electric bike companies. You need to give your e-bike batteries USB-C charging
If you’ve owned an electric bike, e-scooter, or other personal mobility device (and especially if you’ve owned more than one), you know they all have a charger that pretty much fits nothing else you own. I have several electric bikes, scooters, skateboards, and other e-rideables, and almost none of them can share chargers. But don’t fret! There’s already a convenient solution here, and it’s called USB-C. Electric bike battery USB-C charging needs to become a thing. And while, we’re at it, USB-C PD discharging, effectively turning the battery into a backup power supply for your electronics, could easily be added.To get more news about
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We’ve seen this problem before
Remember a decade ago when every cell phone had a different charger? USB saved the day (or at least, micro USB did), finally ridding our kitchen junk drawers of the handful of various DC barrel plug chargers that were turning into a rat’s nest of e-waste.
![](https://magicyclebike.oss-us-east-1.aliyuncs.com/u_file/2208/products/01/b619cb81d2.jpg)
Well thanks a lot, e-bike companies, because you’ve brought us right back to the dark ages with electric bike battery chargers.
Every e-bike has a different charger, and it’s even worse than the cell phone days because not only do they all have different connectors, but they also have different voltages. And using the wrong charger with the wrong voltage significantly raises the stakes of having a very, very bad day should the Battery Management System (BMS) ever fail.
Sure, there’s been some slight standardization with the 5.5 x 2.1mm DC barrel connector finding its way onto a plurality of batteries, though definitely not a majority. There are at least five or six common connectors across the industry, then more than a dozen less common options. If you stop by a friend’s house and want to borrow their charger to juice up while you’re there, the chances of being able to add a nickel to their electrical bill are incredibly low unless you’ve got the same make/model of e-bike.
The answer to this madness is simple though: the common, convenient, and powerful USB-C connector. Specifically USB-PD, or power delivery. Electric bike battery USB-C charging could and should be closer than you think.
The same USB-C charger that we already plug into our laptops could conceivably charge our electric bikes and electric scooters.
It could even do so decently fast. Until a year or two ago, USB-C could handle 100W. That’s more powerful than most electric scooter chargers and approximately equal to the power level of a basic 2A e-bike charger that comes with most electric bikes.
But last year the USB-PD Revision 3.1 increased the power potential of the protocol to a whopping 240 watts!
That’s as powerful as pretty much any e-bike charger you’ll find today, and it’s more than enough to make me and the rest of the electric bike community happy.
But you don’t even have to get fancy with the new higher power protocol for a fast charger. Even the old 100W protocol would be more than enough for us! We’d be spraining our wrists patting you on the back so hard for giving us simple 100W USB-C charging.
And it’s not even that hard. Seriously, I’ll help you out. Take your e-bike battery. Add a DC-DC converter to bump up from 20V to 54.6V (or whatever your battery voltage is). Connect it to a USB-C PD port. Done. Go play Xbox or something.
You want extra credit and to add a ton of value? Make it bidirectional.
Many e-bike batteries already have a USB-A port on them for charging your phone. Give me a bidirectional USB-C port on my battery so I can charge my laptop or any other device from it. Boom, you’ve just made a portable power station out of your e-bike battery! Watch out, Jackery, the e-bike industry is coming for you!
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