For years, I have had a little interest in getting a recumbent bike, spurred on by my purchase of a combination recumbent rowing/biking exercise machine. So this morning, I went down a rabbit hole.
First I checked YouTube for recumbents. The last time I did this, they cost a little too much. Along the way I stumbled over a EBike. I had always pooh/pawed those, recalling only those old things where people stuck a motor on a bicycle. Those are not what todays ebikes are at all. One more stumble and I was looking at a race between a biker and an enclosed recumbent tricycle, both human powered. Guess which one one won.
But, it did make me think. Why not an Aptera Ebike recumbent? Most of the engineering is done. It is not really an EV, but a pedal assist thing. I can see, jumping into this and pedaling over the grocery store, returning with groceries in rear. I suppose you could do one with no motor in order to compete in the human powered races, but I am not so much interested in that.
Of course, why not just Aptera over. Well, with one of the two you get a little exercise.
As always. I have little to zero knowledge on the subject. Just putting it out there for discussion. Gimme the first one off the production line for free 😁
problem is very anti physical and lazy people, people arnt adventurous like they used to be. crash safety is a issue but i imagine driver can be surrounded by rails similar to a Ariel nomad, would body panels would help the areodynamics problem of bikes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O2zlYpy6QCM
https://www.aptera.us/forum/main/comment/607c74a6da92970132747547 not sure what would be most economically appealing, i guess a 2 economical seater and a "passenger trailer" or 2 two seaters or where one of them can act as a trailer with torque vectoring and braking to make towing easy like not towing. the extra passenger per car allows bringing kids along with spouse
a more normal way of things would be a semi compact tandem 4 seater, enough cargo space assuming passengers carry their stuff on their lap (except the driver of course). can tie down on roof or use trailer for the long trips, a areodynamics sacrifice that is prolly worth it given most of the time all the storage space is useless weight