Electric Bikes - How much does wind affect your electric bike?

I recently put 12v more of lithium on my bike. I now have 48v of lithium and my bike only goes about 3 mph faster from what I've seen so far. only had it on there 2 days, though. The wind yesterday was 13 mph. Today it was 14 mph. The highest I've had my bike up to on 36v was 29 mph. That was on a really good day. So far, the past two days, I've had it up to 33 mph on 48v. It seems the past two days have been pretty windy, though. Isn't 13 mph considered pretty windy? The reason I ask is because I have a 5303 hub motor and supposedly, it's supposed to be able to go 35 mph at 48v so I wonder if it's the weight of my bike, the tires, or the wind that's keeping from going faster. It almost seems the extra 12v is a waste so far. Maybe I should take it right now with 36v to see the real difference. I'm just a little disappointed right now.

I weigh about 270 lbs right now. The metal box probably weighs about 7 lbs. The batteries weigh about 26 lbs. I got crappy tires on it. I'm working on losing weight.

I wonder if the bearings could be dirty or old?

maybe this could help. hehe

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sGTB_uZdw0o

I'm going back to a more lightweight setup. I just don't like this setup. I feel like I'm riding a tank around. I feel like the bike is riding me rather than me riding it. Moving back down to 36v until I can figure out how to get 48v on my bike using the topeak bag that I have. Maybe I could strap enough bungie cords around it to put it on top? Anyone ever tried that. I just hate for it to fail and fall off. Either that, or I'll just sell my 12v lithium pack or use it as spare cells.

@morph

If you ever decide to sell that 12v lithium, PM me.

I would be interested in the battery (since I am building a ebike anyways).

On my cyclone 500 the wind doesn't do too much, it might even help a little. I've found that I lose about 2 mph with a decent headwind. However I can ride harder longer because of the cooling effect on the motor. Still haven't gotten around to installing my heat sinks but I still love my bike.

Wind affects my ride a lot because I have an upright riding position on a tiny clown bike. I would consider a 13mph wind twice the speed of what's comfortable to ride 25mph into. On a calm day, I start to feel the wind resistance slowing me down when I get up to around 22mph, and from there it increases exponentially. By the time I hit 25mph, I can't hear much more than wind moving past my ears (can't hear cars pulling up behind me).

As far as the motor is concerned, I'm running a 900w Cyclone at 36v. It pulls hard into the wind, but draws more amps doing so. My 35A controller will spike up to 50A under hard acceleration into the wind. I've only taken it up to 30mph, but its capable of more.

On my 72v 30 amp crystalyte 408 setup , very minimal impact in terms of speed, but at the cost of ah usage.

I feel it's windy and my bike may swerve a little due to the wind force.

I love my setup, very robust in such circumstances.

I'm uprading my motor to a crystalyte 5304, will let you know all about it if I get the opportunity.

Wind resistance is a calculation I admit I don't have down totally. Consider this tho... At 25 mph with a 13mph headwind, the wind speed is actually 38mph... It's going to take a lot more torque to move you through that, which equals amp hours where your speed is only a voltage related thing.

If you're upright then you present a large target for the air = more surface area.

One of the reasons I'm thinking of going recumbent, although expensive, the wind resistance is much less than my mountain bike, hence longer range due to reduced AH usage.

Morph

I would suggest that you mount your batteries lower; with a lower center of gravity, your bike should handle better. I have a Currie conversion kit installed on my mountain bike and love the Rack Mounted Battery system they use. My bike handles well even with heavy batteries on it. If you're handy with tools, you should be able to duplicate something like this. http://www.electricrider.com/crystalyte/battbrkt_detail.htm

Good luck.

I'm on 36v now until I get some bungie cords. I think I'm just going to bungie cord the additional 12v pack to the top of it. Just for the times when I want to go fast. Maybe I'll find some kind of netting to put on the top. I bet motorcycles places have soemthing that I could use. I don't really want to mess with my current setup because I like it. I don't know. I might end up selling the 12v lithium pack. 28 mph is fast enough for me. Every now and then, I feel l ike going faster, though. Neoslan, I'll let you know if I sell it.

I'm going to keep that extra 12v battery. I finally got my bike up to 35 mph today even with 15 mph wind. It just took a very long time and about 2000 watts peak and 44 amp peak to do it. I had to hold the throttle down for a long time. I just wanted to see if it was capable of it and it is. I found a way to strap the extra battery on the top of my topeak bag.