I think that’s an unreasonable assumption - it’s not unusual to make a significant detour to find a gas station. However, I think gogoro would have done themselves a big favour if they’d installed GPS and 3G network connectivity as standard. This can be done for about US$25 these days (for the radio modules, not the UI) and could be used to indicate to the user where the nearest charge station is. There’s no point putting recharge stations everywhere unless people can find them with minimum fuss.
[quote=“Abacus”]
This scooter doesn’t have the infrastructure to have a range of 400km’s. If you load it up with that many batteries then the weight is going to double and reduce the range which requires you to add more batteries. [/quote]
I beg to differ, Although your right the heavier weight of additional batteries will lower the range efficiency but just slightly.
Here is one way you can test it out before adding batteries.
#1 get a gogoro and ride on it by yourself to test maximum range make a note of it.
#2 get a gogoro and ride double with two people on it and test maximum range make a note of it.
What kind of range did you get with two people? How much does your passenger weigh? Was the range significantly different with two people?
If the range only went down 10km with two people then that would give you good starting calculations to figure in how much weight in batteries
you could add and what range you will get after adding those batteries when riding single on it.
The gogoro comes standard with 2 cells, about 2 mores worth could be fitted in the storage area, and maybe 4 more around the body but this would require a smaller
cell by cell configuration splitting down to smaller batteries and lots of them to equal the storage output of 8 big gogoro cells.
8 big gogoro cells would equal about what in range? judging from the video about 2 cells=70km so 8 cells of power equals 280km± because of added weight not 400km but a lot better then 70km. Add in a quick onboard 2 hour charger and your good to go on a road trip.
Its to bad a modern scooter that’s electric has to have those extremely big car size 7 number license plates.
I guess Taiwan felt shrinking the number text and keeping the smallish size plates would not allow them to easily read license plate numbers on speeding cameras and issue tickets. If the country upgrades to the new 4k cameras for speeding tickets maybe we can get some smaller less fugly motorcycle and scooter plates
Yellow plates are also big now,… 7 numbers…
[quote=“Belgian Pie”]Gogoro spotted in the wild …
Remember one thing … Just because you ride a Gogoro, you can NOT park on a disabled parking spot! :ohreally:
[quote=“Guy1983”][quote=“Abacus”]
This scooter doesn’t have the infrastructure to have a range of 400km’s. If you load it up with that many batteries then the weight is going to double and reduce the range which requires you to add more batteries. [/quote]
I beg to differ, Although your right the heavier weight of additional batteries will lower the range efficiency but just slightly.
Here is one way you can test it out before adding batteries.
#1 get a gogoro and ride on it by yourself to test maximum range make a note of it.
#2 get a gogoro and ride double with two people on it and test maximum range make a note of it.
What kind of range did you get with two people? How much does your passenger weigh? Was the range significantly different with two people?
If the range only went down 10km with two people then that would give you good starting calculations to figure in how much weight in batteries
you could add and what range you will get after adding those batteries when riding single on it.
The gogoro comes standard with 2 cells, about 2 mores worth could be fitted in the storage area, and maybe 4 more around the body but this would require a smaller
cell by cell configuration splitting down to smaller batteries and lots of them to equal the storage output of 8 big gogoro cells.
8 big gogoro cells would equal about what in range? judging from the video about 2 cells=70km so 8 cells of power equals 280km± because of added weight not 400km but a lot better then 70km. Add in a quick onboard 2 hour charger and your good to go on a road trip.
Its to bad a modern scooter that’s electric has to have those extremely big car size 7 number license plates.
I guess Taiwan felt shrinking the number text and keeping the smallish size plates would not allow them to easily read license plate numbers on speeding cameras and issue tickets. If the country upgrades to the new 4k cameras for speeding tickets maybe we can get some smaller less fugly motorcycle and scooter plates
Yellow plates are also big now,… 7 numbers…[/quote]
Your math seems off. You just took the estimated 70kms and multiplied it by 4 (4x batteries) and concluded that weight wasn’t a factor. But this is really unnecessary since charging stations can be installed in any population center. That’s the #1 reason to get a Gogoro instead of a more typical charge at home electric scooter.
I don’t make significant detours to find a gas station. Definitely not in a major city in Taiwan. They need a charging network at least as extensive as the gas stations in Taiwan. That requires a solid number of sales and I am not sure they are going to sell enough at 100+K + 900NT/mo to fund that.
Yes they should have installed a GPS station finder but I assume that there will be a smartphone app to download.
Any interface they provided would go out of date very quickly, much better to have a charging dock and holder on the scooter and apps for iPhones and Android phones.
If they can get more stations in 7-11s and such that would help tremendously. The pricing of the scooter is high for taiwan but then there are plenty of cashed up folks. whether there are enough younger cashed up folks in Taipei who want to ride a fancy scooter is the question!
I think it’s a very interesting question marketing wise because you want the specs to attract users to switch and to create a brand (branding is king these days) but you still have to pay for infrastructure rollout. the infrastructure isn’t that expensive from what I read, supposedly a few hundred thousand for few million NTD per station. Lots of small stations outside a 7-11 would be better than a few big ones in gas stations.
If they were to market a 50k bare spec scooter I don’t think they would get many users because the people who want cheap will buy something even cheaper! Most decent scooters are 60-70k NTD already. I think gogoro have done a great job nbut they the active assistance of urban administrations to create incentives to ride cleaner vehicles. any why not, since cities and governments incentivize various transport initiatives all the time! The incentive should be you can only ride no emission vehicles in central areas or national parks like yangmingshan, preferential parking etc. Not just cash back schemes on purchase. It is the city governments duty to create a healthier and better urban environment.
I did say ± with added weight read again.
The #1 Reason to get a gogoro is to convert it to at home charging system in my eyes.
The #1 reason not to get a gogoro is because of a monthly KM limit contract violation of what was it… 1600km?
Considered to be commercial use?
B#%CH Please I Kill 1600km’s in a few road trips or a few weeks easy!
- minus one charging station contract system with 1600km limit
- plus one at home charging system UNLIMITED KM’s woohoo!
um … except for the cycle life of your battery. You can’t get free stuff just by ignoring physics.
OTOH gogoro’s pricing plan is way over the top.
um … except for the cycle life of your battery.
You can’t get free stuff just by ignoring physics.[/quote]
Unlimited KM’s as in no monthly restriction by a at home charging conversion Vs 1600 a month with gogoros station swap contract.
No need to state the obvious We all know batteries have a life cycle and Physics at this point in time point towards no such thing as free energy.
Most decent batteries can go 2000-3000 charge cycles. 2500 cycles x 280km = 700,000Kms Driven before battery replacement. Yeah I’m good with that life cycle LoL Sign me up for one gogoro converted to built in charging with 280km range Via extra batteries.
But just wait 2016 I’d say some one will have made the swap/ done a conversion. Then we can get some real world numbers on their range and based on that figure times it by 2000 or 2500 or 3000 life cycles and be able to calculate how many km’s their gogoro will go before battery replacement. Hopefully by now I’ve inspired some one reading this post to do just that!
When gogoro tells me I need to stop every 70kms to swap batteries and I can only drive 1600km’s a month and this is much more convenient then gas and this is the future and this is a smart scooter I feel like ROFL 
:loco:
If this is the future I don’t want anything to do with it. Whats next this thing…
“Whats that? It’s my new clock check it out! It tells you how many years you got left to live. I picked it up in xinyi. Everyones getting one. It’s smart.”
IMHO your usage pattern of over 1600 km/mth is very extreme and not worth the company’s time considering. You are an outlier, they don’t need to cater for your needs as there is no business case for that. Your idea of driving 1000s kms on a crappy scooter every month is frankly a bit mad. 
LMFAO Dude… are you being serious? Even my wife who is a Taiwanese and not some extreme over driving foreigner manages to drive 70km a day in Taipei city. That’s 2100km’s a month, Darn looks like gogoro doesn’t work for her either.
Do you or your friends work for gogoro? Just saying… when you say driving over 1600km’s a month is extreme it sounds a bit silly
Lastly who said anything about driving 1000’s of KM’s on a crappy scooter? Did you just put words in my mouth?
your wife drives 70km a day on a scooter and you’re still married? unfucking believable, this country is full of wild and wacky things, i love it
LMFAO Dude… are you being serious? [color=#FF0000]Even my wife who is a Taiwanese and not some extreme over driving foreigner manages to drive 70km a day in Taipei city.[/color] That’s 2100km’s a month, Darn looks like gogoro doesn’t work for her either.
Do you or your friends work for gogoro? Just saying… when you say driving over 1600km’s a month is extreme it sounds a bit silly
Lastly who said anything about driving 1000’s of KM’s on a crappy scooter? Did you just put words in my mouth?[/quote]
Every day?
Maybe, you should hire a private investigator. I am sure your wife is up to something.
Not that I want to scare you, really, but I drove 56 km per day for a couple of years and that was tiring.
If you have a stable job 8 hours per day, 15 km from home, which for city standards is far, then you’ll have driven 30 km by the time you finished work. Now, you can cross the city one more time forth and back, every day including Saturday and Sunday.
First of all, I do not think that they will cancel every contract for using more than 1600 Km per month.
They just want to make sure that some company like Pizza hut doesn’t build its whole delivery scheme on their batteries…
Next, about going out of your way for a gas-station or a charging station.
What would a gass station do to my real estate if they built one next door? I would fight it to my death if that ever happened.
A charging station on the other hand would turn out to be a plus already for the reasons mentioned here before.
It would be something to mention when renting out the apartment. Oh by the way, you’ve got the battery swapping right at the corner.
[quote=“Guy1983”][quote=“Abacus”]
Your math seems off. You just took the estimated 70kms and multiplied it by 4 (4x batteries) and concluded that weight wasn’t a factor. But this is really unnecessary since charging stations can be installed in any population center. That’s the #1 reason to get a Gogoro instead of a more typical charge at home electric scooter.
[/quote]
I did say ± with added weight read again.
The #1 Reason to get a gogoro is to convert it to at home charging system in my eyes.
The #1 reason not to get a gogoro is because of a monthly KM limit contract violation of what was it… 1600km?
Considered to be commercial use?
B#%CH Please I Kill 1600km’s in a few road trips or a few weeks easy!
- minus one charging station contract system with 1600km limit
- plus one at home charging system UNLIMITED KM’s woohoo![/quote]
If you want home charging then don’t get a Gogoro. The entire reason to get a Gogoro is to have the ease of battery swaps (many people don’t have personal garages). If you want home charging then get a scooter or motorcycle designed for home charging. something like the Zero Motorcycle.
[quote=“Hamletintaiwan”]
Next, about going out of your way for a gas-station or a charging station.
What would a gass station do to my real estate if they built one next door? I would fight it to my death if that ever happened.
A charging station on the other hand would turn out to be a plus already for the reasons mentioned here before.
It would be something to mention when renting out the apartment. Oh by the way, you’ve got the battery swapping right at the corner.[/quote]
You are talking about an entirely different thing. yes, it is very easy to install a battery swap station anywhere but they can’t install them at a high density if they don’t have a lot of users. I have a feeling that we are going to charging location map and many people are going to say I don’t live anywhere near those locations.
Actually 70Km is really nothing. In fact it was her idea to get a gogoro since her yamaha is getting old. Her yamaha did 22000km’s last year too much for gogoro’s limit. We got the info on it then drove her route. Home to job #1 Then to job #2 and finally to her school, then back home. 72km Not for her. No foul play cheating involved.
Believe it or not some people drive over 50Km’s a day and not just a small group of people either which leads me to my next point…
In Business I learned about things such as target market etc,… and also learned if you can sale and appeal to a larger target market with very little modification to your business plan then you should do what is necessary to expand to more potential customers. Because that is more customers and a sales loss by limiting your target.
It would be too easy for gogoro to make a slight business plan modification and raise there limit to maybe say 2500 or 3000km’s a month to appeal to those extra 10-20% of customers that are turned off by a KM limit on an already limited scooter.
I still find it a bit comical what people in Taiwan define as “far” Driving 1 hour to work everyday in the U.S. is normal for many people.
[quote=“Abacus”]
If you want home charging then don’t get a Gogoro. The entire reason to get a Gogoro is to have the ease of battery swaps (many people don’t have personal garages). If you want home charging then get a scooter or motorcycle designed for home charging. something like the Zero Motorcycle.[/quote]
Actually I would prefer to get a brammo with 6 speed gearbox taking full advantage of the electric motor with higher top speeds. The high costs of maybe 700k plus after import taxes make it unappealing. Converting a gogoro even after extra batteries would still be much cheaper and would be a fun project and something my wife could benefit more from using then me, although I would still have fun pushing the limits on weekends if we took trips. I think a 280km range gogoro could be built including initial gogoro purchase for around 200-300k. Again enough talk because some one will do it mark my words, then we can all learn from their experience.
Ahhh the patch job teaching thing. Yes been there done that. Another testament to the wonderfulworld of English teaching in Taiwan . SO dangerous scooting from one job to the next. Your wife is playing a dangerous game doing 70km a day on a scooter. These roads are deadly. Look at the horrific scooter accidents every 5 min on the news.
70km in a car is nothing. I do more than that daily. But 70km on scooter is a lot!
Saw this just now:
http://technews.tw/2015/07/26/gogoro-presold-over-400-smart-scooters/
From what Google Translate tells me, they have only pre-sold 400 Gogoros at the early bird price so far.
AND
299 元精省方案：含 100 公里里程數，額外里程每公里 2.5 元；149 元加購「性能提升加值型」。適合每月里程 0 – 200 公里使用者。
499 元基礎方案：含 200 公里里程數，額外里程每公里 2.0 元；199 元加購「性能提升加值型」。適合每月里程 200 – 375 公里使用者。
799 元菁英方案：含 600 公里里程數，額外里程每公里 1.5 元；249 元加購「性能提升加值型」。適合每月里程 375－700 公里使用者。
899 元菁英+方案：連續兩個月不超過 1,600 公里里程數（吃到飽概念，但為避免做為商業用途，仍有最高上限）。299 元加購「性能提升加值型」。適合每月里程超過 700 公里使用者。
So, it says you pay . . .
NT$899 for up to 1,600 kms/month
NT$799 for 600 kms
NT$499 for 200 kms
NT$299 for 100 kms
That seems like a
lot
of extra Kms (or battery swaps) for only an extra NT$100 to get an extra 1,000 kms (from 600 to 1600) with no extra charge. 
Maybe they should add one more level:
NT$999 for up to 2,600 kms/month
and allow Mc DA-Nose, Pizza Han, Da Me-Nose and others to use it for delivery.
I think the Beta phase started in the weekend.
There’s a Gogoro station already at the gas station near my house, which is out in Ankeng (kind of remote), so they’ve probably got some spread to them.
They’ll need more stations out in new taipei city as that’s where most people live, especially scooter riders and commuters. I like the gogoro, it’s a nice piece of kit, but I don’t fancy driving a scooter long distance in Taipei these days. So I’m never going to buy one.