pop goes the weasel
Jim Robinson
San Francisco. Handling and throttle response at speed were excellent,
the more I ride it the more I like the way it rides. Range at top end
was, however, a bit disappointing.
>From Full:
07 mi home to work
17 mi work to Corte Madera
09 mi from Corte Madera to GG Bridge toll plaza (est range hit zero
here)
02 mi from toll plaza downhill to charging station at Anza and Owen in
the Presidio
----
35 mi total (I picked up about 20 minutes of charging in Corte Madera,
about 5 mi on the est range meter)
I was feeling pretty smug about finding a place to charge (the plug
was hot and everything!) but alas, after charging for a minute or so,
my Vectrix made a couple loud noises and then would charge no more.
BMC sent the Vectrix truck around right away and gave me a silver
loaner whilst they took mine to the shop for some VecTech loving. It
seems there is some fresh software to make the charge controller
behave nicer.
Since the controller is (as best as I've been able to find out) able
to work with most anything in the range 110 - 220 VAC I'm fairly
certain the problem was not with the rusty nasty outlet at the
charging station. Be that as it may, I am going to start packing a VOM
and/or a wattmeter so I know what sort of juice is going in.
I'm working on a list of places to 'tank up' :
Jim Robinson
The bike was ready by the next afternoon and has given me no trouble
since. Two thumbs up for customer service to BMC.
I've since started using a Kill-A-Watt (
http://www.amazon.com/P3-International-Kill-Electricity-Monitor/dp/B00009MDBU/ref=pd_bbs_sr_1/103-6550043-9231815?ie=UTF8&s=electronics&qid=1194544826&sr=8-1
) to both see what sort of power is coming out of the socket and to
track my power usage. 14 mile round trip commute takes around 2.9 kWh
to recharge. Most I've ever metered is 4.2 kWh after maybe 30 miles.
It's a good thing I'm no sort of professional scientist, because I am
terrible at keeping accurate logs. Maybe I'll get a fancier meter
that'll do that for me sometime.
Or maybe Vectrix will provide a way for customers to access any logs
the bike might be keeping?