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About the 20mph speed limit in Wales built up areas? Which goes live tonight..

platinumsage said:
It's weird how it's fashionable to be enraged by dawdling pedestrians blocking you from passing on the pavement or slow tourists on the tube, but put people in cars and it's suddenly the opposite.
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Walking slowly isn't a public safety measure. Unless you're carrying four cups of coffee.
 
Spymaster said:
I don’t think an afternoon of you walking through the city, clocking cyclists by eye, is reasonable enough research to call bollocks, in fairness. I can’t vouch for T&Ps claims that they’re frequently doing more than 25mph but I do know that scores are doing 20 or more because they either keep up or outpace me (albeit slightly) when I’m doing that in the car. Buses do too. More than half the buses in London, speed down bus lanes, ime.

I doubt many bystanders could tell the difference between a bike travelling at 15mph and one at 21mph without measuring equipment. Twenty is really not very fast and I assume the quicker cycles are e-bikes rather than your usual wanton and furious treaders, so they must be illegally modified if edcraw the donkey boy, is to be believed. I actually don’t have a problem with speeding cyclists. The faster ones generally seem marginally more competent than the dawdlers and at least they’re using the roads and not the pavements.
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Not necessarily modified, some will be but you can easily buy illegal ebikes sold as ebikes online - not least because off-road there's no rule against throttle only, so lots of e-mountain bikes will do this I think. Unless they've changed the rules, having a throttle only mode, even if you are not using it, makes it illegal on road but I'm left a little unsure after looking at this website selling bikes with switchable modes: Throttle Powered Electric Bikes | Free UK Delivery | Pedal & Chain
I was expecting to find places where you order from china rather than UK based retailers. I'm sure some people will buy bikes like this not knowing the law.

The easy way to tell an illegal bike is when you see someone going uphill and not pedalling. But someone would have to be pretty fit to get over 20mph on something other than a road bike unless it's downhill so you can be pretty confident they are illegal, even if it's possible they've actually got from 15 to 20+mph themselves.


newme said:
Unless I am reading this wrong, with a cbt motorbike license you can ride ebikes that can go faster anyway? I was looking at an electric motorbike to replace my current petrol one as the new fuel types have been problematic for various parts in the bike group I am on, particularly seals it seems. Also why bother going to fill up when I can charge at home easily off the road, the possibility of using my legs to reduce the power required from the motor and get fit at the same time seems beneficial both ways around if this is the case.
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As well as what Spymaster says, you need insurance which I don't think is available.

The general term for this kind of bike is a Pedelec iirc in case you want to research it, but I don't think it's possible right now.

Whatever legislation comes along for e scooters might also change things for ebikes/pedelecs though.
 
SpookyFrank said:
Walking slowly isn't a public safety measure. Unless you're carrying four cups of coffee.
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It certainly is. Slips, trips and falls in public places result in fatalities. These would be reduced if most people dawdled everywhere and held up those wanting to dash, forcing them to dawdle too.
 
editor said:
The biggest problem with eBikes and eScooters are the batteries bursting into flames.
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Hopefully LFP batteries, which are starting to be used in EVs, will replace Li-Ion batteries in ebikes in the near future. They aren't quite as energy dense which might stop them being useful but I'd think you could put a slightly bigger/heavier battery on an ebike than they currently have. LFP batteries aren't flammable, they also don't have any cobalt or nickel in them, and they are cheaper than li-ion batteries which is what will actually drive them into use.
 
BigTom said:
Hopefully LFP batteries, which are starting to be used in EVs, will replace Li-Ion batteries in ebikes in the near future. They aren't quite as energy dense which might stop them being useful but I'd think you could put a slightly bigger/heavier battery on an ebike than they currently have. LFP batteries aren't flammable, they also don't have any cobalt or nickel in them, and they are cheaper than li-ion batteries which is what will actually drive them into use.
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Yep. Thing is with all batteries, at the moment good ones are very expensive so until the tech improves to make that no longer the case, there'll always be scope for cut-corners and outright fakes. The size of bike batteries makes shit ones very dangerous and most people charge them indoors so there's going to be an obvious hazard for quite some time.
 
Jesus this ebike stuff is tedious.

Ftr, traffic has slowed right down here, people are complying. The swift move to change all the signs is impressive - did you know some of them are going to England? The others will be recycled.

My village, inconsequential as we are, has not had signs replaced yet. Tractors are still doing well over 20 as they zoom through with tonnes of cow shit spilling out behind them. Wonder if they'll be de facto exempt as they are de jure exempt from road tax as they go around creating the potholes.
 
planetgeli said:
Jesus this ebike stuff is tedious.

Ftr, traffic has slowed right down here, people are complying. The swift move to change all the signs is impressive - did you know some of them are going to England? The others will be recycled.

My village, inconsequential as we are, has not had signs replaced yet. Tractors are still doing well over 20 as they zoom through with tonnes of cow shit spilling out behind them. Wonder if they'll be de facto exempt as they are de jure exempt from road tax as they go around creating the potholes.
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Glad it’s working well. Looking forward to TfL rolling out 20mph on lots of main roads - think it will mean Lambeth will all be 20mph soon!
 
8ball said:
If this is happening a lot in your vicinity you might actually be dealing with botched assassination attempts. :hmm:
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Baffled I have maybe 60 lithium batteries and none have caught fire over multiple years. Sounds like a manufacturing issue. Are there a lot of flaming bikes around?
 
newme said:
Baffled I have maybe 60 lithium batteries and none have caught fire over multiple years. Sounds like a manufacturing issue. Are there a lot of flaming bikes around?
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There's a reason you can't send lithium batteries through the post. But, science. So don't ask me.

I'm just glad Spymaster has spoken to Kris and I did get de facto and de jure the right way around. We could have been here all night.
 
newme said:
I got all my batteries through the post.
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Then they must pass this

For lithium metal/alloy batteries the lithium content must not be more than 1g per cell or 2g per battery. The maximum net quantity of cells or batteries is 5kg per parcel. Each cell and battery must be of a type proven to meet the requirements of each test in the UN Manual of Tests and Criteria, Part III, section 38.3.

Like I said, science. I worked in a PO about 10 years ago and we were told none allowed.
 
planetgeli said:
Then they must pass this

For lithium metal/alloy batteries the lithium content must not be more than 1g per cell or 2g per battery. The maximum net quantity of cells or batteries is 5kg per parcel. Each cell and battery must be of a type proven to meet the requirements of each test in the UN Manual of Tests and Criteria, Part III, section 38.3.

Like I said, science. I worked in a PO about 10 years ago and we were told none allowed.
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So I bought good batteries? Isn't that a good idea?
 
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