e-scooters

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Cartus

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About a month ago I noticed a number of these scooters around my home town of Cheltenham, I thought they differed from the other scooters I’d seen due the 'GPS tracked' sticker on the bottom.

It seems both Cheltenham and Gloucester are being used as part of a year long trial, initially 40 scooters in each place possibly rising to 80 if successful. They are 'geo-fenced' and there is a fairly rigorous procedure to go through including scanning a photocard driving licence and a 'selfie' before you’re accepted. The rules state that you can only use them on roads and not pavements or parks etc.

I can understand the possible benefits of these e scooters, cheap, efficient, environmentally friendly and fun, but I'm not sure the government are going about it the right way - making privately owned scooters illegal to use on roads whilst these are deemed ok to use. Many if not most of the e scooters I see are ‘illegal' ones being used on pavements and paths in 12EDDA2E-1D4C-4955-8CEB-BC2938E7ECCD.jpegparks. Recently I followed a queue of traffic following a hire scooter on a busy town road, it seemed ridiculous.

I wonder what the future for these things really is?
 
If you hire one, as a rider you are insured if you have an accident and cause damage or injury. Privately owned ones aren't insured.
 
Death traps on the road imo. Think pot holes for example.
 
nilagin said:
Most bicycles aren't motorised.
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If you want to be pedantic about irrelevant issues, e bikes are motorised, no insurance required, cycles are 'motorised' by the rider and are capable of inflicting much greater damage than an e scooter I would imagine :)
 
Conventional bicycles have effective brakes and steering, and are relatively stable, while scooters do not.
 
Cartus said:
If you want to be pedantic about irrelevant issues, e bikes are motorised, no insurance required, cycles are 'motorised' by the rider and are capable of inflicting much greater damage than an e scooter I would imagine :)
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Some e bikes do indeed require insurance as they are classified as mopeds.

Electric bikes and the law: What you need to know | Cycling UK

When is an e-bike not an e-bike? E-bikes are classed as regular non-assisted bicycles in Great Britain but if they supply electrical assistance when travelling at more than 25kph (15.5mph), have a motor which generates more than 250 Watts of power or motor assistance can be provided without the...
www.cyclinguk.org www.cyclinguk.org
 
Most ebikes require pedaling to allow the electric motor to operate, if you stop pedaling the motor stops assisting.

A guy I work with uses an escooter to commute, the moment you lift off the power it slows down considerably, much more than a pedal cycle will. And much more than a standard scooter does. It also has really effective disc brakes that stops much better than most rim braked bikes.
 
AgentOrange76 said:
Most ebikes require pedaling to allow the electric motor to operate, if you stop pedaling the motor stops assisting.

A guy I work with uses an escooter to commute, the moment you lift off the power it slows down considerably, much more than a pedal cycle will. And much more than a standard scooter does. It also has really effective disc brakes that stops much better than most rim braked bikes.
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With respect, brakes working on rims have been able to lock both wheels at will for several decades, so I should be a little surprised if a scooter could stop under control as quickly as a bicycle.
 
I tried on in Paris around a year ago, they are quite nifty little things.

Pre-Covid I had decided to buy one if and when they become legal, but I have no interest in hiring them. I used a folding bike either end of a train journey for my daily commute and not having to carry my work clothes with me every day, not getting sweaty and needing to shower at the office every morning is really appealing.

But, now I am working from home and only go into the office a couple of times a month I have lost the need for it.
 
We get them quite a lot round here as there is a long paved path next to the beach which runs for miles. If I wanted to commute 2 - 3 miles a day I'd probably look at one because it's easier to use for part of a journey than a bike. But nobody round here commutes any more :)

Google says they are limited to 15mph which is a decent speed. Based on some tests I did the other day, it's about twice the speed of a 4 year old on a manual scooter :D
 
Cartus said:
Have you ridden one?
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No. Have you?

OK, I'm really not wanting this to descend into the usual TP 4rsery of entrenched positions and keyboard arguments. Having looked at a number of E-scooters including those being used in Cheltenham and the ones for sale made by Xaiomi, I can see they all only have a rear brake. Some (the Xaiomi for example) have the motor on the front wheel, while others (like those in Cheltenham) have both motor and brake in the read wheel.

My reasons for suggesting a scooter has less effective brakes than a bicycle is that with a rear-only brake, the more braking is exerted, the more weight will be transferred forwards, reducing the available friction for the rear tire and reducing available brake force. With a bicycle, the weight shift tends to cause increased downforce on the front wheel, increasing friction and making braking more effective. Put the rear brake on hard on a 2 wheel vehicle and the rear wheel locks easily & skids, resulting in a long stopping distance. Apply the front brake hard and the machine will slow much more rapidly - obviously care is required to prevent the rider being pitched over the bars. Based on experience with both motorcycles and bicycles, the rear brake is just there to help keep things straight on the road, but otherwise having relatively little to do with deceleration. This is just as true for road bikes with rim brakes as it is for MTBs with discs.

Regarding stability, scooters have small wheels that are less stable than larger wheels - the small diameter provides minimal gyroscopic force - and are more susceptible to small imperfections in the road surface than a larger diameter wheel. In addition the geometry of current scooter steering makes it very easy for the front wheel to turn past the point where the tyre can continue to grip & guide the scooter, allowing the front wheel to *relatively* easily break away, causing loss of control. By contrast bicycle steering geometry, riding position and the gyroscopic effect of a large diameter rotating mass work together for stability, and it's relatively difficult to lose control of a bike without doing something completely stupid (not that this stops some people...). The one thing a bicycle can't do as effectively as a scooter would be to rapidly dodge an obstacle at low speed, because the scooter has minimal built-in stability to overcome.

The scooters in Cheltenham are being limited to 12mph, with a second, lower speed limit, presumably activated by the internal GPS system for when they enter certain areas. To me, this is sensible, and a recognition of the inherent design limitations. As always, safety is completely dependant on the person guiding the vehicle, and a scooter ridden by someone skilled and able will present less of a hazard than a bicycle ridden by a drunken numpty.

FWIW " In the UK, e-bikes are technically restricted to a speed of 25 kilometres per hour with a battery limit of 250 Watts. If the e-bike has a higher speed unassisted by pedalling, it’s classed as a motor vehicle that requires tax, a licence and insurance. " https://cities-today.com/do-uk-cities-need-stricter-e-bike-regulation/ 25kph is equivalent to 15mph.
 
ancient_mariner said:
With respect, brakes working on rims have been able to lock both wheels at will for several decades, so I should be a little surprised if a scooter could stop under control as quickly as a bicycle.
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With respect rim brakes may well be able to lock wheels - rear definitely, front dont ever recall doing so on tarmac and rarely on gravel. I used to ride cantilever (pre V-brake) on mountain bike red routes. Disc brakes on the other hand will put you over the front bars if you dont pay attention.
Even without the retardation from lifting off the power the scooter stops fast with the disc brakes. I dont own one but having tried one believe they have more controlled stopping than a bike and non-electric scooters because of the nature of how they work
 
Scooter will have a low centre of gravity than the bike so stablity can not be measured purely on wheel size. Where the motor is in the front the ones ive seen have a regenerative brake system with a form of ABS.
 
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bass_junkie83 said:
Pre-Covid I had decided to buy one if and when they become legal, but I have no interest in hiring them. I used a folding bike either end of a train journey for my daily commute and not having to carry my work clothes with me every day, not getting sweaty and needing to shower at the office every morning is really appealing.
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Same, I've no interest in hiring one. I had also been toying with idea of buying one pre-Covid. To do 3-4 miles to train station in fair weather and take the train to work rather than driving. Although I still need to go to the office, Covid had made the idea of public transport unappealing.

It's stupid to group e-scooter together with mopeds. Anything ridden irresponsibly is a hazard. Ridden responsibly, these things are as safe as pedal bikes. They don't go as fast, they have lower center of gravity -> easier to learn/ride, they are easy to jump off to prevent rider injury and on average they are lighter than bikes so there is less momentum to anything being crashed into.

When my toddler moves to pedal bikes, I'll be thinking of getting either one of this or an ebike for myself. Probably this due to cost and ease of carrying in the car.
 
wyx087 said:
Same, I've no interest in hiring one. I had also been toying with idea of buying one pre-Covid. To do 3-4 miles to train station in fair weather and take the train to work rather than driving. Although I still need to go to the office, Covid had made the idea of public transport unappealing.

It's stupid to group e-scooter together with mopeds. Anything ridden irresponsibly is a hazard. Ridden responsibly, these things are as safe as pedal bikes. They don't go as fast, they have lower center of gravity -> easier to learn/ride, they are easy to jump off to prevent rider injury and on average they are lighter than bikes so there is less momentum to anything being crashed into.

When my toddler moves to pedal bikes, I'll be thinking of getting either one of this or an ebike for myself. Probably this due to cost and ease of carrying in the car.
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Personally I can't risk it until they become legal. The fact that if you do get caught (although unlikely) means point on your licence just isn't worth the risk for me. I know a few non-drivers that use them care free though.
 
See these things just left all over Milton Keynes, but there again it was hired ebikes before that.

I can see the attraction of being able to get somewhere quickly, but they seem to be used by youngsters out for a bit of fun. Is it another excuse for not exercising?
 
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