Ebike Clem

[Stephen]

Thought I'd share my project of the day: electrifying this clem L for my Dad.

A little backstory:

My family and I all chipped in a few years ago to get my Dad a Clem complete in an effort to give him a fun and healthy exercise activity following a near death heart attack in 2020. Despite really liking the look and comfort of the bike, his level of fitness was really limiting the amount of time he could spend on it. He'd be wiped in under 30 minutes, and unfortunately living in the suburban south, safe and accessible riding is fairly limited and largely unexciting unless you're covering big miles out on country roads. Add to that the fact that his main riding partner, my mom, has been a long time road cyclist with a much higher level of fitness, they ended up getting him an ebike from rei. Its made a huge difference in how much he's able to ride and his willingness to ride, but he's still been partial towards the Clem. 

So my folks ordered an ebike conversion kit, gosh, like a year ago and it finally arrived recently. Its a front wheel motor with a handlebar mounted battery pack, and supposedly a pretty simple install. However, for some reason the axle on the wheel was 10mm as opposed to the 9mm clem fork drop outs so I had to do a bit of filing (on the axle) to get it to fit. Took it for a spin and it really goes! Feels a little less jarring/unnatural than other ebikes I've tried. I'm curious to see how it holds up.

Please excuse the messy cables in the pics, still got some neatening up to do. And for those curious, the kit is the swytch bike kit.

[Joe Bernard]

Looks fun but - as a fellow who's built a few eRivs - I gotta throw in a warning here about wattage. If that's a 250W hub you're good, I would worry about 500W on Riv's spindly forks. 

[Stephen]

Hey Joe,

That would be because of too much torque on a weak fork I presume? I'd be curious to hear more about your experiences with eRivs, and is that a determination you've made based on a bad experience? Have you done both front and rear type motors? I have to admit I'm pretty clueless when it comes to the details of ebikes in general, but I hope that since this kit is intended to be universal it will be safe enough for the type of riding my father will be doing and that the company would be responsible enough to highlight potential incompatibilities. It does seem like eBikes are still a bit of a wild west of little to no regulation.. Unfortunately the kit website is pretty limited in describing its technical specifications (it is very much designed for non technical people) and I can't find a spec as to whether its a 250w or 500w motor, but it does list a 40nm torque. How does that speak to your experience?

I didn't notice anything bad on my test ride yesterday, but I suppose I'll give it a longer ride today and see if I notice any dangerous fork flex...

[Johnny Alien]

If its the Swytch kit then they state its 250W

[Stephen]

ahh, thanks for the info Johnny! Yes, I'm now seeing that listed in the instruction manual..

[Patrick Moore]

Stephen: That is a very elegant adaptation; I'll be interested to hear more about your experience with the system.

I take it that you get hub motor, battery, and control system and have the hub built into the wheel of your choice? It's that that makes it interesting to me.

Please let us know the range and charging times and hill-climbing power, etc.

Patrick Moore, who recently wrote a resume for a client who invented and sold the patent to a very interesting bicycle hub motor (but who will remain anonymous).

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Patrick Moore

Alburquerque, Nuevo Mexico, Etats Unis d'Amerique, Orbis Terrarum

[Patrick Moore]

And: Is that disk on the NDS bb spindle a torque sensor?

[Joe Bernard]

Looks like you're good there, Stephen, 250W is pretty mellow. Yes it's the torque that would concern me with a more powerful hub motor; no bad experiences (I used 250W on an Appaloosa), I just try not to be too crazy with slim fork blades not designed with a motor in mind. Most front-hub-motor bikes I see are running really beefy forks. 

My first build was a ridiculously powerful rear-hub Clem, Grant rode it! Then I did a few with even more ridiculously powerful mid-drives, those were tons of fun. But I'm out of the ebike game these days. Maybe in the future I'll try one again. 

Joe Bernard 

[Stephen]

Hey Patrick,

Yeah, its all in all pretty easy to get set up and going, and it would be easy to remove and return to just a regular bicycle. The Kit actually came with the hub motor already prebuilt into a wheel. If you are savvy I suppose you could unlace the rim and build the hub into a different wheel. That thought crossed my mind since the included rim is a fair bit narrower than the alex rims of the stock clem... 

I'll have to give another update on the run and charging times, I took it for a couple rides today and there are discrepancies between the battery reading on the battery vs. on the handlebar display. According the handlebar display I just about used up all my power on a 45 minute ride today, but on the battery itself it indicated I still had over half the power. I think I'll try and see how long I can go before it totally shuts down sometime in the next few days.

To me it seems like a lot of power. I've been running it on the lower power mode and supposedly with the speed limited to 15 mph.

And yes, the disc on the bb spindle is used to sense your pedaling. You can see the magnets in the disc, which pass by the sensor mounted on the downtube.

Hey Joe, good to know I'm in safe territory! Makes good sense, I feel like this 250w motor moves pretty good so I imagine there would be quite a bit of torque with 500w, definitely too much for the slender fork blades. Interesting to hear about your different experiments, did you have a favorite? I have to admit there is something alluring about riding a clem as fast as my road bike with only a little effort..

[Joe Bernard]

I liked the mid-drives although this has a lot to do with the monster hill I was living on at the time. I'm probably not a good source for reviews now cuz I kinda soured on the whole thing; if I got back into it now I would buy a dedicated ebike and leave the Rivs to pedalers. Which you shouldn't read as criticism of your project, it's me saying I shouldn't add any more to the discussion cuz it's about a thing I no longer do. 

[Patrick Moore]

Thanks, Stephen; please do report on further ride experiences.

I'll have to keep Swytch in mind for the future.

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[Wesley]

I was not aware that you can do a mid-drive conversion (I thought the frame had to be special designed to accept the drive-unit instead of a bottom bracket). How did you do it?

-Wes

[Joe Bernard]

It's fits in a standard BB shell. 

https://lunacycle.com/bafang-bbs02-750w-middrive-kit/

[Andy Beichler]

My wife and I have converted two bikes with a mid drive kit very similar to the Luna Cycle kit that Joe posted.  We are very happy with them, so far. It has been about a year and they are still going strong.

[James Valiensi]

Hi,

I had our Clem converted to an Ebike with the Bafabg mid motor kit. 750W system. We got the rack mounted battery. I did it for my 85 year old dad, who only rides ebikes now. He found it too hard to get on and off the Clem and stuck with his small-wheeled ebike.

I’ve ridden it several times.

1. The added weight does not affect the bike handling.

2. I generally pedal faster than the motor on the flats, so it is still a workout

3. It is fun to go up steep hills at 15mph.

4. The wires and motor hanging off the bike kills my OCD, its ugly and my was done by a professional.

5. You have to be careful when making tight turns, have the motor off or in the lowest setting, else the bike will throw you.  

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[Stephen]

Joe,

I can see why you feel that way. If a bike is designed from the ground up to be electric it can't help but work better as a complete system than a converted bike, and theres been so much work done in the field in the last few years. In the future, I could see myself being interested in some type of cargo electric bike.

Patrick,

So I did another test ride yesterday and rode till the battery was pretty much completely drained. Heres a link to the rwgps recording:

https://ridewithgps.com/trips/128471987

It appears the handlebar indicator is the more accurate indication of battery level. On the flats and downhills I rode on the lowest power setting, 1/5, and on the uphills would goose it up to 3/5. I tried to keep it so I was pedaling very conservatively to try and imitate what my father's fitness level may be. That said, with this set up I think I should put a bigger front chainring on the bike as I would too quickly top out of my gears on any downslope. Right around mile marker 12 is where the battery first started to give out on me, which is consistent with the company stated range of 15k(they also have an optional bigger battery pack listed at 30k). 

As the battery got low on power, the motor would quit pushing and the indicator would flash, and then it would kick back in for a while before doing so again. How quickly depended on how hard you were pushing the motor. After the first shut off I kept the power level to 1/5. When the motor would shut off the sensation was similar to riding in sand or some other resistant surface on a normal bicycle. You get used to the motor assistance and when it disappears you get the illusion of riding through some sort of resistance. 

Charging time took approximately 3 hrs, potentially less. Put it on around 7pm, checked around 9 wasn't done, remembered again at 10:30.

Another note on handling, it is a significant weight to have hanging off of your handlebars. I flipped the battery mount around to have the weight more centered over the steerer which was helpful, but I'd say it still loosened up the feel of the bike though not in any seriously detrimental way. And I imagine the exaggerated length of the clem contributes to that feeling. For extra reference I'm 6'2 170 lbs and its a 59cm clem (also a liter of water on there).

[Hoch in ut]

This is an old topic. But curious how your dad has liked the Swytch kit. 

I was originally thinking of getting my wife a Specialized ebike. As she has troubles riding the hills around here. But she loves her Betty. I figure if this Swytch will work, that would be great for her. Hopefully they make a 650b kit. 

[Stephen]

Hey Hoch,

To be honest, it hasn't been the best. Even though he hasn't been riding that much since getting it, the times he does ride it still tends to be his REI ebike. The downsides of the swytch kit are the limited battery range and being forced to have the battery mounted to the handlebar. Its a fair bit of weight to have up on the quill stem, and I think it puts the bike into flexy noodle territory. I imagine a betty foy would be affected similarly, and again it just doesn't go that far. I think it lasts maybe 45 minutesish.

 I think the better option is to try and riv-ify an ebike rather than ebike-ify a rivendell.

[Hoch in ut]

Thanks, Stephen! That’s unfortunate. Although I was thinking of going with a GO+ model. The Betty has a front basket so I’ll have the battery pack in the basket. This should give a bit more range. We don’t ride long. 10-20 miles or so. 

I’m hoping the ebike (whether Swytch or a dedicated ebike) will get her fitness up enough to eventually ween her off of it. 

[Michael Baquerizo]

Perhaps things have changed since your order / model but it looks like swytch can mount in many places, from front to back. A shame about the battery. I would love to electrify my clem