ShareRoller - Quick and Dirty Electric Bikes
- Thread starter Aushiker
- Start date
miro
Member
Some time back it was a mention about his space in Manhattan
Allie Miller
Member
"Approximately 2 months ago Jeff signed a lease on a space for production"
That is the kind of thing JEFF should be putting out: "I leased production space yesterday." He should never again say anything that mentions a future date or future time frame. He should never say anything like, "We will lease production space next week."
That is the kind of thing JEFF should be putting out: "I leased production space yesterday." He should never again say anything that mentions a future date or future time frame. He should never say anything like, "We will lease production space next week."
Lares1090b
New Member
"...and I shall assemble Shareroller by renting out highly affordable commercial real estate in Manhattan"
sarcasm aside, he's probably found a small, but large enough space to store a little inventory and assemble/box the components as they arrive from China.
sarcasm aside, he's probably found a small, but large enough space to store a little inventory and assemble/box the components as they arrive from China.
Allie Miller
Member
March 3, 2014
https://road.cc/content/news/112565...ject-brings-electric-assist-boris-bikes-video
[Note: My bolding below.]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Many of the world’s bike share schemes — like London’s Boris Bikes — use identical bikes and docking technology from Canadian company Bixi. That gave inventor Jeff Guida from New York a simple idea: why not bolt an electric motor to a Bixi bike and turn it into an e-bike?
The result of eight months’ development is the ShareRoller, an electric-assist motor that mounts on the bike’s triangular docking bracket and drives the front wheel. ShareRoller puts out a whopping 750 Watts in its US incarnation though UK and Canada versions will be power-limited to keep them legal. Or somewhat legal. Maybe. But we’ll get to that in a moment.
First, though, Jeff's looking for $100,000 to get the ShareRoller into production, and, almost inevitably, he's turned to Kickstarter to do it.
. . .
Unlike many Kickstarters, this isn’t a rough proto and a bunch of CAD drawings. Jeff says the ShareRoller is a “fully-developed, late-stage pre-production product”.
Jeff worked in management consulting and finance before turning his hand to inventing, but studied electrical engineering in college. But what’s enabled the ShareRoller to go from idea to production-ready so quickly is a technology that’s turning many industries on their heads: 3D printing.
"Years ago, I would've needed a giant engineering company and several million dollars in development research and it still would've taken two years or more," Jeff told Gizmodo.
A $20,000 investment in a 3D printer allowed him to “hyper-drive the design-prototype-test-redesign loop”.
https://road.cc/content/news/112565...ject-brings-electric-assist-boris-bikes-video
[Note: My bolding below.]
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Many of the world’s bike share schemes — like London’s Boris Bikes — use identical bikes and docking technology from Canadian company Bixi. That gave inventor Jeff Guida from New York a simple idea: why not bolt an electric motor to a Bixi bike and turn it into an e-bike?
The result of eight months’ development is the ShareRoller, an electric-assist motor that mounts on the bike’s triangular docking bracket and drives the front wheel. ShareRoller puts out a whopping 750 Watts in its US incarnation though UK and Canada versions will be power-limited to keep them legal. Or somewhat legal. Maybe. But we’ll get to that in a moment.
First, though, Jeff's looking for $100,000 to get the ShareRoller into production, and, almost inevitably, he's turned to Kickstarter to do it.
. . .
Unlike many Kickstarters, this isn’t a rough proto and a bunch of CAD drawings. Jeff says the ShareRoller is a “fully-developed, late-stage pre-production product”.
Jeff worked in management consulting and finance before turning his hand to inventing, but studied electrical engineering in college. But what’s enabled the ShareRoller to go from idea to production-ready so quickly is a technology that’s turning many industries on their heads: 3D printing.
"Years ago, I would've needed a giant engineering company and several million dollars in development research and it still would've taken two years or more," Jeff told Gizmodo.
A $20,000 investment in a 3D printer allowed him to “hyper-drive the design-prototype-test-redesign loop”.
Lares1090b
New Member
Someone raised a good point in the comments on the Indiegogo page. To paraphrase, 'where is Jeff on the smartphone app development?' I'm assuming this is needed to set up Shareroller? In my opinion, the app's UI "screen grabs" are pretty consistent with the graphic design styleof Jeff's website, and the info graphs on the Indigogo page. Has it been developed at all or is what we've seen just a mockup by Jeff? Does anyone know what stage this is at? Apple will need a few weeks to vet it once its submitted to the app store.
Lin B
Active Member
I could easily be wrong about this, but I thought it also could be controlled by the remote so a smart phone is not required. The phone app would provide more detailed stats than the tiny display but I understood the various buttons on the remote could control functionality. I hope so....I don't always ride with my phone and don't want to be required to do so.
Lin B
Active Member
https://electrek.co/2018/08/08/electric-bicycle-prices-rising-imports-tariffs/ Not sure if this mean kit prices will rise drastically, but e-bike prices clearly will. Hopefully, Jeff will get all his parts out of China for both the crowdfunded versions and potential pre-orders. What a clusterf*ck.
J.R.
Well-Known Member
- Region
- USA
- City
- Piedmont Highlands
We did discuss the use of this drive on bike share bikes on the forum when the Share Roller was launched. Every bike share contract explicitly bans attaching anything, even a cup holder and electric drive. I wouldn't want readers here to get a false impression thinking this can be used with a bike share. This from Citi bike:
- You may not attach anything to a Citi Bike bicycle, including but not limited to baskets, cup-holders, electric drives, child seats, trailers or tandem bicycles.
Lin B
Active Member
Maybe Jeff will work out some sort of agreements in the future with specific providers. There seemed to be a lot of support at the L.A. CoMotion event.
Lares1090b
New Member
I get the sense that Jeff has already approached a lot of bike share groups and has been turned away, specifically by Citi bike. While I would personally love to use this on the bike shares in my city, it would seem that many of these groups I follow are looking at full on electric bikes and charging infrastructure for their networks. While Jeff's solution obviously seems cost effective in the sense that it would work with existing infrastructure, I can see a lot of decision makers not viewing it as a very elegant solution. That's not necessarily Jeff's fault, but what I see over cautionary attitudes toward electric personal transport. Where they may have a bit of a valid argument against Shareroller are in rebutting Jeff's claims that Shareroller adds virtually no additional wear to the tire. The tire's exposure to surfaces is effectively doubled with the addition of the unit. The roller needs to transfer kinetic friction into the tire and while it may not wear out the treads as quickly as contact with the ground (due to dirt, cracks, and other abrasive variables), it will definitely reduce tire life in a significant and noticeable manner through the eyes of a maintenance department at a bike share company.
I personally think the best bike share idea is to have users carry and charge their own battery packs (a model that some have proposed) as this would allow electric hub bikes to use existing dock infrastructure and negate the need to run power to docking stations everywhere (right now the docking stations are typically powered by solar, but the panel isn't anywhere near large enough to charge 10's of bikes).
Lin B
Active Member
We've got bike share but no electric shares yet here; electric scooters are plentiful. If share e-bikes become plentiful (and supplant regular share bikes) then Jeff's market will be retricted to bike/scooter owners. That is still a pretty big market.
Lares1090b
New Member
From Jeff's last update...
Currently sitting at the middle of August. At this juncture, I don't think he's going to get much interest from regions that experience winter. Even if it's still months away for places like the north east, I'd now rather sit out the season and see what my options are come spring.
Currently sitting at the middle of August. At this juncture, I don't think he's going to get much interest from regions that experience winter. Even if it's still months away for places like the north east, I'd now rather sit out the season and see what my options are come spring.
Allie Miller
Member
But the ones who paid money through Indiegogo would prefer to "sit out the season" with the Shareroller in their hands rather than waiting for it to be assembled and to be shipped to them, we might guess. And if it is shipped and if the reviews are thorough and positive and if the price is okay and if I haven't bought something else in the meantime, I will buy a Shareroller immediately. I will use it for commuting (my less than one mile, but uphill parts both ways) and for fun.
Allie Miller
Member
Though I am generally against tariffs (for all the reasons that economists offer), I am open to the idea that there needs to be some way to address "bad behavior" in trade without calling in the military--much as we need a variety of criminal and civil fines and penalties to address a wide variety of behavior we want to address. We don't just hang people, we also make people pay fines or not drive their cars.
Going to the link that Lin B provided, I found these reasons (or "justifications") that the USTR gives for raising the tariffs:
- China uses joint venture requirements, foreign investment restrictions, and administrative review and licensing processes to require or pressure technology transfer from U.S. companies.
- China deprives U.S. companies of the ability to set market-based terms in licensing and other technology-related negotiations.
- China directs and unfairly facilitates the systematic investment in, and acquisition of, U.S. companies and assets to generate large-scale technology transfer.
- China conducts and supports cyber intrusions into U.S. commercial computer networks to gain unauthorized access to commercially valuable business information.
Also possible? A crippling Recession/Depression.
The Tariff Act of 1930 (codified at 19 U.S.C. ch. 4), commonly known as the Smoot–Hawley Tariff or Hawley–Smoot Tariff,[1] was an Act implementing protectionist trade policies sponsored by Senator Reed Smoot and Representative Willis C. Hawley and was signed into law on June 17, 1930. The act raised U.S. tariffs on over 20,000 imported goods.[2]
The tariffs (this does not include duty-free imports – see Tariff levels below) under the act were the second-highest in the U.S. in 100 years, exceeded by a small margin by the Tariff of 1828.[3] The Act and following retaliatory tariffs by America's trading partners were major factors of the reduction of American exports and imports by more than half during the Depression.[4] Although economists disagree by how much, the consensus view among economists and economic historians is that "The passage of the Smoot–Hawley Tariff exacerbated the Great Depression."
Lares1090b
New Member
Re: Tarrifs
That all may be true in the sense the China had/has "unfair" advantages, but a certain economic order had set around trade between the US and China. Americans are wholly reliant on low cost consumer goods from overseas. And with all of all of the grievances you mentioned, the system provides for ridiculously cheap widgets. While America's concession may have been that they endured IP theft, etc., China's concession was/is that they'll make stuff on the backs of their people while paying them next to nothing to do it, often in haphazard conditions. My mom bought us a VCR in 1985. It cost $500, which is closer to $1200 now. I realize they no longer exist, but when you could still get a VCR at Walmart...maybe 8 years ago, they were under $100 (in 2010 dollars). I agree that it's good to have rules, but I'm not sure your ideal is attainable, especially since China will almost unquestionably continue its ascension to the status of world super power within the next 25 - 50 years (if we don't all blow each other up before then). A rising middle class combined with population size will dwarf the American economy, and subsequently its military influence. What I'm saying is that they're not going to be pushed around unless this really starts to hurt them and the more affluent they get based on rises in internal prosperity, the less they need America to buy their crap.
That all may be true in the sense the China had/has "unfair" advantages, but a certain economic order had set around trade between the US and China. Americans are wholly reliant on low cost consumer goods from overseas. And with all of all of the grievances you mentioned, the system provides for ridiculously cheap widgets. While America's concession may have been that they endured IP theft, etc., China's concession was/is that they'll make stuff on the backs of their people while paying them next to nothing to do it, often in haphazard conditions. My mom bought us a VCR in 1985. It cost $500, which is closer to $1200 now. I realize they no longer exist, but when you could still get a VCR at Walmart...maybe 8 years ago, they were under $100 (in 2010 dollars). I agree that it's good to have rules, but I'm not sure your ideal is attainable, especially since China will almost unquestionably continue its ascension to the status of world super power within the next 25 - 50 years (if we don't all blow each other up before then). A rising middle class combined with population size will dwarf the American economy, and subsequently its military influence. What I'm saying is that they're not going to be pushed around unless this really starts to hurt them and the more affluent they get based on rises in internal prosperity, the less they need America to buy their crap.
Lin B
Active Member
We don't know what the lead time will be on pre-orders. A month, few months or ?. But if one doesn't have an order via crowdfunding already, it makes sense to wait and see the reviews (unless the pre-order discount is huge) and possibly benefit from any subsequent improvements based on feedback.
Nirmala
Active Member
Another update with good news:
Hello ShareRoller Indiegogo backer:
I'm happy to report that we've finally begun producing ShareRollers! Here's what the final device looks like: a ShareRoller Mini Battery Pack + Motor Module + Wireless Throttle + Wireless PAS all snapped together for transport. Both the Wireless Throttle and PAS snap onto the Motor Module magnetically and are quite secure. We're also proud that the production Wireless Throttle and Wireless PAS ended up just as sleek as the renders we sent you previously.
And here are some shots of just the Motor Module, with a number of subtle changes since we last showed it (read more about this below):
The first handful of production units serve the important task of 'debugging' the production process before we ramp up the volumes. And in building the first few, we did discover a few tweaks that needed addressing, primarily minor fit issues between the plastic enclosure and the electronics inside, as well as between the Motor Module and the injection molded Battery Pack.
The Motor Module design changes are already completed and ready for production 3D-printing (using ultra-tough Nylon), and the Battery Pack mold tweaks are in process as we speak, and we should be receiving updated Packs soon. Aside from that, UN38.3 testing for the Packs and FCC testing for the full device are the only remaining hurdles before we ramp up production volumes and begin shipments. So we're still a couple weeks away from getting volume production underway, but the finish line is in sight.
In the meantime, we will need final Accessory selections from all of our Backers so that we can manufacture accordingly. Please click through to the Google Form link below for more info and to make your choices:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1...1c71ht_0H51QP4PK-cUK8n3g/viewform?usp=sf_link
And now for something fun, we're going to give away a free Wireless PAS sensor to the first Backer that can identify the 5 main changes that have been made to the ShareRoller Motor Module since we last sent photos. Or to the person who comes closest! Email your guesses to [email protected].
Finally, our long-awaited Pre-Order launch is indeed coming quite soon, so stay tuned.
Thank you again for your patience and support.
Jeff Guida & The ShareRoller Team
Hello ShareRoller Indiegogo backer:
I'm happy to report that we've finally begun producing ShareRollers! Here's what the final device looks like: a ShareRoller Mini Battery Pack + Motor Module + Wireless Throttle + Wireless PAS all snapped together for transport. Both the Wireless Throttle and PAS snap onto the Motor Module magnetically and are quite secure. We're also proud that the production Wireless Throttle and Wireless PAS ended up just as sleek as the renders we sent you previously.
And here are some shots of just the Motor Module, with a number of subtle changes since we last showed it (read more about this below):
The first handful of production units serve the important task of 'debugging' the production process before we ramp up the volumes. And in building the first few, we did discover a few tweaks that needed addressing, primarily minor fit issues between the plastic enclosure and the electronics inside, as well as between the Motor Module and the injection molded Battery Pack.
The Motor Module design changes are already completed and ready for production 3D-printing (using ultra-tough Nylon), and the Battery Pack mold tweaks are in process as we speak, and we should be receiving updated Packs soon. Aside from that, UN38.3 testing for the Packs and FCC testing for the full device are the only remaining hurdles before we ramp up production volumes and begin shipments. So we're still a couple weeks away from getting volume production underway, but the finish line is in sight.
In the meantime, we will need final Accessory selections from all of our Backers so that we can manufacture accordingly. Please click through to the Google Form link below for more info and to make your choices:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1...1c71ht_0H51QP4PK-cUK8n3g/viewform?usp=sf_link
And now for something fun, we're going to give away a free Wireless PAS sensor to the first Backer that can identify the 5 main changes that have been made to the ShareRoller Motor Module since we last sent photos. Or to the person who comes closest! Email your guesses to [email protected].
Finally, our long-awaited Pre-Order launch is indeed coming quite soon, so stay tuned.
Thank you again for your patience and support.
Jeff Guida & The ShareRoller Team
