Charging is an obvious barrier to EV use for a flat dweller. I used to rely on a charging point at work but 4 wheeled EVs kept burning out the socket. In a crisis I would run a cable from our 4th floor flat down the communal stairs. At work it was the ambulance bay. Things got bad when my battery started to fail, capacity not much more than my one way commute (Zero replaced it with an upgrade, 6.5KWh to 7.2KWh, without a quibble over 2 months).
I have now worked out how to use the menekes type 2 charging ports that Westminster City Council puts on many of its lamp posts. You have to buy an adaptor but it needs to be a type 2 menekes, not the J1772 oferred by Zero. The type 2 can be had for £165 from evbitz.
While it doesn't speed up charging at least it means you can charge in public. You can almost always get close enough, between cars, to chain the bike to the lamp post, though you may need a second chain. So I don't think its a problem leaving the bike overnight. You can tun off the charging from the app at home. Westminster gives free residents bay parking, free bike bay parking and free pay to park bay parking after you've paid the first 10 minutes.
To help any Londoner considerring getting an electric bike I've made a youtube:
I can really recommend an electric bike in London, especially with what the've done to Park Lane, the Mareylebone underpas and most of Camden and Islington.
Andrew
Author
Topic: Good news for London EV bike charging (Read 1005 times)