JP2999995B2 - Bicycle with electric motor - Google Patents

Description

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE INVENTION

[0001]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION 1. Field of the Invention The present invention relates to a bicycle with an electric motor in which a human-powered driving system by a human power and an electric driving system by an electric motor are provided in parallel.

[0002]

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Hitherto, there has been known a bicycle in which a foot pedal and an electric motor are provided in parallel. For example, Shoko 58
No.-8636 has an electric motor provided below a chain stay (rear stay) extending from the bottom bracket to the rear wheel axle, and a battery is disposed in a space between the seat pipe and the rear wheel above the chain stay. Is disclosed. Japanese Patent Application Laid-Open No. 57-80977 discloses a motor in which a motor is mounted at the lower end of a seat pipe while batteries are disposed in front of a bottom bracket and below a down tube.

As described above, in the conventional battery, the battery is disposed behind the seat tube and below the down tube. Therefore, it has been difficult to accommodate the battery in a well-fitted manner while avoiding an increase in the size of the vehicle body. For this reason, it was difficult to increase the capacity of the battery. In addition, since the large battery occupies the space behind the seat tube and the space below the down tube, there is also a problem that the sense of dullness of the vehicle body is increased and the original slimness and lightness of the bicycle are lost.

In the case where batteries are provided behind the seat tube or below the down tube, the batteries are separated from the center of the vehicle in the front-rear direction of the vehicle, so that the moment of inertia during turning increases and running stability deteriorates. There is a risk. In the case where the battery is arranged behind the seat tube,
When attaching and detaching the battery, the rear wheel becomes an obstacle, and when the battery is arranged below the down tube, the front wheel becomes an obstacle when attaching and detaching the battery.

[0005]

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION The present invention has been made in view of such circumstances, and it has been made possible to secure a sufficient capacity of a battery while avoiding an increase in the size of a vehicle body, to enable a battery to be stored with good fit, It is an object of the present invention to provide a bicycle with an electric motor capable of improving the slimness and lightness of the bicycle, and further improving running stability and operability of attaching and detaching a battery.

[0006]

According to the present invention, an object of the present invention is to provide a human-powered driving system by a human power and an electric driving system by an electric motor in parallel, from a bottom bracket for holding a foot pedal.
In a bicycle with an electric motor having a down tube and a seat tube each extending to a head pipe and an operation seat, the battery of the electric drive system is formed in a long shape along the seat tube, and a concave portion continuous in the longitudinal direction is formed on one side surface thereof. A bicycle with an electric motor, wherein the battery is arranged along the seat tube such that the recess is formed so as to surround the seat tube from right and left and from the front. Achieved.

[0007] Here, a space is formed by the down tube and the seat tube, which expands upward in a substantially V-shape in a side view, and the battery can be attached to and detached from the seat tube from the space side. Thus, the workability can be further improved, which is preferable. The upper edge of the battery is located below the joint between the seat tube and the seat stay, and it faces the lower part of the driver's seat. It is preferable that rain does not directly hit the upper end of the battery.

An electric motor is supported near the bottom bracket, and the rotation of the motor is transmitted to the rear wheels via a one-way clutch of an electric drive system, a speed reducer, and a rear wheel electric means. It can be configured to transmit the power to the rear wheels via a one-way drive system clutch and the power transmission means. In this case, the heavy objects of the manual drive system and the electric drive system such as the bottom bracket, the motor, and the reduction gear together with the battery can be more concentrated near the center of the vehicle body, which is more suitable for improving running stability.

Further, the electric drive system can be configured to control so as to increase or decrease the drive current of the electric motor in response to the increase or decrease in the manual drive force detected by the manual detection means. A lighter and better running feeling can be obtained without impairing the running feeling.

[0010]

1 is a side view of one embodiment of the present invention, FIG. 2 is a sectional view taken along the line II-II, and FIG. 3 is a power system diagram.

In FIG. 1, reference numeral 10 denotes a body frame, which includes a head pipe 12, a top tube 14 extending horizontally rearward from the head pipe 12, and a seat tube 18 extending downward from the top tube 14 to a bottom bracket 16.
And a down tube 20 extending from the head pipe 12 to the bottom bracket 16, a pair of left and right rear stays 22 extending rearward from the bottom bracket 16, and a pair of left and right seat stays 24 connecting the upper end of the seat tube 18 and the rear end of the rear stay 22. .

An operation seat 18a is attached to an upper end of the seat tube 18. In addition, this seat tube 1
Between the down tube 8 and the down tube 20, there is formed a space 25 which expands upward in a substantially V-shape in side view with the bottom bracket 16 as a bottom.

A front fork 26 and a steering handlebar 28 are held on the head pipe 12 so as to be rotatable left and right. A front steering wheel 30 is mounted on the front fork 26. A rear wheel 32 is held at the rear end of the rear stay. A drive shaft 34 (see FIG. 3), which forms a power transmission means, is inserted through the right rear stay 22, and the bottom bracket 16
The rotation of the crankshaft 36 is transmitted to the rear wheel 32 via the one-way clutch 38 (FIG. 3) of the manual drive system and the drive shaft 34. That is, a shaft drive type rear wheel drive system is formed.

A crank 39 is attached to both ends of the crankshaft 36, and a foot pedal 40 is attached to the crank 39. A cylindrical motor case 18a is formed at a lower portion of the seat tube 18.
The electric motor 42 is accommodated in a. Therefore, the electric motor 42 is supported near the bottom bracket 16.

The motor 42 is formed of, for example, a DC motor having a permanent magnet type stator, and the rotation axis of the rotor is substantially parallel to the seat tube 18. The rotation of the rotor is transmitted to the drive shaft 34 and the rear wheel 32 via a one-way clutch 44 (FIG. 3) of an electric drive system and a speed reducer 46 using a planetary gear mechanism or the like. As a result, a human-powered driving system using human power input from the crankshaft 36 and the motor 4
2 is provided in parallel with the electric drive system.

In FIG. 1, reference numeral 50 denotes a controller, and reference numeral 52 denotes a rechargeable battery. These are formed in a U-shape so as to surround the left, right and front sides of the seat tube 18 as shown in FIG. Has been fixed.
That is, the battery 52 has a long shape along the sheet tube 18, and a concave portion 52a that is continuous in the longitudinal direction is formed on one side surface (rear surface) as shown in FIG.

The battery 52 is attached to the seat tube 18 by engaging the recess 52a with the seat tube 18 from the front, that is, from the space 25 side, and surrounding the seat tube 18 from the left and right and the front with the recess 52a.
The controller 50 is similarly attached to the seat tube 18 from the space 25 side. The upper end of the battery 52 is connected to the seat tube 18 and the seat stay 2 in this mounted state.
4 and is located below the driving seat 18a. The controller 50, the battery 52, and the motor case 18a are covered with a left / right split cover 54.

In this embodiment, a manual driving force, that is, a treading force is detected, and the output of the motor 42 is controlled in accordance with the treading force. For example, the driving torque T is determined by using a torque detector 56 (FIG. 3) as a human-powered driving force detecting means having a structure in which a planetary gear mechanism is interposed in a driving system driven by human power and the driving reaction force is detected in the middle of the planetary gear mechanism. The drive torque T
The controller 50 can be configured to increase or decrease the current of the motor 42 in accordance with the increase or decrease of the current.

The motor 42 used in the present invention may be a motor other than the above-described permanent magnet DC motor, for example, a series DC motor. The controller 50 controls on / off of the motor current by a manual switch,
Various methods such as a voltage switching method for switching the motor voltage stepwise, a chopper method for continuously changing the on / off ratio (duty ratio) of the motor current, and the like can be applied.

In this embodiment, not only the battery 52 but also the controller 5 is substantially parallel to the rotor rotation axis of the motor 42.
Since 0 is also arranged, the controller 50 can also be compactly accommodated along the seat tube 18 without creating a useless gap. Further, in this embodiment, since the controller 50 is arranged between the motor 42 and the battery 52, the electric wiring is sufficiently short.

[0021]

As described above, according to the first aspect of the present invention, the battery is formed in a long shape along the sheet tube, and a concave portion which is continuous in the longitudinal direction is formed on one side of the battery. In addition, since the batteries are arranged along the seat tube so as to surround them from the front, the batteries can be housed without creating useless voids along the seat tube. For this reason, it is possible to keep the battery capacity large while avoiding an increase in the size of the vehicle body, and to accommodate the battery in a good fit. Further, since the seat tube is almost hidden in the concave portion of the battery in a side view, the slimness and lightness of the vehicle body can be improved.

Further, since the weight of the battery can be concentrated near the seat tube located near the center of the vehicle body, the running stability can be improved by concentration of the weight. In addition, since the battery can be attached and detached from the front of the seat tube, the rear wheel and the front wheel do not become obstacles, and the attaching and detaching workability is improved.

In this case, if a space is formed between the down tube and the seat tube so as to expand upward in a substantially V-shape in a side view, the space can be used to further improve the workability of attaching and detaching the battery. (Claim 2). If the upper end of the battery is positioned below the joint between the seat tube and the seat stay, the battery can be made sufficiently long to further increase its capacity, and the upper end of the battery faces below the operation seat. Therefore, it is difficult for rainwater to directly hit the upper end of the battery during running or parking the bicycle (claim 3).

By supporting the electric motor near the bottom bracket to which the lower portion of the seat tube is connected, it is possible to concentrate heavy objects of the human drive system and the electric drive system near the bottom bracket. For this reason, the concentration of weight can be further promoted together with the battery attached to the seat tube. Further, if the electric drive system is controlled to increase or decrease the drive current of the electric motor in response to the increase or decrease in the manual drive force detected by the manual drive force detection means,
A lighter and better running feeling can be obtained without impairing the driving feeling of the bicycle.

[Brief description of the drawings]

FIG. 1 is a side view of one embodiment of the present invention.

FIG. 2 is a sectional view taken along the line II-II.

FIG. 3 Power system diagram

[Explanation of symbols]

 Reference Signs List 16 bottom bracket 18 seat tube 18a operation seat 20 down tube 25 space 32 rear wheel 34 drive shaft as power transmission means 38 one-way clutch of human-powered drive system 42 electric motor 44 one-way clutch of electric drive system 50 controller 52 battery 52a concave portion 56 Torque detector as a means for detecting human driving force

──────────────────────────────────────────────────続 き Continuation of front page (56) References JP-A-57-80977 (JP, A) JP-A-56-89789 (JP, U) JP-A-54-73654 (JP, U) 8636 (JP, Y2) (58) Fields investigated (Int. Cl. ⁷ , DB name) B62J 11/00 B62J 23/00 B62M 23/02

Claims (5)

(57) [Claims] An electric motor-equipped bicycle having a human-powered driving system and an electric driving system by an electric motor arranged in parallel and having a down tube and a seat tube extending from a bottom bracket holding a foot pedal to a head pipe and an operation seat, respectively. In the above, the battery of the electric drive system is formed in a long shape along the sheet tube, and a concave portion that is continuous in the longitudinal direction is formed on one side surface thereof to form a substantially U-shaped cross section, and the concave portion forms the sheet tube. A bicycle with an electric motor, wherein the bicycle is provided along the seat tube so as to surround from the left, right, and front. 2. The battery according to claim 1, wherein a space is formed between the down tube and the seat tube so as to expand upward in a substantially V-shape in a side view, and the battery is detachable from the seat tube from the space side. 1. Bicycle with electric motor. 3. The bicycle with an electric motor according to claim 1, wherein an upper end of the battery is located below a joint between the seat tube and the seat stay and is located below a driving seat. 4. The electric motor is supported near a bottom bracket to which a lower portion of the seat tube is joined, and rotation of the electric motor is transmitted to a rear wheel via a one-way clutch for an electric drive system, a speed reducer, and power transmission means. The bicycle with an electric motor according to any one of claims 1 to 3, wherein the rotation of the crankshaft, which is rotationally driven by the foot pedal, is transmitted to a rear wheel via the one-way clutch for a manual drive system and the power transmission means. . 5. The electric drive system according to claim 1, wherein the electric drive system includes human drive detection means for detecting the drive power by human power, and a controller for increasing or decreasing the drive current of the electric motor in response to the increase or decrease in the detected human drive. A bicycle with an electric motor according to any one of 1 to 4.