#30daysOfBiking today is carrying the kid over the hill to and from school with 50lb of percussion instruments, a common excuse for why biking is impractical. 350W front hub motor on the #supercargo bakfiets (20in wheel) makes it doable but a lot of work whether you go fast (high motor eff) or slow (motor gives up and then it's even harder.) Zig-zags help, but as usual, drivers are the problem.
20in hub-motor-specific suspension fork for yuba supercargo? I need this bike to have more power but also regenerative braking, and hold traction better on bumps (currently the motor skips/skids slightly on every bump and crack when climbing.) And it needs about 1000W braking power but 350W is enough assist / for tractionary reasons, I need to send any more power than that to the rear wheel & where it can shift gears. #CargoBike#eBike#SuperCargo
What about cycle you'd love to own? @MartyCormack asks:
Q6. If money, storage space, free time availability, maintaining good marital relationships, etc. did not natter, what new bike do you currently covet or plan to buy/acquire?
@rowmyboat@ascentale@MartyCormack the bullitts are cute but even my #supercargo is already near max capacity and the 10yo + 13yo won't sit together without bickering. I'm working on attaching a trailer bike for the second kid, but it lacks low-speed stability (I actually want the leaning trike to have a non leaning lever.)
@Iragersh looked like bundles of unfolded corrugated cardboard boxes maybe. I'm not saying the yuba couldn't have handled that. This post was mostly for the mountain, which I've already demonstrated fits nicely on it, in one of the other #superCargo pictures... [edit: ah there it is, see: plenty of room for a mountain.]
Fun fact: The front wheel of your bicycle travels farther than the rear wheel.
If you travel perfectly straight, both tires travel the same distance, but introduce any turns at all and the rear wheel will always travel a more direct route through a curve than the front, resulting in a lower total travel distance.
It would be fun to hook up bike computers to both wheels and see if you can measure this difference over a sufficiently long journey.
Several positive interactions with folks attracted to the cargo quadricycle today, including someone driving a big truck (which was at least working, towing a trailer with lots of plant debris) shouting "Love that bike!"
The cargo quad's rarity means I can't easily be stereotyped as "an entitled cyclist" so even people I'd normally expect to be wary of on an upright bike are pretty open and smiling when seeing the quadricycle.
Could be an opportunity to win hearts & minds. #BikeTooter
@glightly I think it was similar a decade ago with two kids on an xtracycle edgerunner eBike in SW Portland, if people haven't seen it before, all of the stereotypes go out the window. Now on the #SuperCargo bakfiets, even with Clever Cycles and Splendid Cycles just 500ft down and across the river, it's still the first one many people have ever seen.
how is the #hillTopper sprinter kit for going up a big hill in a hurry with an empty 110lb #superCargo bike for a 200lb dad? Not terrible. But you should get a bigger motor if you want to do this a lot. I'm doing 16mph on the flat/slightly uphill, had been running the motor at max for 2min at that steady pace up Bertha (60ft climbing.) Then another 70ft climbing in about half the time. Would be easier without cars in the way.
Is the #HillTopper motor and little "sprinter" battery enough for this #supercargo to climb Terwilliger after riding up Mt Tabor? Kinda? Not really, but I had a second inverter battery pack to charge it up a bit, shoulda plugged it in earlier but I did make it almost to the Chart House before it turned acoustic. #cargoBikes#pdxBikes#eBikes
The SW Ridge Dr hill south of Stanley Ct, 80-ish lb kid, #superCargo with 350W #HillTopper front hub motor. I think I was distracted talking about the motor and probably could have mashed the throttle more in the flat spot between these two lumps. #eBikes
@rbellinger not mine, a local on a ride last weekend, but I can confirm the utility of a small geared hub motor #hillTopper 20in wheel with the much heavier #superCargo + passenger (ideally I would want more power for steep hills but I can deal and it is light, top speed is probably higher with his kit that looks like a 48V battery, maybe field weakening involved)
the problem with pedal strike on this long-as-a-boat #superCargo is, after just about a year, the spindles are bent or something is making the bearings go unk-unk on every rotation >_< #BikeTooter
Q3. I told my kid that sometimes when you own a bike and like riding it, the bike feels like it takes on its own "spirit". This question is from @glightly:
What is your favorite cycle (I use "cycle" because some have more or less than 2 wheels) you've owned and why?
@ascentale@glightly A3 #BikeNite it's hard to have a favorite, but if it's raining, the #supercargo with rain canopy is quite the umbrella bike. It needs more motor, I don't get to ride it as much as I want yet.
People who say they need a car because it rains sometimes, have you tried just carrying an umbrella or dressing your #eBike as one? I just rode a 1.5 miles round trip to pickup the kid from school, and my shoes were completely dry the whole time. Keep the DOTs' filthy road water off of you and getting slightly sprinkled with rain is fine. #Portland#pdxBikes#bikeTooter#pdxtst
@hocus yuba #superCargo in this case, but a bakfiets with rain canopy is made by several brands e.g. Urban Arrow, Bullitt, R&M Load/Packster, Workcycles Cr8. Most of those can be bought with a motor or there are kits to adapt them if you can match one of the motor setups (or two, in my eventual plan) to the frame. https://yubabikes.com/cargobikestore/supercargo/
Finally got the #superCargo and @ShawneMartinez's #BullittX in the same place at the same time to compare. Conclusion: without his rear rack extension, they're the same length. The BullittX carries more of that in the floor, with more vertical front and back angles. Random dog's butt for scale. #CargoBikes#CargoPalooza#eBikes#TwoLessCars
bike check / mountain check for the yuba #supercargo with the little #hillTopper#eBikes kit. Rode from Barbur up Terwilliger to downtown, around with the @bikeloudpdx#pdxBikes#eBike policy ride, and back out Barbur from 1st. The battery indicator was red (of blue, green, red) when I got home but it never faded on the long steady climb out Barbur, 10 minutes for 2.5 miles with 200+ft elevation (ODOT, get your cars off of our essential historically-streetcar-graded bikeways)