{"id":504,"date":"2018-08-04T12:32:21","date_gmt":"2018-08-04T12:32:21","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/?p=504"},"modified":"2018-08-04T12:32:21","modified_gmt":"2018-08-04T12:32:21","slug":"phase-iii-climbing-mt-baldy","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/2018\/08\/04\/phase-iii-climbing-mt-baldy\/","title":{"rendered":"Phase III: Climbing Mt. Baldy"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Slick, taking a breather at the Mt. Baldy Lodge. My apologies for the mediocre image quality; all I had with me was my iPhone.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Phase III (pardon the electrical pun) <\/span>of our City Slicker testing involved riding Slick from my home up to Mt. Baldy Village. \u00a0 It’s a 2,500-foot climb over 9.2 miles, and it’s rough.\u00a0 It’s a challenging climb on a small IC-engined motorcycle, and it’s really, really rough on a bicycle (as I know from personal experience).\u00a0 I knew power consumption would be higher based on our Phase I and II testing (see those results here<\/a> and here<\/a>), but the earlier tests did not include steep climbs.\u00a0 Phase III was a fairly steep uphill climb all the way, and then a steep descent all the way down. \u00a0Here’s the route I took, up and down…<\/p>\n

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A satellite map of the test route…north Upland to Mt. Baldy village.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

I didn’t know how Slick would do, and I didn’t want to run the bike down more than 50% (you know, to make sure I had the juice to get home).\u00a0 I decided in advance that if the bike hit the 50% energy remaining mark on the way up, I’d turn around and head back.<\/p>\n

I need not have worried, though.\u00a0 I sailed up to the Mt. Baldy Lodge (that first photo you see above) with 56% power remaining on the charge indicator. \u00a0 I stopped to take a picture, and then I turned around and rode home. \u00a0 Here’s what it looks like on a miles versus battery charge plot…<\/p>\n

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Miles versus Battery Charge, up and down Mt. Baldy Road.\u00a0 The bike started with a 99% charge and was at 56% remaining after climbing from 1700 ft above sea level to 4193 ft above sea level.\u00a0 On the way down, power consumption was dramatically lower; I covered the same distance using only 10% of the battery’s charge.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

As you can see from the above chart, energy consumption on the way down was near zero.\u00a0 I used 43% of the battery’s energy (from 99% to 56%) to make the 9.2-mile, 2500-ft-elevation climb, and then I used only 10% of the battery’s energy (from 56% to 46%) to cover the same distance riding downhill.\u00a0 Cool.<\/p>\n

I ran this test in the Eco mode, mostly because I didn’t want to use too much energy on the climb.\u00a0 In the Eco mode on flat ground, the bike tops out at an indicated 37 mph (don’t forget that the speedometer is about 8-10% fast, so actual speed is lower).\u00a0 On the climb, Slick slowed to an indicated 33 to 34 mph on the steepest hills, which is about what my 150cc CSC Mustang could manage.<\/p>\n

On the way down the mountain, Slick ran 43-44 mph (still in the Eco mode), and the throttle became meaningless.\u00a0 The bike coasted downhill faster than the motor could drive it.\u00a0 It reminded me of my bicycle down this same stretch.\u00a0 On my bicycle, I topped out at the same speed and pedaling was useless because my Bianchi was already going faster than I could pedal.<\/p>\n

Watching Slick’s regeneration function on the dash was cool.\u00a0 The red regen plug (to the left of the battery charge indicator) stayed red for most of the run downhill.\u00a0 I previously wondered if the bike only regenerated at lower speeds; I now know it regens at all speeds when Slick is going faster than the motor is driving it. \u00a0 Just like before, though, I never saw the charge percentage<\/span> indicator go up (say, from 48% to 49%).\u00a0 It just stayed at a given percentage for a much longer time.\u00a0 I asked the wizards at Zongshen about this, and they confirmed it’s what they would expect.<\/p>\n

The knee in the x-y plot at the 56% charge level is where I turned around (at the Mt. Baldy Lodge). \u00a0 It shows that Slick uses way less energy going downhill than it does going uphill. \u00a0 Like they say…duh. \u00a0 The slight changes in the slope of each line (for the uphill section, and then for the downhill section) are due to changes in the grade on Mt. Baldy Road.\u00a0 There were undulations in the road, and that’s why there are minor variances in the slope of the line on both the uphill and downhill portions of the graph.<\/p>\n

Once I was home, I put Slick back on the charger for the ride back to CSC. \u00a0 I’m headed out on a road trip next week, and I wanted to return the bike to Steve.<\/p>\n