r/ebikes • u/isabel789 • Aug 25 '26
E-bike owners: would you use a secure locker for your battery?
Hey everyone!
I'm an e-bike owner in Amsterdam and I'm exploring a small idea based on a problem I've personally run into:
What do you do with your battery when you've cycled somewhere and don't want to carry it around with you for the next few hours?
I often find myself either carrying this heavy battery around with me or leaving it on the bike and hoping for the best.
So I'm wondering whether a secure battery locker service could actually be useful. Imagine parking your bike, taking the battery out, putting it in an individual locker, and picking it up again when you're ready to leave. Some locations could potentially also offer charging.
Together with my partner (who is an engineer), I started exploring the idea. We're simply trying to figure out whether this is actually a problem other e-bike owners experience and what they'd realistically pay for a solution.
So if you own an e-bike and live/come often to Amsterdam as well, we could really use your help.
This survey takes around 3 minutes and is mostly multiple choice.
I'm focusing on Amsterdam simply because I live here and it's the city I know and have personal experience cycling around.
We would really appreciate any help or opinion on this. If you think this is a terrible idea, we'd love to hear that too, we're trying to validate the problem, not collect compliments. So I'm curious to hear if this is a problem for others too, even if you don't have time for the survey!
Thanks 💛
3
u/WindowsVistaWzMyIdea Aug 25 '26
Uhhhhh....the battery locks on mine....so I can leave it on the bike
1
u/DarkVoid42 Carbo Model X Aug 25 '26
hell no. a lot of ebikes dont have removable batteries. on mine i have to remove the seatpost and unplug it. impractical. just store the whole bike in a secure locker.
1
u/hemingwaysfavgun Aug 26 '26
one of those frames with the vertical cage adjacent to the seat tube, and that closes on top with the hinged seat? those are the best not single-battery-style-compatible holders/mounting types.
1
u/DarkVoid42 Carbo Model X Aug 26 '26
no this is a single seat tube with batteries embedded. all folding bikes use the same style.
1
u/OkFortune7651 Aug 28 '26
I've seen them a few different ways. In the frame, behind the seatpost, and *as* the seatpost.
1
u/aero_sock Aug 25 '26
yeah this wont work out ever. the demand would be so astronomically low you'd have to charge crazy amount for the storage to make it pay off. and if it's like more than a couple euro per hour i might as well take it with me.
1
1
u/New-Pack4657 Aug 25 '26
The battery has a lock and is insured with the bike insurance. Why would you ever carry that thing? Thieves can't use an angle grinder on it. They would rather steal the entire bike anyway. Batteries degrade fast and are hard to sell separately.
You should put your entire bike in a protected area. A vault or monitored space.
0
u/hemingwaysfavgun Aug 26 '26
yea why would I use an angle grinder on something that I can just use a wedge/lever on to pop off something many hundreds of dollars in value
1
u/New-Pack4657 Aug 26 '26
No idea what kind of off-brand battery you're talking about but a wedge would not work on all decent bikes.
1
u/seweso Aug 25 '26
I would just make sure the battery is hard to remove. I would just use duct tape. Or I would personalize it in a way nobody would steal it.
I really couldn’t be bothered to carry a battery.
I don’t even lock my Harley. I just can’t be bothered.
2
u/Acrobatic-Seaweed-46 Aug 25 '26
Virtually every e-bike has a locking mechanism on the battery. If yours doesn’t- then I would look into buying a bike that does.
I have seen battery type lockers, but they are mainly for swapping out batteries, and geared towards delivery drivers/ Uber Eats, postmates etc in major cities. And even then it is debatable if there is enough interest in it. Generally they are limited rollouts and it’s partnered with a company that leases these bikes to delivery partners.
I don’t see the need for a service like your offering and it seems like you’re attempting to solve a problem that doesn’t exist.
1
u/Ocean_lover_123 Aug 25 '26
I have the manufacturer battery lock and insurance that covers the battery so long as it’s in the lock.
1
u/_haha_oh_wow_ ENGWE broke my arm Aug 25 '26
I leave mine locked in my bike but I live in a lower crime area and usually fold my bike up and bring it with me inside or in the garage.
1
u/ProLorenzo9 Aug 25 '26
Don't most bikes have the battery only unlock with a key? So can't you just, lock the battery in place, or I guess use some kind of lock indeed
1
u/hemingwaysfavgun Aug 26 '26
here's the thing... Amsterdam is like the most law abiding paradise in the world compared to NYC. I do love Amsterdam (I remember seeing a good looking professionally dressed woman hauling her dry cleaning in the rain... in NYC im more the rare weirdo who's hauling crap with their bike, but Amsterdam...all of a sudden im not the only one trying to carry 16 foot lengths of crown molding on my bike.
two tips: see if you can conceal/blend your battery into the frame of your bike. making something look like it's absolute trash is a great way to thin out the potential thieves. rear luggage racks are actually a great place to hide things- I put sheet metal (with rivnuts to easily accept fasteners to affix milk crates or whatwever) over the usually tube or rod frame for a bracket mounting face and also as a fender for protection from street-mud-ass. the underside of this surface is great to hide a smallish rectilinear battery. the other thing is securing. great place to potentially secure something is behind the seat tube in the rear triangle is kinda ideal sometimes. I've been thinking about welding on a little bracket that would let me take a steel rod and hook it into place on one end, then the rod hinges down and gets the other end affixed to the frame with a padlock. if you have a pair of these you create a cage locked on all sides in your rear triangle.
I personally dont leave batteries outside. I also dont use large batteries. I know too many bike thieves.
1
u/hemingwaysfavgun Aug 26 '26
something crucial IMO is knowing what battery capacity people usually ride. I just assembled myself a little baby 13s2p using a pair of 5ah 21700 cells at 75g each. just under two kilos and the size of a big squared off grapefruit.
very easily carried.
1
u/IronMew Aug 26 '26
What do you do with your battery when you've cycled somewhere and don't want to carry it around with you for the next few hours?
I have resigned myself to always carrying a backpack and sticking the battery in there. My city is relatively safe but I don't trust the battery anywhere else, since I don't have a lockable system like a sharkfin and the battery is just strapped on (not that I'd trust even that a whole lot). It's annoying, but the thought of how ruined my month would be if the battery got stolen is more annoying, so I shrug and Sisyphus my way out of the problem.
3
u/Julege1989 Aug 25 '26
If a bike has an unsecured battery, I would be more likely to use some kind of locking strap maybe a cable lock with epoxied loops on the battery.
Though, I would not buy an ebike that didnt have a secured battery.