My Zike S/N - 00442 was given to me by my good friend Mark at C5ALIVE.
It is in need of a lot of restoration.
No batteries.
Crank arm and peddles warn.
No chain.
Tyres and tubes in need of replacing.
No drive belt.
Saddle in poor condition.
As you can see from above a lot of work to get it back operational.
I decided to totally strip down the Zike to its individual parts and do
the restoration as cheep as possible.
So far the Zike has been totally strip down all bearing greased crank
arm replace with one obtained from my local cycle shop.
Peddles and saddle removed from an old exercise bike thrown in the skip
at work not exact replacement but help the budget restoration project.
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This has given me another problem as the NiCad batteries are slightly longer than the originals. Original battery pack was 58cms my replacement pack was 60cms. With my replacement batteries fitted into the Zike body there is not enough room for the original control board. This has left me with a decision do I spend out lots of money on more replacement batteries or find another way around the problem. I first decided to mount the control board in a small box located above the battery compartment and behind the saddle stem. I then decided to make a simple relay motor control system that would fit in the space behind my battery pack. The system is fused and makes use of the thermal sensor on motor and will shut down if motor overheats.
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As can be seen in the pictures above this has enabled me to fit battery
and control system into my Zike.
The original control board has been tested and is O/K. The Zike is an
early model and had a go button with a three position
switch that enabled you to select theree rate of acceleration.
In practice not being able to control rate of acceleration is not a major
disadvantage providing you assist you Zike at the start by peddling and
then hit the go switch. The switch has been replaced with a lever micro
switch mounted on a bracket system that sits on the left brake lever.
The small slide switch is used to disable the go micro switch when not
in use.
The DC charge socket has been replaced with a bolt through type. As the Zike had no charger I looked round for a cheep solution. I had two 12v 1000mA plug top chargers originally used to charge torches etc now not in use. With the two chargers wired in series this gave me a 24v NiCad charger and works a treat. This was a lot cheaper that buying a 24v charger. I will put more information on this system in my Zike Information section.
Ordered replacement drive belt from www.zikebike.com
Good quality belt arrived and I compared it to another belt that was on loan to me and found it to be a good match.
Eager to try out my Zike quickly fitted the belt and decided to take it for a test ride. Disaster struck the belt jumped off and got jammed in the rear wheel drive cog and chain, totally destroying my new drive belt. I should not have been in such a hurry! On further investigation found the teeth spacing on my Zike to be 2mm not 3mm. Belts on most Zikes are 3mm. I had stored in the back of my mind that the Zike had used two different drive belts in production, but until now I had never seen one. My Zike is an early one S/N - 00442. Maybe the different belt was used in the first production run? My Zike also had a three position switch fitted to the go trigger.
Back to square one need to find a supplier of 2mm Zike drive belts.
More information soon.
S/N - 00442
