Regen Braking for e-bikes ?

[Pragmatic]

Pragmatic, the amount of regen available with most systems will not be a weight transfer event. For weight transfer to be anything of any consequence, you would need something like the GMAC drive, and some very heavy duty circuitry from the motor to the battery cells to handle that kind of current. With today's bikes, that kind of regen is going to smoke most systems not designed to handle very large amounts of power.....

Roger.

 

[BobG]

My BionX powered Elby has regen and I don't remember ever turning it on. Nice feature if you only ride downhill.

I've enjoyed the regen feature of my BionX D500 retrofit, now close to three years old. Yes the "regen" is minimal. That said, I have one route from my house to an adjacent town that is 440' up and 1075' down where the regen feature will restore most of the power used for the climb.

If I ride directly to my town it is 480' down in 2 miles. If I leave home with a fully charged battery there will be no regen braking because the system is designed to not overcharge the battery. When the battery has a slight discharge the braking feature will kick in. When the battery is down to half the braking power is quite pronounced at level 4 regen.

I don't use the brake lever switch. One less cable to clutter the bars and the reed switch can be fussy to keep properly spaced from the magnet. I just adjust regen/assist levels manually with the G2 console. With a little practice you'll do it as fast as a teenager sending a text! For example if I want to return to level 2 assist from level 4 regen I just make six quick taps with my thumb on the + button without even looking.