One of the hardest things about owning a classic car is finding replacement parts. Especially if the car is particularly old or rare, or if the parent company is now out of business, sometimes this can be literally impossible and a new part will have to be manufactured from scratch. The same is true of bicycles as well, and there are plenty of defunct bicycle manufacturers to choose from. [Berm Peak] found a couple old rental ebikes from a company that’s not in business anymore and set about trying to get them working again. (Video, embedded below.)
Of course, unlike many classic cars, ebikes are encumbered by proprietary electronics and software that are much harder to replace than most physical components. As a result, these bikes get most of their electronics pulled out and directly replaced. This bike also had a seized motor, so [Berm Peak] replaced it with another hub motor he had in his shop. Some of the other highlights in the build include a custom 3D-printed latching mechanism for the battery’s attachment point at the frame, a 3D printed bezel for the new display and control unit, and the reuse of some of the other fun parts of the bike like the front basket and integrated headlight.
There are a few reasons for putting so much work into a bike like this. For this specific bike at least, the underlying components are worth saving; the sturdy metal frame and belt drivetrain are robust and won’t need much maintenance in the long term. It also only cost around $500 in parts to build a bike that would take around $2,000 to purchase new, so there’s some economic incentive as well. And in general it’s more fun and better for the world to fix things like this up and get them running again rather than buying something new off the shelf. And while proprietary electronics like those found on this bike are ubiquitous in the ebike world, they’re not all completely closed-source.
I saw this video a while ago and was a little disappointed to not see much in the way of Electronics reuse. I do get that that kind of level of “hacking” is way outside of the realm of possibility for [berm peak] but a collab would’ve been nice to see.
He just did a another video, fixing a second bike.
1. YouTuber produces content.
2. YouTuber pays YouTube to have his content promoted among “15-35 male, interested in tech and DIY” demographic.
3. Content pops up in “related videos” for the target demographic.
4. Few days later there’s a Hackaday “article” promoting the same content.
And then repeat that half a year later.
https://hackaday.com/2025/05/19/the-nightmare-of-jailbreaking-a-pay-to-ride-gotcha-ebike/
You tube creator ‘surprise butt-sex face’ on video thumbnail continues.
As to Hackaday, bandwidth ain’t free.
Doubtful there is a lot of scrap value. Most of these Ebikes are sent to the landfill, or just crushed with the mixed metals. Meaning, they can be sourced cheap, our free. Just so the owner can be rid of them. Not many have the tools, skills, or time for hacking the electronics. Focusing on the mechanical, and replacing the electronics with easy to source parts is a better choice for most people interested in taking on such a project. It’s also a potential small business opportunity. Likely a lot of Ebikes laying around, needing repair, owners decided to buy a new one, rather than pay for repairs. Still a lot of growth in Ebikes. People want faster, more range… Haven’t seen much, but probably a market for custom builds as well. This is also a good start in that direction. Cheap source of base parts.
‘Faster, more range’ was 5 years ago.
Now is ‘Outlaws’.
Many states are regulating and requiring motorcycle licenses (e.g. anything with a throttle or over 250 watts/anything with balls).
Rental e-bikes were always geldings.
But unstandardized geldings.
Find the ones made w as many off the shelf bike parts as possible.
Ignore the big ego reinvent everything junk.
I’d run away from this one based on belt drive.
Belts are excellent, though you have to accept the drivetrain tradeoffs. I commute on Gates Carbon CDX, it’s been great through nasty winter weather.
If you can afford a CF status symbol, you can afford to move.
Winter sucks, but 3 hour (YMWV) drive to Sierra if I go insane.
Belt drives are fantastic and often outlast many other components.
Only sith…
But:
Chains better than Belts when either can work.
I can think of no exception to this rule.
Bike drive.
Oil Pumps.
Valve train.
No such thing as ‘serpentine chain kit’ though…Which you could make work if you really really wanted to…but smog rules.
Change ‘either can work’ to ‘both commercial solution’.
Seriously…3 speed hubs?
If you want to compare, do the belt driven 3 speed vs a chain driven 3 speed…
Don’t just go to ‘derailers suck’.
The drive my ‘outlast’, but I bet the belt doesn’t.
Looks like a wear part.
Maybe old school helicopter, IC engine to transmission power.
They used belts, less hazardous to rotor when it fails, could be other reasons.
Big old belts, a foot wide.
I wish I knew where, I’d love to own an ebike for free or near to
Where to find used rental e-bikes
the sidewalk
The river…. up trees… hanging from lightpoles…
https://x.com/CamBendy/status/910265760215310336
https://www.theguardian.com/lifeandstyle/2017/sep/27/scores-of-obikes-fished-out-of-melbournes-yarra-river
https://www.news.com.au/breaking-news/shocking-images-of-disgusting-find-in-melbourne-river/news-story/9185bddb5ea35968ddb64676370c3632
While the belt drive is interesting, these things are actually pretty terrible as far as bicycles go. They’re terribly heavy and rely mostly on the electric assist to get you anywhere – otherwise you’re struggling to go anywhere with that three-speed hub. That’s intentional: if you run out of lease or outside of the geofenced area, these things are supposed to flop down like a dead fish and “discourage” you going any further.
Old video. Was already posted before. Please do not repeat the same old and bad video.
This one was posted 3 days ago, and it’s him doing the same thing to a second bike, so not exactly a repost, more like “second verse, much like the first.”
I did see an image where there were hundreds of thousands of E-bikes in China.
Literally there were enough bikes there for ever man, woman and child in the USA.
Yet they keep making more. These things aren’t exactly environmentally friendly to dispose of either.
I think those are rental bikes, not e-bikes.
A large pile of Chinese e-bikes would be like a pile fissionables.
At some point they’ll go critical.
If you could bring two large piles of Chinese e-bikes together quickly, perhaps prompt critical?
CBC has an article about mountains of abandoned bike-sharing bikes in China: https://www.cbc.ca/documentaries/documentary-channel/inside-one-of-china-s-hidden-bike-sharing-bicycle-graveyards-1.6325287