repair.
Compared to car or motorbike, yeah, but compared to a normal bicycle, there's a challenge if the electronics are fried or when battery need replacing.
The distance travelled on a full battery is absurd
This is true on eco mode, and depend on battery capacity, which affect the weight
Regen braking ebike do exists, i did a quick google and Rad Bike have it, i'm not sure how it feels to pedal one, but i'd imagine it will be heavier than normal ebike without assist.
honestly it depends on how long the apocalypse is. the batteries are eventually going to go to shit, I think I'd rather have a flex fuel bike that can run on vegetable oil or pure ethanol, the latter of which which should either be abundant or easy to make in any apocalyptic situation.
I feel like I could keep a small engine running pretty much indefinitely.
Then let me tell you about the perfect apocalypse vehicle I already have, a Honda CT110. These were only sold in the US from 1980-86, but over here in Australia (and in NZ as well) our national post carrier used them as their main delivery vehicles, so Honda kept making them until 2013. Nothing ever changed though. It's got a kickstarter and the headlight's powered straight off the stator, so if the battery dies it'll still keep going. I once ran it on two-stroke mix because I ran out of fuel, it's had "right at the back of the shed" vintage petrol too and ran great. It also uses the same spark plug that basically all Honda small engines use, so there's a million of them around I could tax. It is literally just a bored-out lawnmower engine with a gearbox bolted on 😅
In a non-nuclear apocalypse, I think they'd work wonderfully for a while. Some especially well built varieties might last long enough for people to figure out how to make new ones.
For a movie or in a book, I think they'd work best for a mad dash to safety immediately after the collapse of civilization. Whizzing past gridlocked cars on the way out of town, running out of charge half a mile short of the top of a mountain pass, recharging just enough on regen braking down the other side to make it to the destination for the night.
After a few years, any working electric bikes would be highly prized. Bikes drawing power from trailers of lead acid batteries and then diy batteries would be attempted to various degrees of success. Plain bicycles and walking would be the normal ways of getting wherever one might want to go.
Personally, I would probably just stick with a regular bicycle: I don't have enough solar panels to even come close to powering my ebike nor do I have a method to transfer the power. Electricity would probably be reserved for navigation devices if available, lights, etc.
A bicycle will never lose power and if you have a dynamo you can even use it to generate power. In an apocalypse type scenario, that seems pretty ideal unless you're exceptionally well provisioned and have a good understanding of electrical engineering.
I half remember reading a post apocalyptic book, space aliens ruined physics or something, steam pressure wouldn't even work! anyway shortly after the fall they were wearing full plate armour and battle charging the enemy on bicycles...
I agree. Batteries are the worst part of the setup to me, with diy options being terrible on weight to power density.
Other super solid option. Also a portable power storage and a portable motor is super useful if you're creative with it.
Pump water, winch this to places (food storage hanging in a tree, packs up steep or vertical travel), run power tools (saws, routers, etc) or run a fan.
Kind of wonder what a attachment system for a bike motor looks for this tbh, but some of these only make sense with the motor and not just pedal power.