[roccman]

I ride a Yamaha 225 XT dual purpose. Great bike - 80 MPG.

[PraiseDoom]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('roccman', 'I') ride a Yamaha 225 XT dual purpose. Great bike - 80 MPG.

[roccman]

Yep...u nailed it.

No juice...no ride.

F'n hot dude!!!

My son and I are headed out for a ride in about 30 minutes while it is cool...

He has a Yamaha XTR 90.

[Chris25]

I guess petrol isn't just going to stop being delivered.

It's cost will just increase and increase.

With this increase, inflation will increase. Food cost will increase, absoloutely everything will.

There will be a stage where running a car will not be possible unless you are extremely rich.

In many ways I look foward to that stage. Cars are noisey, pollouting and cripple the natural world.

Although of course the bike won't exactly "hug" the trees. The good thing is you can ride the bike most places without a 10-inch layer of oil-sourced tarmac on top.

[PraiseDoom]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Chris25', 'I') guess petrol isn't just going to stop being delivered.

It's cost will just increase and increase.

[Chris25]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('PraiseDoom', '')$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Chris25', 'I') guess petrol isn't just going to stop being delivered.

It's cost will just increase and increase.

[TommyJefferson]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Roy', 'I')n the meantime its fun to ride for recreation and it pretty low cost to operate. And air-cooled Honda singles are legendary for their reliability.

[JoeW]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('TommyJefferson', '
')
That's the thing. Motorcycles are great fun. My Kawasaki KLR650 was a great hooligan ride. I could jump curbs to avoid red lights, park anywhere, and split lanes to surf traffic.

I just don't want people to look a few variables like mpg and purchase price and promote the myth that motorcycles are financially better for transportation when they are not.

[tsakach]

What do you think about this electric motorcycle, that delivers horsepower roughly equivalent to a 250 four-stroke motor but has much more torque low in the rev range. The parts can be purchased separately and used for a low-cost EV conversion of a street legal bike. The small battery pack could be easily charged with a few solar panels.




"Electric motorcycles"

[TommyJefferson]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('JoeW', 'I') can't believe that the KLR wasn't financially better than just about every car on the road.

[Terran]

Anyone have any experence with a moped?
Mopeds come in many designs, some look more like a motorcycle, while others look like a bicycle.
I'm thinking about building my own. My plan is to get a regular bicycle, and attach a small two stroke internal combuston engine, the system I'll be using is a direct friction drive system.

I've read somehere in the laws that engines cann't exceed 49cc.
The engine I'm thinking about should be 35cc, two stroke air cooled. It runs on a mixture of gasoline, and motor oil 1/25 ration. This application should only add an additional 10 pounds to your bicycle.
This is suppose to send the bicycle to 30mph, this is how fast I wanted to go. State law states that 30mph is the max speed ones can go without human power assisance.

The two stroke seems to offer the highest power ratio to its weight, I can an electric bike and that cumbersome machice can only go 20 miles per charge at 70pounds.
Best off the fuel consumption is very low, with a gallon of gas you can get 150mpg. And there's a lower CO2 output. I can use the bike lanes to get around traffic.

Only drawingback is it's obnoxious noise pollution; think about being around a weed wacher or lawn mower. 2 strokes are not efficent are combusting fuel, they spew out uncombusted hydrocarbons, NOx, ozone, and leaves a nice trail of blue smoke.

[gg3]

Yo Terran, good to see you here again...
My guess is that bicycle frames would be dangerous at a consistent 30 mph, since they don't have suspension and would be vulnerable to all manner of crappy road surfaces. Mopeds as such, have suspension and heavier frames.

Probably better and less costly to go looking for a complete moped, and you can probably find one that'll get 100+ mpg. Ideally with a 4-stroke motor that doesn't, as you said, spew uncombusted hydrocarbons or sound like a weed wacker.

[WisJim]

My son and his friends (college age to mid 30s folks) have a number of mopeds. Sounds like a swarm of giant locust when they are on a group ride. The 2 stroke engines are notoriously dirty burning engines, and the older mopeds, the kind my son finds in someone's shed for a few dollars, end up needing work and parts that sometimes are hard to find. However, some of the new ones look pretty good. There have been some 4 stroke engines used in mopeds, but are kind of hard to find, and paprts for the older ones are even rarer.

For short trips and around town, we are trying out electric bicycles. We have a Zap pack that is over 10 years old and just put a 36 volt hub motor on another bike, but need to do something better for a battery. The NiMH that my son fixed up for it is heavy, and he is looking into a lithiom battery. I think that the hub motor and controller and NiMH battery cost over $1000 altogether, plus the bike, and lots of work.

[steam_cannon]

Some ideas...

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('Terran', 'I')'m thinking about building my own. My plan is to get a regular bicycle, and attach a small two stroke internal combuston engine, the system I'll be using is a direct friction drive system.

[yesplease]

Bicycles are dominated by aerodynamic friction, not rolling friction, so an e-bike with a X kWh motor will go as fast as a moped with a X kWh engine. An e-bike is just as suitable for relatively short commutes imo, however, it must have a wider gear range if you have any large hills/etc to allow the rider to add input for said drops/climbs.

[fastbicycle]

Hi I own a cannondale super v mountain bike that I put a golden eagle conversion kit and a modified go-ped engine on.I get about 160 mpg and a top speed of 50mph it is a two stroke that requires
91 octane fuel my normal commute time in an auto is 45min and I
have done it as fast as 51min on the bike the kits and pictures are
available at bikeengines.com it does have the disadvantage of occasional breakdowns.

[manu]

I knew a guy who made a solar cycle back in the early 80's, it could reach a speed of 55 mph. It made the second page of the L.A.Times. But it couldnt be driven on the streets as there were to many regulations.

[frankthetank]

A guy at Menards yesterday claimed he put on 459 miles using 3 gallons of gas on a scooter (guessing a 49cc model)?? I didn't think they got that good of fuel mileage. The dude was like 300 pounds!

[SILENTTODD]

$this->bbcode_second_pass_quote('FreakOil', 'I') can't imagine Americans adopting the Vietnamese transport way anytime soon. I think this country will turn into Iraq before that happens.

[kaktus]

I dont want to offend but isnt a two stroke engine a big step backwards? environmentally it would probably be better to drive a H-D.