Excited!!

I am excited today. In fact I haven't slept well since Friday night. Friday being the day I decided to commit to buying this particular electric bike kit. For AU$999 it is a real bargain, considering the competitor that was recommended to me came in at a whopping AU$1,699.

I hear you all saying, "Well you get what you pay for" but sometimes you just can't afford to pay. This price mean the "Wife Acceptance Factor" (WAF) is much more in the fat part of the bell-curve, instead of riding the upper shoulder.

I've been excited about electric bikes for all of three weeks now, but before that I didn't know they existed. Then one night on my local news they had a piece on this guy who was spruiking and flogging electric bikes. For a while now I have been in a job which doesn't require me to have a car. In the last 14 years of my career I would have to travel to client site visits, not any more. Driving to work in traffic on my own, seeing all the other people doing the same drives me crazy (pardon the pun) it is such a waste.

I had already done all I could to reduce my fuel usage while still driving to work and not over-capitalising on my car. I bought my Daihatsu Sirion (1 litre 3 cylinder motor) at only 5 years old with 65,000 km on the clock for only AU$6,500 a couple of years ago. It has been great only using $20 worth of fuel a week. Now with rising petrol prices that has gone up to $35/week. My wife's car is a different story, a 3.5 litre V6 petrol guzzler.

So I went out to have a look at the powercor bike in action, it was pretty cool! Only one problem, it comes in one frame size. I am 6'5" and a too-small frame will kill my back and knees on a daily commute. I have to think about it.

I started talking to my Wife about it to gauge the WAF, my reasoning was this:
If we save $30 a week in petrol by me not driving to work and you driving the little car during the week when you don't need the big car, we can pay for the electric bike in only 54 weeks. I get some fitness out of it and with the electrics I reckon I can make it to work in 35 minutes, as opposed to 25 minutes in the car.

After thinking about it for a little while she agreed that it was a good idea, even if it was just something different in our lives, bless her cotton socks!

So I started investigating, but now I am out of time and have to get ready for work, maybe I will do another post at lunchtime about my research period.