Big Issue hire bike scheme

[Cudzoziemiec]

Yet another dockless hire bike scheme launched today. The bikes are red and white, have "human" names and cost 20p per minute capped at £12 a day. Bristol is the first place to have these but it's implied the scheme will be expanded to other cities (and who knows, maybe some towns too?), so perhaps you'll see some near you.
https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/news/big-issue-e-bike-rental-scheme-ready-to-roll-into-bristol/

[markcjagar]

I can't wait for them to come to Sheffield so I can play "spot the hire bike in the canal" again.

Last time it was Ofo, they soon realised it's a daft place to run such a scheme.

[Cudzoziemiec]

I've just visited two of the sites mentioned (it required only a small deviation from my route) and can tell you about the Bird Bikes I saw. At the first location there was only one bike, named Hope. At the second, there were four or five. The bikes appear to have front hub e-drive with the battery under a lid in the down tube. They have drum brakes and what looks like possibly a bottom-bracket gearbox; a cylinder immediately in front of the bb, labelled "Truck Run" if you peer at it. Or possibly this is the electric motor and they are single speed, but in that case I don't know what the oversize front hub with a chunky cable attached could be; possibly a large dynamo, but that seems odd with an e-bike. The tyres are unbranded but at least are pneumatic. There is a chunky side stand on the chainstay, a front basket and inbuilt lighting. I touched one – the steering felt very light – and set off an alarm, which is both louder and long-lasting than those on either the Yo Bikes or the Voi scooters. All the more fun when they go in the river, no doubt.

[Kim]

The bikes appear to have front hub e-drive with the battery under a lid in the down tube. They have drum brakes and what looks like possibly a bottom-bracket gearbox; a cylinder immediately in front of the bb, labelled "Truck Run" if you peer at it.

Might be a crank rotation sensor of some sort?  E-bikes require some sort of pedal sensing, and the usual arrangement of a disc with some magnets squeezed onto the left side BB spindle and a Hall sensor^[1] isn't likely to stand up to hire bike abuse.

Which reminds me, I really ought to seek out one of the electric Beryl Bikes and have a play...


_{[1] The usual single-magnet cadence sensor arrangement being a bit too slow to respond, and is unable to tell which direction the pedals are rotating in.}

[Cudzoziemiec]

How big would such a sensor be? What I saw was about the size of a Schlumpf drive (obviously something as expensive as that isn't going to feature on a hire-scheme bike, but I don't know if there are cheaper alternatives?).

[Cudzoziemiec]

A quick google reveals it must be one of these: https://www.truckrunmotor.com/products

In which case either the front hub really is a dynamo, or it has two-wheel drive.

[Cudzoziemiec]

First ride report (no, not mine):
https://www.bristol247.com/news-and-features/features/test-riding-the-new-big-issue-e-bikes/

The bike itself is basic but functional. My saddle had difficulty staying up in its highest position and the brakes could be better.

Despite only having one gear, what these red and white bikes are much better than, however, are the much-maligned yellow YoBikes.

But for the scheme to be a big success, however, the bikes need to be regularly maintained by Big Issue staff and well looked after by the general public. I am optimistic about the former. Less optimistic about the latter.

They're drum brakes so presumably they'll bed in. Good that Big Issue people will be doing the maintenance, presumably this is intended as a sort of work experience style activity for them (possibly in conjunction with one of the many similar schemes locally, such as Lifecycle, Julian House and Bike Project).

But the app itself is experiencing teething problems. At least hopefully that's all they are:

But then the app would not let me finish my ride. It was frustrating to say the least to be asked in the app to submit a photo of the parked bike and seeing the words ‘uploading the picture for verification’ appear and then disappear.

I tried this several times, uploading a new photo and then getting a spinning red wheel of death; all the while still being charged 20p per minute.
....
While waiting outside my flat for daughter number one to get changed for that evening’s after-school activity, the bike locked itself due to inactivity.

And the verdict?

Nifty as they are, these electric hire bikes will have to be a whole lot better to make me switch from using a Voi for short journeys when not either using my own bike or my own two feet.

[Cudzoziemiec]

Today I noticed something curious about the brakes, which are drum brakes. On some bikes they're cabled up UK style, right lever for front brake; on others, they're Euro style, left lever for front brake. The amount of movement in the levers also varies widely from bike to bike, much more so than you'd expect for almost brand new bikes.

[Cudzoziemiec]

The Bird Bikes are now fully assimilated into Bristol's cycle ecosystem; this morning I saw the front basket from one, with headlamp attached, lying on the pavement sans velo.