At one point I found myself with my only vehicle in the shop, and I didn't live with anyone else (who had a car) and I had no way to get around town at all, except to use public transportation (-which isn't that great locally). I decided that I should have an "alternate vehicle" available for just these times.

I have a recumbent bicycle (Cycle Genius Falcon LWB) and it's great for recreational riding but it's not always that great as actual transportation. Often times the effort required (or its sweaty aftereffects) is not desireable, and it doesn't end up having a whole lot of practical carrying capacity as far as cargo goes.

I also decided that for maxmum versatility, the "alternate vehicle" should be easy to transport inside a typical car. When my car needed to go into the shop I put the bicycle rack on the back, strapped my LWB recumbent on and drove to the shop, and rode the bicycle home. To pick up the car I did the same, in reverse. The problem here is that the recumbent is very long overall, it won't fit on many automotive bicycle carriers and won't fit inside the trunks of many cars at all. If I had to transport it on or in anyone else's vehicle at some point in time, I would likely have a definite problem.

I ruled out getting a motorcycle or scooter because they wouldn't be easily transportable in another vehicle. That left only mopeds and motorized bicycles as possible choices.

I ruled out a moped for a couple different reasons--their weight and their engine dependency. Part of the point of being easily-transportable is that it is easy to put into a car trunk--and mopeds typically weigh 100 lbs or more, where a motorized bicycle only weighs the total of what a normal bike weight (25-30 lbs) plus the weight of the engine kit (~10 lbs). The other reason is that when a moped's engine stops working, you are basically left walking home. Mopeds that have pedals can be pedalled manually but they aren't hardly ideal for covering significant distances--they usually only have one speed and it's set rather low to allow starting the (pedal-start) engine. A motorized bicycle on the other hand is not dependent upon its engine to be useful. With many engine kits there is some way to quickly totally disengage the engine drive so that the bicycle can be pedalled normally, and the only resistance of the engine is its added weight on the bicycle.
.....Also because of this lack of engine dependency, a motorized bicycle can still make use of bicycle-only pathways (and possibly public transportation options) as long as the motor isn't used.

In late August of 2006, I decided to go ahead and try this project. At the time in 2005 that I first asked around online for advice on bicycle engines, the price of gasoline was around $2/gallon, and it had since risen to around $3/gallon, and wasn't expected to drop much anytime soon (as of this writing it has dropped down to around $2.75/gal). The two main questions I have are "will I use this motor-bicycle enough to save any money?" and "will this engine kit hold up long enough to save any money?".

....As it happens, I planned on buying a new bicycle just for this project (as I did not want to use the one I already had) and the one I wanted to buy is rather expensive. It is true that a much-less-expensive bicycle could have been used, so to make this test fairer I am not even including the cost of the bicycle in the engine's cost/performance figures. The engine kit only needs to offset the cost of itself to be successful, if the bicycle has a failure of its own I will also not count that in the costs (unless I can directly link it to the use of the motor). One not-unheard of problem with the engine type I am planning on is that the spokes on the rear wheel start to break, but we will hope for the best and deal with that problem if and when it occurs.

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