Blog

Finally, thanks to those who made it out to the Sooke Slow Food Cycle last month. It was an honour to be invited back to one's hometown in order to spread community awareness about electric bicycles, and to see local towns take increasing interest in low impact transportation alternatives.

With June in force, we're extending the regular store hours to include Saturday as well from 12:00-5pm, and will be rotating our crew of staff to have someone knowledgeable on hand.
We’ve also finished making and installing an awesome all aluminum “Grin Technologies” on the building, so those of you trying to find us on the weekends will no longer have to treasure hunt for the little window signage.

Vancouver Maker Faire

The one exception will be Saturday June 23rd, where we will be present at the 2nd annual Vancouver Mini-Maker Faire, this time taking place at the PNE. We had a great time checking out neat projects once again at the San Mateo Fair last month, and look forwards to being a part of the Vancouver event.

We now have dangerous goods training to ship lithium ebike batteries using Fedex air services. Unfortunately this adds a $50 FedEx hazardous material surcharge and about $10 in special packing material, but it does mean we can resume battery-only shipments anywhere in the world. The hazmat shipping is not yet added to our online cart checkout, so for the time being we will send updated quotes over email. We are also working on a solution for ground shipping to the US via a different carrier.

We've also standardized all of our V2.25 CA devices to include a short DC power plug as standard. By default this ships with a protective rubber cap, but if you ever want to connect a Lumenator light, DC-DC converter, or other device that can run off the pack voltage then it couldn't be more convenient to plug in. The power is right there at the CA, no additional wiring required.

We had a booth at the Taipei Bike Show earlier this year and unveiled the Version3 Cycle Analyst device under development. Among other things, this unit can directly connect to a THUN torque sensor, enabling any ebike conversion to have a proportional torque control like BionX. It also features a battery state of charge graphic and a host of new capabilities in the setup menu.

The full details are discussed in the V3 CA endless-sphere thread where we are experimenting with a limited beta release. There will be a more general pilot batch later this month, so those wanting to build a non-proprietary pedalec ebike should stay tuned.

This Friday May 11th we're pleased to be hosting the book release party for Kris Holm's hot-off-the-presses "Essential Guide to Mountain and Trials Unicycling". This is the first comprehensive treatise on modern unicycle technique and skimming through the pages makes you want drop everything and hop on a one-wheeler. Some drinks and snacks will be provided and a good stash of books themselves will be on hand for anyone wanting a copy signed by Kris himself.

Plus, if everything goes as planned, we might even have a Grin Technologies sign installed on our building to help you find us, and some more novel geared unicycle projects for brave riders try out.

It's been over a year since we moved to our new shop space in False Creek. Renovations are always ongoing but the last round included a big spring cleaning to organize piles of miscellaneous inventory we'd like to clear. This means lots of bargain goods on our garage sale shelf for those hunting for project parts. The list includes sample and prototype batteries, hub motors, slightly used or scratch & dent CAs and ebike lights, motor controllers and more. Available at the moment for walk-in customers only.

Finally, it is with some sadness that pay tribute to Justin's mom Louise, who died unexpectedly in a car accident at the end of May. She was large driving force in many of the ambitious shop and office renovations GRIN has done over the years, volunteering tons of elbow grease and bringing a special touch for all the colours, artwork, and plants that breathe life into a space. We will miss her, but the legacy of her help here will live on.

For those who've been a bit uncertain about ebike torque arms, when you need them, how to install them, etc. we've completed a long overdue section of our website devoted to this topic. Please have a look and let us know if it covers most all bases you'd want to know about.

One of the things we will have to show at Maker Faire is the infinitely geared Nuvinci unicycle project that Justin built in April/May. The hope is to have this fully electrified in time for the fair as well, after all, what could the world need more than a continuously-geared, chain-driven, electric-assist uni?