I own two Charger 'Human power assist" type bikes that I bought. One from a company called Electroportal and the other I bought off of e-Bay. I love the bikes. The power modeule that control the bikes propulsion are now not functioning. The company has been sold and the new owners cannot repair them. I need an electric bike to get around mostly city conditions but be able to go off the beatren path on occasions. Distance and speen are more important to me than off road capability. I paid about $1250.00 a piece for the bike I have now. What bike do you recommend or what conversion kit to you recommend?
Or does anyone know of someone who can repair the controllers or modify them or if anyone has them for sale?
I talked with Sam (Electroportal) a couple weeks ago and am reasonably certain he can help you. However there are no replacement controller boards for these bikes since the original company is gone. One time he told me that in order to sell one of the boards he has, it would mean taking it out of a functioning bike.
However something Sam had worked out was a way to reconfigure the Charger with a different controller & drive train.
It's easy to find a 24v controller. On my Charger bike I used a 4QD controller. It required connecting a throttle on the handlebar. It won't work as a pedelec like the original Charger.
The next issue once you have replaced the controller is that when the motor spins it's going to spin the pedals. What I did was to find a freewheeling crankset. The specific crankset was made by Shimano named the 'Front Freewheeling System' and had been sold in the 1960's on some Schwinn bicycles. I searched and searched for a crankset that freewheels and that was the only one.
However Sam had found a different solution that's probably better.
- David Herron, The Long Tail Pipe, davidherron.com, 7gen.com, What is Reiki
Thank you for the reply. I am dead in the water here. The bikes are very well built. I have been riding them w/o the controllers. It works but I would much rather have some voltage! One of the bikes is set up for more 'off the path' features, while the other is set up mainly for urban assault. It has smoother tires. Also, I am told that there is a 15AH battery with the same deminsions as these. Man, that would be awesone to haveeven 20% more capacity. Like I have said, I would love to have a throttle kit to just convert these since they are such nice bikes. As for Sam, I have shipped the one controller to him last spring and I finally asked for it back in about October. I have emailed him since but have gotten no reply.
Originally I wantd to have two functioning bikes to have a partner ride if they were into it. Then I had only one functioning controller so I swapped them out depending on the application. Now I have nothing. So if there is a way to add a throttle instead of the original mechanisms, that would be better than nothing, right?