from the I've-never-had-functioning-brakes,-I-don't-oil-my-chain-and-my-derailleur's-out-of-adjustment dept.
Brakes that are too effective have led Lyft to remove thousands of its electric pedal-assist bicycles from New York City (Citi Bike), San Francisco (Ford GoBike), and Washington, D.C. (Capital Bikeshare):
A month ago, Jordan Wyckoff was riding an electric Citi Bike to work in Brooklyn when he slammed on the brakes to avoid a minivan that swerved in the bike lane. But when he hit the brakes, the front wheel locked up, sending Mr. Wyckoff over the front of the handlebars and onto the pavement.
The same thing happened to Dominik Glodzik when he tried to brake before a stop sign in Astoria, Queens about two months ago.
William Turton flipped over the front of an electric Citi Bike while trying to brake before an intersection on Bedford Avenue in Brooklyn.
In recent months, dozens of riders have reported injuries while riding electric Citi Bikes, prompting the company on Sunday to pull all of the approximately 1,000 electric bicycles from New York City's streets amid safety concerns about the brakes. Lyft, which owns Citi Bike, took similar precautions with its other bike-sharing services in Washington and San Francisco.
Motivate, a subsidiary of Lyft since 2018, operates bicycle sharing systems in several cities.
Previously: Uber May Try to Buy Citi Bike Parent Company Motivate
Lyft Acquires America's Largest Bike-Sharing Company, Motivate
Related: New Electric Bikes, Scooters, and Dockless Bicycles Hitting U.S. Streets
Uber Buys Electric Bicycle-Sharing Startup JUMP Bikes
Related Stories
Two-wheeled electric vehicles have benefited from improvements in battery technology:
As car companies make strides toward expanding the reach of electric cars in the U.S., the same is happening in the world of two wheels. Outside the U.S., motorcycles, mopeds and scooters are vital, affordable forms of transportation that alleviate congestion. They also run on fossil fuels, and many of the smaller motors are more polluting than regular cars.
In the U.S., these smaller vehicles largely have been leisure devices. But as battery technology improves and cities get denser, some startups are seeking to produce cheaper and greener mopeds, scooters and motorized bikes. When John McChesney reported on e-bikes for NPR in 2008, they were pretty much a new thing in the U.S. Electric bikes have a long history but re-emerged after the turn of the century.
Meanwhile, dockless bikesharing programs, popular in China, have made their way to the U.S. The bicycles are located using GPS, unlocked using smartphones, and parked almost anywhere. Entrants such as LimeBike, Mobike, Spin, and Ofo are competing against existing bikeshare initiatives and public-private partnerships that use fixed docks. Dockless bicycles have made their way across the nation, sparking skepticism, 911 calls, and thefts.
Cycling gadgets: the invisible trackers and dockless bikes shaping 2018
Dockless bike-sharing startup LimeBike is working on creating virtual parking spots
Uber is getting into the dockless bicycle-sharing business with an acquisition reportedly worth $100-200 million:
Uber has acquired bike-sharing startup JUMP for an undisclosed amount of money. This comes shortly after TechCrunch reported that JUMP was in talks with Uber as well as with investors regarding a potential fundraising round involving Sequoia Capital's Mike Moritz. At the time, JUMP was contemplating a sale that exceeded $100 million. We're now hearing that the final price was closer to $200 million, according to one source close to the situation.
JUMP's decision to sell to Uber came down to the ability to realize the bike-share company's vision at a large scale, and quickly, JUMP CEO Ryan Rzepecki told TechCrunch over the phone. He also said Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi's leadership impacted his decision.
[...] JUMP is best known for operating dockless, pedal-assist bikes. JUMP's bikes can be legally locked to bike parking racks or the "furniture zone" of sidewalks, which is where you see things like light poles, benches and utility poles. The bikes also come with integrated locks to secure the bikes.
Also at VentureBeat, Recode, and The Mercury News.
Related: New Electric Bikes, Scooters, and Dockless Bicycles Hitting U.S. Streets
Submitted via IRC for Fnord666
Uber and Lyft are reportedly battling it out to buy Citi Bike's parent company, Motivate
Lyft might have thought its plan to buy bike-sharing company Motivate was a done deal. Uber, it seems, has other plans. Reports last week suggested that Lyft had struck a deal for upwards of $250 million to buy Motivate. But Uber is considering muscling in with its own offer, Axios reports.
Motivate is behind Citi Bike in New York and Ford GoBike in San Francisco, along with bike-sharing programs in other cities including Boston, Chicago, and Washington, DC. Commuters used its bikes 3.18 million times last month.
As the battlegrounds get more intense for the companies' non-ridesharing offerings, Uber and Lyft are exploring electric scooters and, yes, bike sharing. Uber recently bought Jump, which has an exclusive permit to run a dockless bike share system in San Francisco, so Motivate would expand its portfolio of urban services.
Both Uber and Lyft have reportedly applied for licenses to run electric scooters in San Francisco; scooters were recently pulled from the city's streets pending a licensing process, in part because they've proven a nuisance for many. There are more ways than cars to get people around cities, and both companies seem to be focusing more on alternative transport methods. Bike sharing, at the very least, would be a stopgap until flying cabs come along.
Source: https://www.engadget.com/2018/06/08/uber-motivate-citi-bike-acquisition-lyft-bikesharing/
Lyft buys the biggest bike-sharing company in the US
Lyft has acquired Motivate, the bike-sharing company that operates Citi Bike in New York City and Ford's GoBike program in San Francisco. Terms of the deal were not disclosed, though it was reported in June to be around $250 million.
Motivate, which Lyft says accounts for about 80 percent of bike-share trips in the US, also operates networks in Chicago; Boston; Washington, DC; Portland, Oregon; Columbus; and Minneapolis. Lyft says it "will invest to establish bike offerings in our major markets and pursue growth and innovation in the markets where Motivate currently operates," but it's unclear where or when it might expand beyond the cities Motivate is currently in. The company also did not share when Motivate's bikes will be available in the Lyft app.
Also at NYT and TechCrunch.
Previously: Uber May Try to Buy Citi Bike Parent Company Motivate
Related: New Electric Bikes, Scooters, and Dockless Bicycles Hitting U.S. Streets
Uber Buys Electric Bicycle-Sharing Startup JUMP Bikes
E-bikes are the fastest-growing segment of the bicycle industry. They're popular with commuters and baby boomers who might not otherwise be able to get out on a bicycle.
The bikes, which can cost $2,000 or more, combine the frame of a regular bike with lightweight batteries and electric motors for extra zip.
Their sales jumped 72% to $144 million in the U.S. last year, helping to breathe life into bicycle sales that have been relatively flat, according to the NPD Group, which tracks retail bike sales nationwide.
Their popularity has led to conflict.
In bike-friendly southern California, as local land managers take cues from agencies like the National Park Service, some are banning e-bikes from bicycle paths. That has angered riders, said Morgan Lommele, of PeopleForBikes, a bicycle advocacy group and trade association.
[...] Maine and 21 other states have adopted laws that classify e-bikes into categories. Most are treated like regular bicycles under such laws, said Lommele, who has been working with states to create uniform definitions. Only the fastest e-bikes are restricted to roads.
(Score: 4, Informative) by shortscreen on Tuesday April 16 2019, @06:55AM (1 child)
Did the Lyft bikes not have separate front/rear hand brakes? Or did the riders not know that locking up the front wheel leads to this result?
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:21AM
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 2) by coolgopher on Tuesday April 16 2019, @06:58AM (8 children)
Back in my day we preferred the rear wheel when braking, only using the front for light or everything-is-going-to-hell-anyway braking...
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:04AM (7 children)
This happens on ANY bicycle (or even motorcycle!) with a sufficient front brake. You *NEVER* start with the front brake, you hit the rear brake first, shift weight to the back, and only use the front brake for final stopping power if there is no other choice. If you are really good you can balance the two out as you come to a stop and to avoid either the launch (front brake) or the skidding crash (rear brake.) But really this is just a limitation of non-ABS braking systems combined with a lightweight high center of gravity vehicle with brakes sufficient to stop it under maximum traction.
Really the better question might be why these dumbasses didn't perform a few brake checks BEFORE ending up in a situation where you had to slam them on. From my own experience with bicycles your brakes can be VERY hit or miss if you don't practice with them before going on a ride. Some brakes feel fine at low speeds but fade when you clamp down in an emergency and others feel sloppy at low speeds, but will bite hard if you clamp on them in a panic. Finding balanced brakes that bite about the same at all speeds is very unusual compared to cars since most don't have a sacrificial rotor surface (except the newer disc brake bikes) and as a result can only use the wear of the rubber surface against the wheel for stopping power, not the interaction of wear between the brake pad and the rotor where both sides abrade giving a more uniform braking grip under normal circumstances (good properly sized brakes still lock up if you slam the pedal to the floor however, same as on these bicycles.)
(Score: 4, Informative) by FatPhil on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:27AM (2 children)
This is how unloaded the rear wheels can get: https://www.google.com/search?q=best+stoppies&btnG=Search&hl=en&gbv=1&tbm=isch
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 4, Informative) by Nuke on Tuesday April 16 2019, @12:21PM (1 child)
FatPhil wrote :-
I don't agree they are incomparable. Most of these other posters are talking about slow-ish workaday utility pedal-bike riding, but what you say corresponds exactly with my experience of pedal bike riding which includes several seasons of road racing at a top level. As you say, in extreme braking the rear wheel is almost lifting and is therefore contributing little to the braking effect. Part of the skill of handling a pedal bike at higher speeds is to be able to judge this, sliding your weight back to counteract the tendency of the rear to lift, but keeping the bike close to the point at which it does, using principally the front brake judiciously.
Because the rear has less effective weight on it during braking it is more likely to lock, and the moment it does it the bike will whip round and you will be on the ground. So contrary to some other advice here, a skilled faster cyclist will be very cautious with the rear brake. If you are riding a bike more slowly you will be stopped before this develops, hence I suppose the advice in some other comments to use the rear brake.
A problem with the hire bikes is probably that many people assume bike brakes are very poor and therefore pull them on as hard as possible when needed. That will lock the front brake on a properly maintained bike and send you over the handlebars, even at relatively slow speeds.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday April 16 2019, @01:44PM
Perhaps the best advice is to simply behave in such a way that you least often need to use your brakes, and if you do, only gentle braking will do. Pedestroids on their mobiles are fair game - run'em down if you have to, but you get the special move bonus if you can clip them just so that it knocks their imDumb out of their hands.
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 5, Informative) by kazzie on Tuesday April 16 2019, @11:56AM (3 children)
I strongly recommend reading the advice of lifelong cyclist (and bike mechanic) Sheldon Brown [sheldonbrown.com] on using the front or rear brake skillfully. Here are two key quotes:
(Score: 2) by Nuke on Tuesday April 16 2019, @12:24PM
Indeed. And your post came up just as I was posting mine, making a similar point. The rear brake is really the secondary brake.
(Score: 2) by FatPhil on Tuesday April 16 2019, @01:58PM
[* Oh, alright, they were almost certainly Spanish, as I know there was a summer-school for hundreds of Spaniards in town at the time.]
Great minds discuss ideas; average minds discuss events; small minds discuss people; the smallest discuss themselves
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @02:44PM
Which means it is stupid that they removed the bikes. What are they going to do? put weaker breaks on them? People should understands that bicycles are vehicles and they need to learn to ride them properly.
(Score: 2) by corey on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:17AM (3 children)
I've got hydraulic Shimano disc brakes on my ebike, they are super strong. Locked up the back wheel pretty easy.
(Score: 3, Informative) by Nuke on Tuesday April 16 2019, @12:26PM (1 child)
The rear wheel is easy to lock up, you don't need fancy brakes to do so. The more severely you are braking the less weight there is on it.
(Score: 2) by kazzie on Tuesday April 16 2019, @12:56PM
Indeed. And your post came up while I nipped out of the house, and before I finished typing the below post. ;)
(Score: 2) by kazzie on Tuesday April 16 2019, @12:54PM
I remember the thrill of being able to lock-up my rear wheel with those new fangled (cable operated) V-brakes way back in the 1990s. I soon ended up with a bald tyre!
Of course, at the time I hadn't learned that if you lock up a wheel, then you've lost the stopping power of the brake pads, and are relying on the friction of the tyre alone to slow you down. No such thing as ABS on a pedal bike, you've got to pump the brakes (or better, improve your technique) yourself.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @08:06AM (4 children)
If you can't lock up the wheel when you slam the brake, your brake is too weak. Learn to ride a bike.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by ledow on Tuesday April 16 2019, @08:15AM (1 child)
Yep. And if you do lock a wheel, lock up the rear brake, not the front (if you get the choice).
P.S. Also, don't go so fast that you can only stop in time by locking the wheels. Same rule applies in cars. Yes, sometimes you need to. But 99.999999% of the time, it's better to just slow down and look ahead, and be very careful where things can leap out in front of you.
You drive to what you can see is clear, and what you can brake inside... if you can't see round the corner, can't see through the fog, see that the gap to the vehicle in front of you is shrinking, or an obstacle presents itself, you slow down rather than carry on going at the same speed and hope your brakes will stop you in time.
If you can't come to a full controlled (i.e. not emergency) stop before the thing in front of you does, you're in for a world of hurt, no matter what you're driving.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @02:40PM
I wish that drivers of cars that run over pedestrians in the city would serve jail time and not get out of trouble by calling it an accident - as you mentioned, they need to slow down when changing direction or when driving close to slower people or vehicles
(Score: 5, Insightful) by rigrig on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:09AM (1 child)
Yes, but because these people decided they needed to tell the Press about how it was all the bike's fault, it became a "well-known problem", so it's only a matter of time before the next inept cyclist decides to sue for even worse PR.
People like this are why we can't have nice things.
No one remembers the singer.
(Score: 2) by dry on Wednesday April 17 2019, @01:55AM
I assumed these bikes had electronic assisted brakes or such that was defective as I thought everyone knows what happens if you jam on the front brakes on a bike.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Tuesday April 16 2019, @09:17AM (7 children)
Is that riders only get to ride the bike for 30 minutes before they need to return it to a dock somewhere (yes, I know there are places with dockless bikes, but these Lyft bikes are not them), so each time someone grabs one, it's a different bike that won't ride/handle the same as others.
What's more, since these aren't personal bicycles, you get a lot of people who are not experienced bike riders (especially with the electric bikes), unfamiliar with the bikes they are riding (as they just grabbed it out of a dock), or both.
This is a recipe for problems.
I have my own bicycle and know how its brakes respond (and if I don't like that response, I can adjust the brakes accordingly) and am familiar with how it handles.
Having bikes for folks to rent in urban areas is a wonderful idea, but we're going to see plenty of this as more inexperienced riders get on these bikes without a clear idea how to ride them safely.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Coward, Anonymous on Tuesday April 16 2019, @10:58AM (1 child)
With rental ebikes, you can add speed to incompetence. I'm pretty sure I know how that story ends. With regular bikes, inexperienced people tend to be slower.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by NotSanguine on Tuesday April 16 2019, @12:09PM
Yup. What's more is that those renting the ebikes rather than regular bikes are likely less athletic too. Which makes them more likely to be less experienced bicyclists. So the likelihood of issues becomes even larger from that perspective as well.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @04:45PM (2 children)
You can chain 25-29 minute trips using the same bike, docking and immediately undocking the bike. You could possibly get the same bike again on a slow day if you finish your business quickly and remember which dock you parked it in. But you will inevitably use many different bikes with a bikeshare service. Some of them will feel 10% better/worse than others.
Playing it safe and not braking too hard should keep you from falling on your ass. Instead of using the pedal assist to significantly raise your speed, you should use it to climb harsh hills more easily, if there are any.
(Score: 2) by NotSanguine on Tuesday April 16 2019, @05:22PM (1 child)
That's likely good advice. I imagine it may be helpful to to some folks here.
However, I have my own (non-electric) bicycle. I can ride it whenever I like, for as long as I like, without paying some corporation that's sucking up my location information and who knows what else from my phone.
Does the app require full network access? Access to contacts, photos and other data in addition to tracking your location?
In fact, even if I didn't own a bicycle, I wouldn't install additional surveillance monitoring on my phone. Thanks, but no thanks.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @06:17PM
When I used a bikeshare, I had a little plastic key with a barcode that inserts into the dock. I still have it on my keychain, in fact. No phone needed, although I sometimes used a third-party app (Spotcycle) that could locate stations and occupied/unoccupied docks.
The service worked for me despite the restrictions. I could bike from location A to light rail, etc. No need to lug a bike around to certain places, no chance of getting a bike stolen. I moved before they rolled out any pedal-assist bikes, but I would have liked to have them available.
Certain cities have better terms. For example, Houston BCycle has 60 minute trips instead of 30.
(Score: 2) by bob_super on Tuesday April 16 2019, @07:36PM (1 child)
> so each time someone grabs one, it's a different bike that won't ride/handle the same as others.
People do rent cars all the time.
They're just careful for a few minutes until they figure out the dynamic behavior.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @11:12PM
Clearly, you’ve never driven a rental car. People get into those things and cane the shit out of it the moment they leave the parking lot. Slow down for speed bumps? Nope, this is a rental! Redline off the lights. Yes sir! This is what rentals are for.
(Score: 2, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday April 16 2019, @03:55PM (3 children)
From https://www.citibikenyc.com/how-it-works/meet-the-bikes [citibikenyc.com] one of the side view photos shows an internal expanding drum brake on the front of one of the models -- the "Dockless" version. Note the actuating lever below the front axle. It's not as clear what kind of brake is used on the "Classic", it has a smaller diameter front hub and may use some different type of brake? Anyone in NYC that can take a look and report back?
These drum brakes are more common in England (and not in USA), where it rains frequently, and they are fairly water resistant--generally a good thing compared to rim brakes that can be problematic when wet/greasy. But I believe the drum brakes are also quite sensitive, like the latest disk brakes used on high-end bikes.
Anyone that hasn't ridden a bike since childhood would probably be surprised the first time they grab some brake on a bike with *good* brakes. As others have noted, experts learn to do all their hard braking with the front wheel, keeping the rear wheel just barely touching the ground to maintain control & balance. Non-experts either: don't slow down very fast (relying more on rear brake) or they pitch over in an attempted emergency stop.
A possible improvement (which would need some experimentation) for these bikes is to fit a stronger return spring at the brake, to raise the force required at the lever by some modest amount. My choice would be to try to make the drum brakes acceptable, since everything is packaged away/hidden, usually a good thing when dealing with an unsophisticated customer. Compare to disk brakes where there are exposed parts to catch on things (and some disks come with sharp edges).
(Score: 1) by Coward, Anonymous on Tuesday April 16 2019, @11:17PM (2 children)
So first you criticize the "experts" (who probably just assumed a strong front brake)
but later you agree that
Do you really think the bikes had a mechanical fault, as the SN story title suggests, or was it user error, as your own post suggests? My money is on the latter (but I'll admit that it's just a guess).
Anyway, an experienced biker does all the hard braking in front only when traction is good.
(Score: 1) by Coward, Anonymous on Tuesday April 16 2019, @11:35PM (1 child)
Sorry to reply to my own post, and for blaming the victims, but this story [washingtonpost.com] has more details. I can easily imagine brake levers with the wrong leverage ratio having being installed, which could explain the handling problems.
As the late Sheldon Brown wrote [sheldonbrown.com] when discussing brake lever mismatch:
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday April 17 2019, @02:52AM
Thanks for digging out that WP article. The initial point I was trying to make is that these bikes don't use a "normal" (for USA) front brake. Drum brakes are just that much different than rim brakes (or disks) and have their own set of strengths and weaknesses.
If the WP article is correct, it's possible that the brakes were combined with the wrong levers as you suggest. Or they could have been improperly assembled. Typically these have two internal "shoes", one leading and one trailing. The leading shoe is "self energizing", braking force tends to increase the contact force between shoe and drum due to the internal geometry. If this shoe doesn't have a fairly strong return spring, or if it isn't well controlled (tight fitting pivot), it could jam and lock the brake with very little lever force by the rider.
In the era before disk brakes were common on cars, drum brakes and self energizing (or "servo) was studied at length, with the goal of reducing brake pedal force for heavy cars. For example, brakes were made with additional linkage internally and two (or more) leading shoes. Here are pictures of three common types, https://www.quora.com/What-are-the-3-types-of-drum-brakes [quora.com] With age and wear, unexpected brake locking became more likely with the designs that flirted with more "servo" in their geometry. Wiki also has a useful section, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drum_brake#Self-applying_characteristic [wikipedia.org]