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Hidden motors for road bikes

cyclingtips.com

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Re: Hidden motors for road bikes

#11

Post by cakeface »

rocky1138 wrote: post #4

Is there any way to scan these bikes for EMF radiation?

Racing bikes are wired to track cadence and speed already which is perfectly legal. These signals are sent to an attached computer on the bike. I don't know if you'd be able to separate out that signal.

Re: Hidden motors for road bikes

#12

Post by AstroJetson »

orik wrote: post #5

I remember a Kickstarter that was popular that had a bicycle wheel with a motor in it that you could fit most bikes. I'd be far more interested in a solution like this for a daily commute, seems very elegant.

Me too, it would make biking to work in the summer a little less sweaty, which would make the co-workers happy.

Re: Hidden motors for road bikes

#13

Post by duskwuff »

rblatz wrote: post #7
rocky1138 wrote: post #4

Is there any way to scan these bikes for EMF radiation?

Or a nonlinear junction detector? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nonlinear_junction_detector

Any contact between two dissimilar metals (e.g, steel and aluminum) creates a nonlinear junction. Bicycles are full of those.

Re: Hidden motors for road bikes

#14

Post by [deleted] »

orik wrote: post #5

I remember a Kickstarter that was popular that had a bicycle wheel with a motor in it that you could fit most bikes. I'd be far more interested in a solution like this for a daily commute, seems very elegant.

[deleted]

Re: Hidden motors for road bikes

#15

Post by bbarn »

dabeeeenster wrote: post #6

There are two videos on Youtube that have been regarded by bike fans as suspicous. I will let HN readers make their own minds up! https://youtu.be/8Nd13ARuvVE?t=3m35s and https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ideiS-6gBAc I would love to hear smart people's thoughts!

Here's the thing. No one to date has actually been caught using one. The banned woman was caught having one, on a spare bike in the pit. She claims it's owned by a friend (who corroborated) and that her mechanics mistakenly put it in the pit, etc.. it's a pretty shaky story, but the fact remains they have never actually caught someone using one during a race.

There's a large number of people who think it just wouldn't help that much. While 100 watts extra would be a game changer, the forced cadence, inability to manipulate the pedals, etc makes it potentially no help at all.

As for those two videos.. Cancellara has been attacking like this for years. It's his style. He's also the 4 time world time trial (solo racing against the clock) champion, so he's exceptionally good at sustained high output power.

Hesjedal and the spinning wheel.. Why wouldn't you turn off your motor on a descent is the only thing I'd say? I wouldn't put it past him, he was one of the Lance era EPO doping crew, I just don't buy it on that video. I've seen plenty of crashes in person where bikes did all kinds of weird things.

Re: Hidden motors for road bikes

#16

Post by creaturemachine »

rocky1138 wrote: post #4

Is there any way to scan these bikes for EMF radiation?

The UCI is ahead of the curve here, they've been aware of developments in this field and proactively developed testing procedures. I believe the first case of this was detected using thermal imaging.

Re: Hidden motors for road bikes

#18

Post by JonoW »

rocky1138 wrote: post #4

Is there any way to scan these bikes for EMF radiation?

Why don't they just weigh the bikes? Website states the motor weigh's 1.8kg, that would be easy to detect surely? The component spec for the bikes of a race team are probably fairly fixed, so shouldn't be hard to figure out what a bike should weigh?

Re: Hidden motors for road bikes

#19

Post by krkoch »

rocky1138 wrote: post #4

Is there any way to scan these bikes for EMF radiation?

I think the current case where an athlete (Femke Van den Driessche) is caught with "bike doping", she was caught by "scanning" her bicycle with a smartphone, using the compass to detect the permamagnets in the motor.

Re: Hidden motors for road bikes

#20

Post by jcoffland »

jzwinck wrote: post #8
rocky1138 wrote: post #4

Is there any way to scan these bikes for EMF radiation?

Easier than that, simply X-Ray the bikes at the finish line. Don't even announce which races will do it, that way partial enforcement can work.

I'm sure all these health conscious road bikers will love being blasted with X-rays. Millimeter waves sound so much more friendly.
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