Performance evaluation of electric bicycles

Electric motor powered bicycles (short: "electric bicycles") have been making their way into the U.S. market for about two decades. Such electric bicycles can be used for a large variety of purposes. This paper gives a systematic, comprehensive, theoretically and experimentally based characterization of electric bicycles, and reports on the different performance requirements. Thereby, the needs and challenges in designing electric bicycles with improved overall performance are identified. For example, generally critical issues such as heavy, bulky batteries and high drive costs can be addressed. Furthermore, the overview can be used for comparison of existing drives in a thorough, technically meaningful way.