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Plug-in electric scooter put to the test

“Mezamashi TV” morning show takes a new plug-in scooter for a 141-kilometer test run from Numazu to Tokyo:

The scooter runs fine on flat roads, but has serious trouble climbing hills – even with the assistance of some pedaling. They find that its battery dies rather quickly and the scooter must stop at random houses/businesses so that it can be plugged in and charged for a few hours.

The plug-in scooter needed 33 hours and 10 minutes to make the journey (with 5 battery charging stops). A gas-powered scooter made the same trip in 12 hours and 4 minutes. The gas for the trip cost 425 yen, while the battery charges totaled a mere 53 yen.

It would seem that the plug-in scooter is a really cheap way to make short trips in areas without steep hills.

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12 comments - What do you think? Posted by James - November 17, 2009 at 7:00 am

Categories: Technology Tags: bikes, eco, gadgets, motor, tech, vehicles

http://whatjapanthinks.com Ken Y-N

How on earth did an ordinary scooter take 12 hours to go 141 km? Under 12 kph?

The Overthinker

I agree. Did they stop for the night somewhere? I could walk there in 12 hours….

Vonskippy

Maybe a really long extension cord would cut some time off that 33 hours.

helical

One could even add pedals so you could keep on charging the battery with a generator.

Mt. Man

helical,

You would think that mechanism would be easy to make. Unfortunately, to be able to power and MOVE something like that off a charge just by pedaling – you’d be pedaling for hours. The amount of energy generated from pedaling is not enough to power or move the bike+person, unfortunately – otherwise we would all be riding these already.

Same goes for the car. The amount of energy generated from the wheels turning to flip the alternator thus the battery to power the basic stuff like lamps = just is not enough to move the car which weights a ton and the people in it. The batteries are too heavy to begin with.

At least for now. Somebody needs to come up with a faster/easier chemical battery (read: cheap enough) that can save enough power from pedaling.

We’d all be flying to the Moon by then.

Mt. Man

To add:

they should just add pedals anyway, so some could actually pedal it a little bit.
But when the bike is as heavy as the scooter would be – a lot of people would not be strong enough to move it by pedaling. But pedals would still be useful enough to get the thing off the road, I suppose!
Iago

If they ditch the heavy motor and batteries, then it would be much easier to pedal.
helical

Iago … I think you may be onto something here!

Roppongi Health

How about charging scooter from power grid ? There is power lines everywhere in country. You need just split second to charge that battery from 33kV grid, not 2 hours!!! Thats too much.

There should also be some kind of system to connect schooter to power grid. Some kind of long cables with weights at the end, so cable can be connected some 10m well above ground.

CPT. Charles

“It would seem that the plug-in scooter is a really cheap way to make short trips in areas without steep hills.”

Well, that kinda limits things, doesn’t it?

I realize Japan isn’t all mountains, but isn’t exactly Iowa either.

Ken Y-N: long bathroom breaks?
kage

HaHa 33 hours?!! It would be bether if they had go on foot, or bike.
But the idea is pretty nice. If they add some hydrogen engeni to powerup the battery it wold be nice.
Buster

I for one am all for electro scooters in urban scenarios. Most people, especially in many Asian cities, use it to drive max. some kilometers from one end to the city to another one. Battery life therefore wouldn’t be a big problem while air and noise pollution would decrease dramatically.

Plug-in electric scooter put to the test

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