Bike Manufacturers Are Making Bikes Less Repairable

Founder of Gouach, the repairable (and fireproof!) e-bike battery mentioned in the article, happy to answer any question!

- we salvaged 100s of discarded e-bike batteries

- we found that 90% of components were like new

- batteries were thrown away because of the spot-welding and the glue which prevents repairability

- we spent 2 years (and 5 patents) to design a robust, safe, and easy to assemble system that requires nothing but a screwdriver

Our batteries have been in use since 2 years in the streets of France, on micro-mobility e-bikes, in the harshest possible conditions (rain, snow, cold, heat, shocks), and we're very happy with their performances!

We're now opening it to the general public (for conversion kits, and to replace old batteries that are no longer manufactured)

We plan to open-source at least part of the embedded software, so people can write extensions (to let their battery "talk" with any e-bike system, and share it — using WASM embeddable code — to other people on the web!)

Let's fight planned obsolescence!

(and if you're looking for a new battery, there's 25% off on https://get.gouach.com)

absolutely beautiful mission, thank you!

How do you address local heat generation at the interfaces between the cells and the contacts? Does that pose additional risk of cell failure leading to thermal runaway in high current scenarios?

Yes! You can check the technical details on our documentation and our FAQ here (sorry, we're still cleaning up now, but feel free to ask for details)

https://docs.gouach.com/knowledge-base/frequently-asked-ques...

We've seen that our design does not pose heating or resistance issues

Thanks so much!! Appreciated

Hello,

I own a Specialized Vado SL from 2022. Can I use your battery as a range extender?

Yes! You can use the Datex extender that we sell when you order the battery here https://get.gouach.com

That's awesome!

Minor grammar tip - saying "since 2 years" is a tell that you're a non-native speaker. It's a common mistake that most people will understand, but the correct phrasing is "for 2 years."

I'm sure this is a pitch you practice a lot, so I wanted to help for next time.

Thank you!! Appreciated :)

Which cells did you test with? Is that result valid for other cells?

What is your team's background in battery safety?

We are using DMEGC INR 18650 cells, which is the best quality/price ratio that we've found, often beating even great brands.

We've developed a LOT of experience on safety after fighting a few fires haha, this is why we added a lot of software and hardware safeties (fuses everywhere, alerts, etc)

Oh and we designed a fireproof casing to be extra-cautious that nothing would happen to our clients! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tJETffg0kFc

Why does that URL redirect to your indigogo site?

Meanwhile, English speakers are trying to get the hang of depuis/pendant...

Are you working with any external lithium ion battery safety specialists?

Alternately, “since two years ago” works too.

“Since” goes with a particular moment in time (rather than an amount of time) to refer to the period between that time and now, like an old restaurant saying “making pizza since 1922” or for recent events like “since yesterday.”

Seems like a perfectly valid question to me. Why the flagging? Redirecting to IndiGoGo makes it look like it's not yet a real product. Linking directly to the product mentioned when the link was provided seems like a much more helpful thing rather than some generic self promotion. So is the product being pitched actually being sold as claimed, or is it hoping to become a product while looking for funding?

So, why is the link redirecting?

Why does configuration require a closed-source app, with an account on your proprietary platform?

Hi! Thanks for the question!

The link was our original pre-launch page, and now redirecting to the Indiegogo campaign!

The product does exist, and is in use, but until now our clients have been B2B, who are able to pay upfront for the commands.

As we are now opening to the general public, and we're a startup, we needed a schema like Indiegogo to get the money upfront and be able to buy the materials to assemble all the batteries!

We're expecting to ship at the end of the year

Web page claims the app is being open-sourced.

It's the "account required" part that really bugs me. Implies that everything is routed through some cloud backend that'll shut down one day and then you lose access to all the smarts in your "infinitely repairable" battery.

>> 2 years in the streets of France, on micro-mobility e-bikes, in the harshest possible conditions (rain, snow, cold, heat, shocks)

Um... Paris isn't exactly a harsh climate. Send some batteries to me in a month or two and I'll show them winter. Proper winter starts when it stops snowing.

That’s great have you looked into the marine industry?

I just read about Gouach on Indiegogo last week ( https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/infinite-the-repairable-u... ) -- very cool stuff.

Everything is relative ;-) Hash in the context of places where you'd ride your bike is a very different kind of hash than let's say, the weather on mercury or pluto.

'Since two years ago' is still awkward. Generally a native speaker would choose the phrasing 'for the last two years.'

The other two examples work, though 'since yesterday' is still slightly forced unless its an answer to a direct question.

In the thermal runaway video, you have steel bars holding the battery down. Is there risk of the battery casing blowing apart without that steel holding it down?

And French teachers scream at students: "h muet!!!!1onze" and then turn around and say things like "I ate you!" and I want to scream: "h non muet in English you little..."

So what's your point exactly?

There is no required account :)

The app just allows to connect over Bluetooth to the battery if you want to set a wifi password to retrieve your data and set alerts!

It also lets you configure your battery for any type of e-bike system

No, the app is never needed! It's for extra features and configurability

Thanks so much!!

No! The casing contains the explosion. We just used steel bar to be extra safe, and make sure the batteries don't move while filming

Not yet! If you have interesting applications or contacts, we'd love to know! Send us an email at contact@gouach.com :)

"Required" is hiding the ball here. There's desirable functionality - that you're touting in your sales pitch! - that isn't accessible without your client software, and it sure looks like https://clients.gouach.com/ won't do anything without a login.

https://docs.gouach.com/connected-batteries/monitoring-inter... explicitly states "In order to access the connectivity features, you will need a Gouach client account."

None of this is the end of the world, and I'm glad the batteries will continue to work as batteries after you go out of business, but it does come off as hypocritical given your big talk about repairability.