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[Mooseman]

One of my riding routes I gain 5+% over four miles.

Is the amount of regen displayed somewhere? I'd expect a rather low effect in terms of range although it really depends on how you ride the bike. I just hate the idea of converting precious momentum into heat if I can avoid it.

[stevenh]

100% regen on the SR/F feels even more strong than chopping the throttle closed on my 690.

Still can't figure out how everyone is having trouble parking on slopes and rolling bikes... I park my SR/F at the top of a reasonably steep (and very uneven) path every time I get it out of the garden so I can close the gate behind me, but that's sort of by the by... on any particular slope there is always an angle you can position the bike at so that it can't or won't roll... which is what I've always done, and why I don't need a parking brake.

Cas

I've somehow managed to have the bike roll off the side stand twice on a slight decline (SR/F).  Bike went down (very, very slowly) both times.  Now I use the dumb rubber zero parking break if there is ANY slope when parking (yes, it only takes twice for me to learn).

Steve

[stevenh]

One of my riding routes I gain 5+% over four miles.

Is the amount of regen displayed somewhere? I'd expect a rather low effect in terms of range although it really depends on how you ride the bike. I just hate the idea of converting precious momentum into heat if I can avoid it.

On the SR/F, SR/S it's shown on the screen as lines on the side (power and torque go negative on regen).  It's progressive when using 100% off throttle regen with throttle position.  You can watch it increase as you roll further off throttle.  That's how my custom mode is set up, 100% everything except a max speed of 85MPH.

Steve

[enaef]

Some of its properties are positive. Adjustable engine braking can be very nice feature, especially downhill.

I'm happy you wrote this. Because what you wrote earlier "Regen provides such miniscule charge that it's practically worthless" was just nonsense in my opinion. Come to Switzerland an ride some mountain passes. Last Saturday I gained 10% riding downhill the Stilfserjoch ....

[enaef]

Regarding No 4:
Being on FW19 with an SR/F, I also experience always an overshooting of targeted charging. It can be as extreme as 20% (targeted 80%, stops at 100%). However: This is only at the moment. Several hours later (usually the next morning), the SoC is exactly or very close (1% difference) as was targeted in the first place.

I also experience 'magic charging' despite being on FW19.
Especially after riding rather fast for a while on the motorway, coming home with quite low SoC like 8%. After a while SoC goes up nearly 10% without charging.

Also, when charging for 100%, reduction of kW going in for balancing seems to start later than on FW17 (or 18). At the same time, if I wait until the charging is really finished (stopped by the SR/F) the SR/F draws quite many kW for quite a long time while already SoC you giving 100%.
Consequently: If I need a really full or quite full battery, I do not stop charging at the moment SoC reaches 100% at the display. Experience says, that otherwise SoC goes quickly down the first few % right after riding.
To prevent that, I wait until the power going in is < ~ 6 kW (Premium Version with Rapid Charger on a 22 kW Station).

It's quite a while I'm asking me what the reason could be for this worsening of SoC calculation.
I'm not a technician / engineer at all and it may be farfetched. However:
I have read several times, that customers would expect a battery upgrade of some sort, since it is some time since the last.
WHAT IF there is such a upgrade under way and Zero tries to adapt the FW in a way it will work for coming batteries and the ones in use at the moment (14.4 kWh)?
Pure speculation ....

[Crissa]

One of my riding routes I gain 5+% over four miles.

Is the amount of regen displayed somewhere? I'd expect a rather low effect in terms of range although it really depends on how you ride the bike. I just hate the idea of converting precious momentum into heat if I can avoid it.

Yes, there's little meters displayed on the dash in the lower right corner on ben 2 bikes.  Not sure where it is on the gen 3 bikes, but the torque meter inverts.

-Crissa

Whoa, 10%?  Nice!  Usually I lose from 1-2% per mile (once on the freeway in the cold I was losing 3%!) but the hills where I can gain it back are fun

[2020_SRS_Commuter]

About number four:
On my SRS the bike charges past the charge target by a bit less than 10% . I was confused about this too... at first. Then I realized, after it quits charging, some sort of levelling occurs and the end result after about 20 minutes of sitting is a lower value than when the charging stopped. I have mine set to 88% for the ride in to work, and in the time before I start my ride if the bike is still charging when I walk by to pack the bags or whatever I may see 95% on the display. But once its finished, and I go out there to ride away, its spot on the charge target within 1%.

You can see the same levelling effect at the other end of a ride too. For example when I arrive at work it may show 26 -28%, but when it begins to charge at 7PM the initial reading is 33-36%.

[Crissa]

SoC is a computed value, so it's really an estimate anyhow.  But temperature shifts and power draw can change what the computer sees, and then it will recalculate in the background.

-Crissa

[Mooseman]

While that is all correct (the numbers might not be 100% accurate but should provide a good estimate), a little free energy trumps wear on the brake pads and brake dust every day. I still enjoy the regen and will use it whenever I can. Point taken though, every energy conversion comes with losses.

[Richard230]

Some years ago one of the U.S. monthly print magazines was testing a Zero and commented that the regen power developed when maxed out on the bike was limited to 25% of the controller maximum output. I assumed they got that information from one of the company's engineers and didn't just make it up.

That sounds about right to me, based upon my riding both my 2014 and 2018 Zeros. If that is the case and you figure how little time you are on regen compared with when the throttle is opened, you don't put a lot of power back into your battery pack when regen is activated during a ride. However, as mentioned previously, every little bit helps. 

My second electric motorcycle, a 2010 Electric Motorsport GPR-S with a very large D&D "SepEx" motor, featured the ability to generate power on overrun and feed it back into its unhappy Hi Power battery pack. That bike had one of those meters that kept track of such things and it would typically indicate that regen was adding about 2% to the pack's capacity during a typical ride. Just for fun attached is the performance specifications of that golf cart motor.

[Crissa]

"regenerative braking only adds 10-15% more range with city driving and a negligible amount with highway driving"

So... it 'only' adds 10% of range in the city, and then nearly none when you're not stopping at all.  What a great piece of logic (not).  As opposed to not having that 10% at all?  10% range is a huge gain.

-Crissa

[DonTom]

Or to rephrase. It adds 10%, 'only' in the city, nearly none while cruising.
While 10% in the city is certainly nice, it is exactly the place where most people have least worries about range.

Or to rephrase even better:   Regen is great then you MUST slow down. Such as coming up to a red light or stop sign. Then, you want as much regen as possible.


Otherwise, the misuse of having too much regen can waste a lot more energy than it gains, such as having too much regen to go down hill when you have to go uphill again at the bottom. Then it's better to coast down the hill, or just stay at a steady speed.


As a general rule, use the most regen at slower speeds.   Use very little or none at all at higher speeds. That's for deceleration regen.


For braking regen, I see no reason to NOT keep it at 100% at all times. When you want to use the brakes, it means you must want to slow down or stop regardless of speed.


-Don-  Reno, NV

[enaef]

I thought Stilfserjoch was in Italy.
[...]
The physics say that you'll always use lot more energy going up the hill than you can possibly get by going down.

You are right, Stilfserjoch is in Italy. (l was wondering, if someone would comment on that.) However: Going downhill, after the first sharp turns you can turn right to the Umbrail pass, which is in Switzerland. Stilfserjoch itself is ~100m away from the Swiss boarder.

Ofcourse I know that physical law. I certainly do not drive up a hill IN ORDER TO gain energy by going downhill afterwards. But if I drove up the hill for fun purposes, I'd be silly not to use regen downhill.
As DonTom wrote: "Regen is great when you MUST slow down."
And riding down from the Stilfserjoch to Santa Maria you definitively MUST slow down (1640m decrease / 264m ascent on 16.8 km road). If I'm correct that's nearly a 10% steep gradient on 16 km ...

[Crissa]

Because too much braking regen skips the fine control of friction brakes and abs, Don.  Or you're going down a hill and pacing traffic.

That regen does little for freeway driving is just a dumb statement.  You'd rather regen than brakes on the freeway anyhow.

-Crissa

[princec]

Regen would be far more useful if there was a bit of room for some supercaps to actually store all the energy instead of just dumping most of it. Then it could be bled back into the battery at a reasonable rate.

Cas