Tinkerer toys (65cc bicycle)

[DRPhoenix]

More fuel for the fire,

[OldPete]

The OP has fled this thread.

[DRPhoenix]

Originally Posted by OldPete

The OP has fled this thread.

Yup, cheap kits like these not for the faint of heart or those with lack of patience. Usually I'm all about dualsport and thrashing the DR650, but alas my wife was diagnosed with ALS last summer so these fit my limited opportunities to screw around with motorized two wheels for a few hours every couple of weeks or so as a break from caregiving and maintaining my sanity. Feels good to break them and then fix 'em , cause there ain't no tools in my arsenal to fix the other.

[btcn]

If youse still reading this I'll give ya my take on them there motor bikes.

So, I had a 4 stroke verson. Its a chinese one but it was overall decent.

You don't want the 2 strokes. There pretty shitty quality, and they won't last long at all. They ain't good for long rides. THAT IS, CHINESE 2 strokes at least. Other brand name 2 stroke bike motors can be very good.

The 2 strokes have much worse gas milage than a 4 stroke, and gas ain't cheap cause youse gotta add like $2 for a bottle of oil per gallon for premix, so that means you'll be paying about $6.50 per gallon! Maybe you can get oil cheaper, don't know, but remember oil is the only thing that stops it from siezing. It's so important.

If you must have 2 stroke, go for a higher end one.


I had a 4 stroke chinese kit. It was one of them Grubee ones. It had the 49 cc 4 stroke copy of a Honda GXH 50 [BTW the actual Hona motor can be used with this kit you can just buy the kit and motor seperatly]. The motor wasn't bad at all. It went for a while, ran good until I had modded it with a straight pipe and no air filter and didn't rejet! It blew an exhaust valve, zero compression now. Then fucked up the flywheel trying to pull it without a fly wheel puller. While the valve can be bought for only $7, with the flywheel and needing a pull starter and any other damage it's probably worth it to just buy a new motor they's only like $130 shipped for just the motor.

However, if you take good care of it, and install it good, it'll last a good amount of time. Not the best designed unit, but for about $350 its not bad at all.

Stock, I'd get the claimed 35 MPH no problem. Later with mods and a smaller rear sproket I could run 47 MPH in the right conditions.

What is the bad? Well, some things is a little cheap [like the motor's muffler mount bolts, they has cheap bolts in it and with that exhaust that hang off without support they'll brake eventually, had to have mine has heli coils in it, but they sell good screws that will prevent this from happening]. Also, mine never come with no air filter. Another thing y'all is I found many of the threads for screws they's cheap and shitty like the motor mount ones would strip easily.

Also, only 1 gear! Makes for SHITTY off the line acceleration! I could pedal faster from about 0-8 MPH, shitty hill climbing, and lower top speed. I would love if these had either a CVT or like a 4 speed gearbox! If you can fabricate a little, there is a CVT that could be fitted to this you can buy. But gears would be funner and more top speed generally. Also, these motors are VERY low on torque. Torque is in like 2 ft/lbs range or something. But its more likely because of no gearing it feels more gutless.

But, all in all, I'd say its good. Mine was fitted to a Schwinn Jaguar for $99 from target. Looked neat. I added a 1 gallon gas tank [motorcycle style] that had long range. The 4 stroke kits do get at least 150 MPG as claimed. I got more like 150-200 MPG, and that was 99% riding WFO! Cain't complain about that!

But overall, its a good engine! It was very quiet stock, had a neat little sound.

[miked826]

Originally Posted by svejkovat

http://motorbikenz.com/

Highly recommend a look through that link. That's my idea of minimalist adv'ing.

This is damn near the only respect-worthy hybrid I've ever come across. And I've looked plenty. I belonged to that motorized bicycle forum and also one called endless-sphere. If you're interested in a motorized bike you can use realistically as a pedal bicycle when desired you are not going to find much interest anywhere out there. Unless things have changed dramatically in the last two years.

What's really unfortunate (if you're into gas engines) is that all the brains, imagination, and engineering skill collect at endless-sphere and the interest there is all but exclusively electric-bike. Motorbicycling.com is depressingly casual by comparison with interest mostly centered on tweaking the china two stroke kits grafted onto beach cruiser bicycles. Before anyone gets upset with that, of course there are wonderful exceptions to be found. But mostly it's just high-school level shop stuff.

I pretty much wore out my welcome at both forums a couple of years ago... even weighed in here at advrider on the topic at the time... to exchange ideas related to a true pedal/motor bicycle. The photo above of the guy in N. Zealand is a RARE example of that true hybrid. Pretty much every other gas motorized bicycle in existence fails miserably as a pedal bike. With any of the chinese kits they lack a means to isolate the xmission to the motor while pedaling.... pretty much like pedalling with a flat tire. I got sick of trying to discuss this with others at motorbicycling. Its almost like "who wants to pedal anyway? I've got a motor".

http://endless-sphere.com/forums/ has, almost inexplicably, just about zero interest in petrol power. Shame that since plenty of the emphasis is on true hybrid human/electric vehicles. Personally I see gas powered transport being around for sufficient time to make continued interest in it more than worthwhile.

There is, of course, the bone simple, but eventually problematic, idler drive against the rear tire. Poor compromise, but simple. A more sophisticated drive that emulated rim brakes, with a drive wheel on one side, an idler wheel on the other might be interesting.

I'm still going to pick this up again when time permits. It just got shelved for a while. One more example perhaps of my perfection paralysis.

My Gas/Electric Hybrid does all 3 equally well and flattens hills like a pancake without having to touch the pedals if you so choose. My 48V, 12AH, 9 pound, battery range is about 80 miles (no pedaling) with the gas engine running and electric brake battery regen. Can I get a amen?

[Lafitte]

Nice bike package !
Looks like a Jesse James build !
? ---- time/money involved in build
? ---- parts list / suppliers

[miked826]

Originally Posted by Lafitte

Nice bike package !
Looks like a Jesse James build !
? ---- time/money involved in build
? ---- parts list / suppliers

Thanks much. I tried my best. This one was experimental but now has over 1500 miles on it with most of it spent on Venice Blvd. One of the most Third World Streets in America for a bicycle traveling @ 40MPH. LOL

Well about 6 months of trial and error to build since this was my first build and I had only an idea in head of how to make all this work and look right. Parts total after tax was $4000. Makes me wanna pull my hair out of my head every time I say that part.

Parts suppliers include about a dozen I would say. Mind numbing even thinking about it.

Autozone
HomeDepot
EbikesSF.com
Bicycle-Engines.com
SickBikeParts.com
FeltBicycles.com
PirateCycles1.com
Gasbike.Net
UniversalCycles.com
Numerous Ebay sellers

My Bike on Venice headed due west into the sun.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MxLctMt75aw