Bicycles Unstable At Speed
You really can’t imagine how often people approach me about building illegally fast e-bikes. It is almost never a true cyclist or anyone who knows what it is like to manage a bike at high speed. They don’t realize that even the first motorcycles, made from bicycles, had the rider’s weight low, below the top of the tires. Anyone that has descended a hill, fully loaded for touring, knows how scary it can be when the bike begins to shimmie and shake. That’s called speed wobble and it happens on a lot of different vehicles.
On a traditional bike, with rider’s weight being higher, they become unstable at sustained speeds much above 20mph. That is why the company in the story above came out with a stabilizing headset. You’ll note it started by addressing e-bikers with limited cycling experience.
There is a case moving through the courts in California right now on just this subject. A young lady took her friend on a ride. The Rad bike is supposed to be able to hold the additional weight. The low end brakes, on an absurdly heavy e-bike, carrying an extra passenger, couldn’t keep it at a manageable speed. Speed wobble set in, they crashed and one died.
E-bikes are not cheap motorcycle alternatives. They do not meet DOT standards that even mopeds must. Even then they must be lisc and insured. That is why e-bike max speed is so low. Trails, MUP’s and Lanes have 15mph speed limits to protect cyclists and pedestrians alike. We get to ride there. Motorcyclists do not.
There is a reason products like that shown above exist. E-bikes are designed to make traditional cycling easier, more convenient and accessible, not faster. As mentioned last week, we are just a year or two at most til 20mph max bikes and no throttles will be the law on most trails, lanes and MUP’s (speed limits already exist).