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Making a smart bike dumb so it works again
- MarceliusK 1y agoThere's something beautifully satisfying about stripping away all the unnecessary "smart" layers just to bring back basic functionality
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- Aardwolf 1y ago> You can also charge this light with USB-C instead of the original micro-USB. A dynamo would be the next upgrade
- dobladov 1y agoI can't state how convenient hub dynamos are, no noise, no maintenance, unlikely to be robbed without stealing the whole bike, it just works, perfect for a city bike.
- tomn 1y agoI get why people like them, but they make way less sense when you work out the capacity of an equivalent weight (not to mention cost) of lithium cells. It's easy to get to about 90Wh, which will run a dynamo-powered light for 30 hours on max (most dynamos seem to be rated 3W). There are definitely cases where it makes sense, and not having to keep batteries charged is nice, it's just easy to miss how good batteries are these days.
- tomsmeding 1y agoNot having to take the light off the bike and charge it and then forget to take it back to the bike, not to mention forgetting charging it and finding out when it's dark, is completely worth having a dynamo.
- tomn 1y agoA spare battery in your saddle-pack solves most of those problems. If you're worried about being without light, a (typical) dynamo system is more complicated and exposed than a battery system, so will be more prone to failure.
- alanfranz 1y agoI suppose you’re a casual cyclist and you don’t commute on a daily basis. If you commute on a daily basis, a hub dynamo and light system is a bliss. Just hop on the bike and go. I have used bikes with Shimano, SP and Son for thousands of kms in all kind of weather and never really experienced a fault. It’s as simple as car lights - you just take them for granted. With battery powered lights you need to take them off and put them back; recharge them; remember to bring them with you and not lose them. A spare battery pack is not enough (front and rear) and may not work during cycling (not all lights can be charged while turned on). And, low quality battery powered lights tend to quickly break (2-3 years) while I now realize one of my b+m systems is 10y old already. Good battery powered lights will probably last more, but they’re as expensive as dynamo powered ones. So yeah, battery is ok and cheap for casual cycling, but very suboptimal if you want reliable lights every day throughout the year.
- tomn 1y agoYou're comparing a hub dynamo with cheap low-capacity rechargeable lights. Rechargeable lights from the usual suspects are generally not good, they are expensive for what they are, have low capacity, and don't have swappable standard-size batteries. They make dynamo systems look like a good deal, but if typical battery-powered lights were even close to their theoretical optimum I think people would be much less enthusiastic about dynamos.
- alanfranz 1y agoGood lights last more (I have a Blackburn lamp and it’s working) but it’s still less convenient than dynamo. You need to remove and remount it every time, with the risk of dropping or forgetting. Ofc if you mount fixed battery-powered lights and you could just swap a usb c battery, maybe it would compete with dynamo. But an easy swappable battery would still ve easy to steal (unless it’s inside the frame with a lock or sth like that)
- fatfox 1y agoThey make a ton of sense when you’re riding long distance and when you don’t have access to a charger.
- Aardwolf 1y agoIt's not about weight, it's about having the light work when you need it. Ensuring the battery is not empty at the time you want to ride it and it is night is not always convenient I'm talking about commute, not sports, here.
- gonzo41 1y agoIf you like hub dynamos, give hub gears a try. My electric bike has nexus 7 hub gears. It's fantastic. There's essentially no maintenance.
- dobladov 1y agoExactly my setup, a nexus hub with 8 speeds, the bike has been outside under rain and occasional snow, and it's completely reliable for my daily work commute.
- analog31 1y agoHow are they for drag when you're not using the light? My only misgiving is: Which bike to put it on?
- dobladov 1y ago> Which bike to put it on? As mentioned, a city bike, I don't think a dynamo hub would be a practical choice for a racing bike or mountain bike, nor fit all riders. The drag is not an issue for a bike that I use to commute to work and go shopping, the convenience out weights by far the drag, and if the worry was weight and drag there are other parts that contribute much more like the carry bags, pannier rack, mudguards that again, are convenient. Another positive factor not mentioned would be environmental, no need to create waste with batteries.
- lnx01 1y agoI would imagine it's minimal. I'll never forget a demo I played with at a Science museum as a kid. A dynamo with a crank you can turn, and set of switches that allow you to turn on one, two, or three incandescent bulbs. The crank turns freely without load, and is increasingly more difficult to turn as load is added.
- ortusdux 1y agoHow much energy do they rob? I can't think of dynamos without thinking of Bart Simpson - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaKjmxb7Qlc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GaKjmxb7Qlc
- Xylakant 1y agoIt depends both on the lights and the dynamo. Incandescent lights used substantial chunks of your pedaling power. LED lights need maybe 5W or so. Hub dynamos are pretty efficient. For an untrained person your average power output is around 100W. That means powering the light would be around 5% of your power if you’re using an efficient hub dynamo. That’s in the ballpark of “bad chain maintenance costs more energy”
- consp 1y ago> Incandescent lights used substantial chunks of your pedaling power. Not solely caused by the lights as they are about ~5W anyway (edit: the old one in my box of bike parts says 6V/3W on the metal). The wheel dynamo's are insanely inefficient and get hot everywhere which were the primary ones used with most incandecant lights.
- 0_____0 1y agohub dynamos are not particularly efficient. it's very difficult to make an electric machine that is efficient at the (very low speeds, relatively) that a bike wheel turns at. 60% sounds about right. However, safety lights use much less than 5W, and a modest but very useable headlight about 3W, so your figures are otherwise pretty close.
- malfist 1y ago100W is pretty high for an untrained person. Back when I was cycling regularly I could hit those numbers but not every time. I took my first ride of the season and averaged a whooping 63 watts. Stealing 5 watts from that it taking away 8% of my energy. If you account for efficiency loss in the dynamic it's probably closer to 16% of my output. That's a huge chunk
- joeblubaugh 1y agoI’m sure a Lion pack weighs less than a dynamo
- wiether 1y agoI thought you were talking about those Lion[0] and it left me quite confused... [0]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_(chocolate_bar) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lion_(chocolate_bar)
- dheera 1y agoI detest this trend of needing an app for every piece of hardware. Just put the damn interface on the hardware. You are after all selling the hardware, not the app.
- jagged-chisel 1y agoThey are not selling the hardware. They are taking your money in exchange for the privilege of utilizing the hardware they created to use a service they built so their customers can obtain data about your usage of the device and whatever it connects to. I fear that small companies without VC are the only ones interested in making a thing they sell that doesn’t require some ongoing commitment from buyers. And those companies run the risk of folding overnight. It’s fine for the customers since their hardware continues to function, but it’s not an attractive business model.
- consp 1y ago> but it’s not an attractive business model It's been the business model for over 100+ years with bikes. It's not an attractive VC buisness models as it cannot needlessly extract wealth beyond the product sale. It is double dipping as you fully pay for the bike, and people fall for it somehow.
- charcircuit 1y agoThe electronic computer didn't exist 100+ years ago. You can't ignore the exponentially growth of technology that has happened and pretend that the market dynamics are the same that they were such a long time ago.
- JadeNB 1y ago> The electronic computer didn't exist 100+ years ago. You can't ignore the exponentially growth of technology that has happened and pretend that the market dynamics are the same that they were such a long time ago. One can't argue that manufacturers won't try to get away with this stuff, because they will, but one can argue that it's parasitic rent-seeking, which it is. Certainly, there are new classes of device that can be made by leveraging new technology in previously impossible ways, but that's not what we're talking about here. We're talking about classes of hardware that functioned perfectly well 100+ years ago (for a bike), or for other cases discussed in this thread less long ago but before the internet age, that are being artificially hobbled to allow additional revenue extraction.
- tchock23 1y agoIf anyone is looking to do the opposite (i.e., make a dumb bike smart) check out the QZ app (qzfitness.com). Made by a solo dev who is amazing at support despite the tiny price and lack of subscription. I have no affiliation, just thought anyone reading the original post might be curious about the opposite...
- zorrolisto 1y ago[flagged]
- c2xlZXB5Cg1 1y agoThe light placement (so the mudguard casts shadows) would drive me insane
- franciscop 1y agoAnother problem is that when turning, the light doesn't follow the handlebar, so it "stays behind" the curve. It's bright/wide enough and I only drive in the city so neither problems are a huge deal though.
- consp 1y agoThat is actually less of an issue as you might think, if the light is designed properly. As you will have to look at the corner before you ever shine the light directly towards it. This is not much different from motorcycles. Since this is a vanmoof (first edition probably) I think they followed the design of "old fashioned" bikes which also lack the turnability features as the light is attached to the frame part of the central steering bar and not the insert which turns with the steering wheel.
- andrewshadura 1y agoOld-fashioned bikes usually have the light attached to the fork or the headset, not to the frame.
- frosted-flakes 1y agoI consider that an advantage because the light stays nice and steady while I weave around bumps in the road.
- scottyah 1y agoI was hoping this was about the Copenhagen Wheel. I'd love if my expensive brick could get going again. It was my first lesson in "Don't trust a startup".
- ortusdux 1y agoI've been eyeing a Pikaboost 2 conversion kit for a while now, but I share your skepticism. For me it's more of a distrust of first gen products than it is startups. Even apple messes up 1st gen. I live up a hill, and all my destinations are at sea level, so I just want enough E-bike to get home at the end of the day.
- pedantsamaritan 1y agoI thought I'd read about unbricking it. https://www.reddit.com/r/ebikes/comments/1bis770/diehard_copenhagen_wheel_users_unite/ https://www.reddit.com/r/ebikes/comments/1bis770/diehard_cop... links to a private FB group that I haven't joined, but implies maybe it hasn't been solved yet. https://www.instructables.com/Build-a-Key-for-the-Copenhagen-Wheel-With-an-ESP32/ https://www.instructables.com/Build-a-Key-for-the-Copenhagen... makes me think at least one piece of the puzzle has been.
- consp 1y ago> I'd love if my expensive brick could get going again. It was my first lesson in "Don't trust a startup". This does not even require an app. Simply lock down all hardware and make it economically unviable by charging 100+ euro for a 5 second "software update", which you need to do if you ever unplug the battery for > 10 seconds. See the thousands of Accell bikes (mostly Sparta branded) on dumps. You can get them going again but that's only for diehard hobbyists and requires custom hardware.
- deleted 1y ago[deleted]
- autoexec 1y agoI'm sure there are startups that won't screw over their users even if they don't make it. Don't trust/buy any hardware that requires a cell phone app to use though.
- xnx 1y agoWeird. That looks so much like a Vanmoof which typically has light buttons on the left handlebar. Might be a knockoff.
- franciscop 1y agoIt is an early edition Vanmoof, it has a single button on the handlebar that was for the Bell, no button for the lights. I could find little info about this model, it was only later versions that were a lot more popular.
- thih9 1y ago> Now my bike has a button, you press it and the light turns on. It's like magic how simple it is! I recall no situations where I preferred an app as opposed to a regular hardware button like this.
- southernplaces7 1y agoThat companies would follow such absolute shit practices to the people who trusted them with their money for actual physical products is grotesque. It should even be treated as a type of fraud, downright. Fuck these "smart device" manufacturers that can't seem to help themselves against fucking the thing you bought right over with bullshit fashionable tech trends that barely work. That they do all this for the sake of extracting every possible penny out of you through data via forced app interaction only makes it more disgusting and parasitic. It used to b e that purely digital social media/ad-type companies mostly did this, now the very visible nonsense fashion is to cram as much extractive app-based shit into every possible physical product under the sun. I can't wait to see a mass consumer revolt against such garbage, putting these companies sales firmly down the toilet. To those of you who fund, found or promote such things in your ventures and pitches, simply: Fuck. You..
- SoftTalker 1y agoCaveat emptor has been a saying since long before social media ad-type companies.
- dylan604 1y agoBut the fact that media ad-type companies can still get away with shenanigans is the crazy part. The hype machine just seems like it will always be faster/more powerful than those pointing out the lunacy. After all, the emperor's clothes look fantastic.
- SoftTalker 1y agoI’m just saying, it’s always been this way.
- jmward01 1y agoThis is victim blaming. Being aware of everything will paralyze you to inaction because you can't read a 20 page TOS just to view a website or buy a hairdryer. Like so many things in our society right now, this is a trust thing. Functioning societies have a level of trust that allows greater return than the maximum minimum. If I trusted companies more I would buy more things. But I don't so I avoid things like new cars and 'smart' TVs. That trust is generally built up with strong institutions and things like 'consumer protections'. Right now however people believe in ideas like 'buyer beware' and 'it is the buyer's fault for getting scammed' and it just leads to a weak economy filled with junk that people hate but have no other option.
- ThrowawayTestr 1y agoWatch out, the voltage out of that battery charger is the unregulated battery voltage.
- franciscop 1y agoThanks, this felt fine though. I added a small resistor to limit the current, but even without it (direct battery) the light worked fine. I didn't think I'd need a boost converter here.
- ThrowawayTestr 1y agoIt has low voltage cutoff on the battery so you're probably fine.
- franciscop 1y agoThanks! I just added the (very basic) circuit schema.
- ctkhn 1y agoMaybe I've been listening to too much YKS but I can't imagine buying a bike that required me to use an app and company's cloud to control basic functionality like that
- dylan604 1y agoIs it possible the app wasn't advertised as required, but shown as a feature?
- ben-schaaf 1y agoThis is why I avoid anything that advertises as having an app. Whether it's adding huge latency to a volume change, using it for advertising or removing functionality entirely; the manufacturer simply has too much ownership over a product you've supposedly bought.
- smitty1e 1y agoMy clothes dryer has this stupid touch screen interface and keeps reminding me that it can be controlled by an app. I'm all: "So? I Don't want my phone colluding with the dryer and the garage door opener to overthrow me."
- jmward01 1y agoDon't be ridiculous. They won't collude against you. They clearly will have a turf war instead with each claiming that the TOS you signed by opening the packaging (the TOS being, of course, on the inside of said packaging) gives them exclusive rights to your entire being.
- sandworm101 1y agoWe have a shredder at work with a touchscreen. It is a shedder, basically just a motor and some rotating blades. But every time i use it i have to wait 30 seconds for the touchscreen to wake up. Totally useless.
- 1y ago
- tails4e 1y agoThis is a very real issue for even expensive items. If you buy a car today, doesn't it have some sw component that requires phoning home to work properly. What if that company goes bust? Or if a war breaks out and that company is in a country on the other side? Both Tesla and byd seem like challenging purchases with all that's going on
- ryandrake 1y agoI'm thinking that removing the smarts from "smart" devices may become a lucrative cottage industry in the next 25 years, as devices become orphaned and useless when their manufacturers disappear or go out of business. Bonus service: Pre-dumbing a smart device to increase its usefulness prior to purchase. Store sells a "Smart Dishwasher" for $400? I'll unlock it and un-app it and sell it to you for $500 instead.
- reaperman 1y agoProducts are often cheap enough that the labor costs are too high compared to getting a new unit. It would generally work for appliances that are built into a house or hard to transport because then the relative cost would be offset by the cost of labor to remove and install a replacement. For example, people generally wouldn’t do this for a TV when they can get a decent replacement for $300 new.
- iterateoften 1y agoIt would probably only work in countries where services are cheaper than buying new. For example in south america is is common to get shoes repaired or customized. Clothing altered to fit or be repaired etc. In the US it really only makes sense if that article of clothing is > $200-300. Its pretty hard around me to find a tailor that will do much of anything more than basic hemming for less than $75-100. whereas in south america it would only cost me around $5 to get something altered or a shoe repaired. I would get something altered about once a month in south america. In the US, maybe once every couple years.
- CamperBob2 1y ago
- brbcompiling 1y ago[dead]
- lutusp 1y agoNot the topic of most comments, but instead of a 22 ohm resistor that burns up the majority of the battery power to protect the LED from overcurrent, a switching power supply would allow the light to run more than twice as long for the same available battery energy. And I agree with other comments that linking products to their manufacturers is deplorable -- you don't own a modern product, it owns you.
- franciscop 1y agoOh that's a great point/addition, thanks! The voltage already seems to be good. Everything seemed to work without even the resistor, just added the smaller resistor I had just in case and because I understand an LED in series with a power supply is a very bad idea, even if "it works" (wanted to be on the safe side). So is there something like a purely current protector that doesn't change the voltage much?
- lutusp 1y ago> So is there something like a purely current protector that doesn't change the voltage much? First, in a regulated power supply, you control the current by (a) monitoring current, and (b) adjusting voltage. Second, a switching power supply can easily be designed to regulate load current, which is what you want for an LED load, because the voltage across the LED changes with both current and temperature. The point of a switching design is that very little power is dissipated by anything except the load. In your present circuit, the 22 ohm resistor is dissipating at least half the available power, all to protect the LED from overcurrent. I should add that, in any LED driving circuit, a way must be provided to limit the LED's current, or it may experience thermal runaway and failure. A switching power supply is an ideal way to do this, but only if it senses current in the load, not voltage. Apropos, I designed switching power supplies for the NASA Space Shuttle. They were about 90% efficient, in spite of the fact that they had to deliver widely varying voltages and currents.
- mg794613 1y agoHow did that VanMoof end up in Japan? That's quite the trip it made. Also that must have been in the sweetspot of couple of month between the release of the bike and the bankruptcy, who else would want to transport a "dead" bike that far?
- franciscop 1y agoIt seems I misunderstood and they did operate at some point in Japan: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43768560 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43768560
- discordance 1y agoVanmoof had a very flashy store in Omotesando
- jonasdegendt 1y agoThe bikes were built in Taiwan anyway, so seems reasonable enough to sell them in Japan.
- frxx 1y agoNice article and hack! Two things are confusing me here though: If this is a VanMoof, I believe they were sold in Japan and even had a Store in Shibuya Secondly, they were bankrupt, but to my knowledge were bought and is therefore still (again?) in business.
- franciscop 1y ago- Oh sorry, my friend bought it 2nd or 3rd hand after another individual had an accident and I understood they were not in Japan (some repair parts were 3rd party), but I searched and it seems you are right! I'll correct it. - We tried a few times to recover the account but had some trouble with CS and the particular account, so ended up giving on that. It didn't help that he visits the country from time to time and we'd need to migrate the account each time.
- frxx 1y agoAhh I see. Yeah there are still many problems with "connected" bikes like this that are easier solved with a hardware hack!
- doctorpangloss 1y ago> The lights don't work without the App. I've owned a lot of VanMoofs. You absolutely do not need to use the app to interact with the lights, they are automatic. If the bike is misconfigured, it takes about 30 seconds to reset its preferences with a physical button accessible from the exterior, since the SX2. Your friend may have bought a broken VanMoof.
- franciscop 1y ago> "since the SX2" + "Your friend may have bought a broken VanMoof" The explanation is that it's one of the first generation ones. Originally there was a single push button outside on the handle, for the Bell, and a single charging micro-USB.
- dmarinus 1y agosomething more problematic of this smart bike is that it also requires an app to unlock. from what I read they used many (low quality) custom parts for this bike which aren't available anymore.
- franciscop 1y agoSince we were swapping it from owner every few months initially, when the App still worked, we left it unlocked and with a normal chain lock. Luckily for us, since now the app doesn't work anymore.
- steffandroid 1y agoHey, I'm one of the app developers at VanMoof – what's not working exactly?
- jonasdegendt 1y ago> something more problematic of this smart bike is that it also requires an app to unlock. It doesn't, assuming you have the PIN to the bicycle. > from what I read they used many (low quality) custom parts for this bike which aren't available anymore. I've worked on my two VanMoofs a bunch to keep them running and they're okay quality parts in my opinion. Additionally, they sold about 200k bicycles so there's plenty of second hand, and even new, parts out there.
- verisimi 1y agoIf government were 'for the people' it would be required that appliances etc work regardless of communicating with the parent company. Eg, it is probably already illegal to use the term 'purchase' for this sort of thing - as it actually seems like some sort of 'service contract' with terms for both parties to agree to. That items that need to 'call back to base' are allowed to be sold with no repercussions, tells you who the legal/governmental systems are serving.
- yapyap 1y ago1. The [1] in the blogpost leads nowhere. 2. > Someone risked life in prison for a measly $3.5/500円 light. Is the punishment really life in prison in Japan for stealing a bike light?
- pkphilip 1y agoThis is a real issue with most vehicles these days. I have a pal with a Triumph Street Twin which gave the message in the console and they couldn't figure out what was causing it. The bike would go into limp mode indicating as though there is something wrong with the engine. They tried for months to diagnose why the message was coming up and they couldn't figure it out. It would be great to have a motorcycle with as little electronic magic as possible to allow it to be repaired easily