What's the best way to add a front braking system to a Razor EcoSmart Metro? : ElectricScooterParts.com Support

David Johnson

started a topic over 7 years ago

When you apply brakes, the weight of the vehicle and rider is shifted forward on to the front wheel. If you only have a rear brake, it will skid out because of the loss of traction between the rear tire and the road surface. A bicycle mechanic will adjust the brakes so that when the rider applies both front and back brake levers at the same time the back brake gets applied first, then the front for controlled hard braking. With bicycles the front brake is usually the left lever, and should never be applied first or run the risk of flipping. So, it's important for the rider to get in the habit of applying the right lever first. Right Rear are the two Rs of braking. After you apply the right brake first, then you can apply the one that's Left. Easy? This ensures the fastest controlled braking. If you are going to modify your Scooter for more speed or not, either way, it's important to insure the fastest controlled braking possible. This should be your first concern. Before modifying your scooter to be faster, you should invest your time and money in faster controlled braking, just saying. Thanks. Love Truth Always, David

ESP Support

said over 7 years ago

Disk brakes offer the absolute best in braking control and performance however they would be very complex and fairly expensive to install on the Razor EcoSmart scooter because a new hub that accepts a disk brake rotor would need to be installed on the front wheel, and there would probably be a front fork dropout width problem since the EcoSmart scooter's front forks are not designed for and may not be wide enough for disk brakes.

V-brakes have excellent braking power and control and would be fairly easy and inexpensive to install on the EcoSmart scooter when compared to disk brakes, To add front V-brakes to the Razor EcoSmart Metro electric scooter the first step would be to bring it into a bicycle repair shop and have them weld V-brake bosses onto the front forks. Then the front forks would need to be repainted and a V-brake, brake cable, and brake lever with built-in brake switch installed. The EcoSmart scooter's controller has an extra connector for a second brake switch that the new front brake lever switch could be plugged into to complete the installation.

Although caliper brakes would only require one hole to be drilled into the front forks to install, which almost everyone has the tools to do themselves, they have extremely poor braking power so I would not use them on an electric scooter. Caliper brakes barely have enough braking power to stop a small children's bicycle and they are just about useless for stopping electric scooters. I am speaking from experience here because I installed a caliper brake onto the first electric scooter that I custom built and it took forever to stop, even with both shoes dragging on the road trying to help.

David Johnson

said over 7 years ago

I'm thinking of using another rear wheel on the front. It has the EcoSmart band brake already installed and an extra freewheel sprocket to save for later. I haven't measured to see if it would fit yet, but if it does I would move my old rear wheel to the front, use the new one in the back with a new chain when installing the Curry's 36V 1000W motor, 1000W controller, and throttle upgrade. It probably won't work with the front fork.

ESP Support

said over 7 years ago

That would probably work if the front forks were cut and welded back together to make their dropouts wider. You could measure the distance between the rear fork dropouts and the front fork dropouts to see what the difference in width is. Unless you have a donor EcoSmart scooter to get the rear wheel from then obtaining a rear wheel might be difficult though. As far as we know the EcoSmart scooter's rear wheel is not currently available.

G

Gene Johnson

said over 6 years ago

Old post but thought I'd add what I've done while I'm thinking of other options. I've had this setup for several years now and it works great. When I first got my scooter I worked at making it lighter and have less rolling resistance. Things I do to bicycles. I replaced steel parts with aluminum and replaced the stock tires with 1.5" Kenda high pressure tires. The smaller tires allowed me to install a short-reach side-pull caliper brake. The stock tires require a long-reach brake (I tried one) but the braking power is peer due to the reduced leverage. The trick to use the short-reach is the use of a home made drop bolt. These were used way back in the '60's on bicycles that were made for long-reach brake bikes to allow the use of the better braking of the short-reach version. Back then you could buy factory made drop bolts but those are long gone. You can make your own as I did. My current issue with this setup is I now live where the streets are very rough and my narrow high-pressure tires give a pretty rough ride. I'd like to go back to a more stock type tire but I need to find a front brake solution first. The front fork is a standard 100mm spacing. I replaced the steel front wheel with an aluminum one. The rear is 130mm and will not fit the front. I'm curious if you came up with anything? If I figure something out I'll post what I did.