Just to keep those who are following this saga in the picture, today was another interesting day. Getting helpful information out of French bureaucrats is like getting blood out of a stone and if you let that be the deciding factor, you’d never achieve anything.

It appears that the man from DREAL was not giving me all the information I’d asked for after all. He said that it isn’t the role of DREAL to do what manufacturers ought to do when it comes to obtaining a Certificate of Conformity ie homologation, for vehicles like my bike. I’ve delved deeper into things today and it appears that that isn’t the whole story – DREAL do have a role to play.

A vehicle for which approval is being sought has to be inspected and if necessary, subjected to tests at an approved testing centre (as you might expect) but no-one in an official capacity has told me who or where they are. But I found them myself today. I’ll not say any more about that for now but it appears that procedures have been laid down and when they have been followed and the results determined, these are then forwarded to the DREAL for the issue of a Certificate of Conformity.

Usually it’s manufacturers who do this for a proposed series of vehicles that they intend to market but it can also be done for one-offs that meet the relevant regulatory requirements both by manufacturers and individuals who have either built a one-off or imported a machine from another country as I have. So it appears that all is definitely not lost after all as far as my bike is concerned, which I think falls into this latter category ie meets the regulatory requirements for a vehicle of its class.

For the most part, the class of two and three-wheeled motorised vehicles is dominated by motor cycles (Category L3) and search as I might, I couldn’t locate the relevant paperwork to initiate a request to start a Certificate of Conformity project for a bike like mine. So I have sent a message to the testing body that seemed to me to be the most relevant and now await their reply.

If I’ve read the relevant material correctly, ‘creating a new dossier’ costs 85€ and for a motorcycle the total testing and approval programme comes out to around 2000€. This is more than I’d like to pay but I think it would be a small sum for Dakeya to pay if it opened up the whole EU market for their bikes. I also think that as electric bikes like mine are not subject to tests for eg emissions and noise, the cost might be quite a bit less, but I’ll have to wait and see.

The very helpful man at the DREAL sent me a reply. He said that he didn’t have detailed information on my bike’s actual model but he told me the category into which it would fall. Which it does.

From the research that I’ve done, which has been pretty detailed, I also know the features that it must have in order to be classed as a ‘Cyclomoteur’, whether powered by an internal combustion engine or an electric motor. Which it has.

I’m therefore pretty much convinced that if my bike was subjected to inspection, it would be granted approval.

I’ve therefore just sent Dakeya in China a detailed proposal for me to act on their behalf to submit my bike for test. This would require them to pay for the cost of the inspection (whether the bike passes or not) and indemnify me for my expenses and the cost of my bike if, due to the delay presented by the test process, I am unable to recover it from the seller if it does not pass.

So yet again I’m waiting for another reply. I never give up until I know all hope is lost 😕

I know I said that I wasn’t going to spend any more time on registering my bike but I thought I’d have one more roll of the dice. I contacted the DREAL for Nouvelle Aquitaine, a government department that can help out with this kind of problem and received a reply the very next day.

In summary this said that it’s not their role to undertake the tasks that are the manufacturers’ responsibility and that as my bike has been imported, it has to conform to local regulatory requirements including having a Certificate of Conformity granted to its manufacturer. Their advice was that I should seek to annul the purchase with the seller, which I have taken steps to do.

But in the meantime, I thanked them for their reply and sent them the following message.

“.. overall I think that this is a good, well-made bike that is fit for purpose and meets regulatory requirements. It is also at a price at which many people could afford to use it for short journeys instead of their cars, as I want to, which is not true for competitive products that will inevitably always remain as minority products for enthusiasts.

Could you advise me, if I wanted to act on behalf of the manufacturer, how would I go about securing a CDC for this product and what costs would be incurred? I ask because I am not familiar with the French registration system and any advice you can give would be of value.”

So now I’m waiting for a reply.

Sadly, it is now more or less certain that I’ll be unable to register my new bike, meaning that it’ll be illegal for me to use it on French roads. I received a message from the registration authority yesterday after my third attempt to do so, when I had been confident that I’d submitted all the documents that were needed. But I was wrong.

The message said that I’d only submitted a declaration from the manufacturer that it conformed to regulatory requirements whereas what was needed was a copy of the official Certificate of Conformity issued to the manufacturer for the machine by an agency of an EU member state’s government confirming that it did so.

So, as I suspected might be the case, Dakeya, my bike’s manufacturer, needed to have applied to the appropriate French agency, for example, to sell the bike in France and for the agency to have checked that it conformed, possibly tested it and issued the relevant certificate. My guess is that a hefty fee would have been involved somewhere along the line which is possibly why the manufacturer hadn’t done so.

It may be that the process is more straightforward than I think it might be – after all, it can’t be as stringent as obtaining type-approval for a new motor vehicle – but I don’t have the time or motivation to take the matter any further as I now have other priorities to attend to. Like servicing my aircraft and getting them back into the air and getting the interior of my house ship-shape.

I’m disappointed that it’s come to this but French bureaucracy is so intractable and it’s not worth spending any more time and effort. I’ve now requested CDiscount, the web site through which I bought the bike, to arrange for its return for a full refund and I hope that they’ll cooperate without making a fuss as I’ve been a pretty valuable customer of theirs over many years. But we’ll just have to wait and see what transpires from here 🙁

By Jove, I think I’ve got it! I’ve looked all over my new bike in an attempt to find a frame number and up until this evening my searches have yielded nothing. But as readers probably realise by now, I don’t give up that easily.

I got back onto the internet this evening to see if I could eventually crack the problem of how to register a Speed Bike and found a reference that said to do so, you must provide the bikes unique identification number which I guess is then used in a similar way to a motorised vehicle’s VIN number. So I set off looking to find where this unique identification number comes from and found that you seem to be able to apply for one which must then be attached to the bike by something as simple as a sticky label or by engraving it on the frame.

This immediately made me think of bikes I had when I was young that all had frame numbers stamped on them and quite by chance I then happened upon another web site on which you can register your bike in France as an anti-theft measure. The process naturally uses the bike’s frame number and helpfully it offered a little pop-up screen showing the usual places where frame numbers are located.

So that encouraged me to restart the search for a frame number on my new bike and lo and behold, on the last place I looked by lying on the floor and looking up at the bottom of its frame through which the pedal spindle passes, there I found a number.

I could hardly believe it. Why hadn’t either the manufacturer or the seller in Germany, with both of whom I’ve discussed my registration problem, told me about this and why didn’t they include it on the bike’s paperwork? I had to lay the bike down on the floor to read the number but as far as I’m concerned, this is the unique VIN that the registration authority is seeking to register my bike in France.

I’ve already resubmitted my registration application so now I’ll have to wait another two weeks for a reply. But this time I think I’ve cracked it, I really do 😉

I’m still trying to get my new electric bike registered as required in France to legally use it on public roads. My first application was rejected but although I don’t know for sure, I think it was because the delay receiving the manufacturer’s Certificate of Conformity that hadn’t been included with my application was too long and the registration authority just closed my file as a result.

Now there’s a new twist. As far as I am aware, bikes like mine cannot legally be used in many countries (the UK included) and France is the only one that requires them to be registered in order for them to be used legally on public roads. This is because they are treated under similar laws to cyclomoteurs and motor scooters with engine capacity up to 50cc.

As a result, I’m now being asked to provide a VIN number for my bike but because it doesn’t have an internal combustion engine and, presumably, because no other country that allows them to be used asks for them to be registered, bikes like mine do not come with VINs.

I’ve just pointed this out to the registration authority and asked what on earth I can do to satisfy the legal requirements as surely I can’t be the first person in France asking to register a bike like mine. The whole process has been a bureaucratic nightmare right from the very beginning and to be honest, I’m getting a bit sick of banging my head against a brick wall 🙁

I’ve spent literally the whole day, more actually as I didn’t finish until this evening, assembling a base for a bed for bedroom 2, what’s called a ‘sommier’ down here. It was inexpensive but I thought that as I’d sourced it from Conforama it would be of reasonable quality. But some hope. The manufacturing quality was appalling. Several of the long allen-headed screws that hold the main framework together didn’t line up with the inserts they had to screw into and it took a long time to get them to go together as I didn’t want to drill out the holes through which they passed for fear of weakening the assembly.

One of the inserts was also missing, so I’ve had to email the supplier to try to get one sent to me ASAP and I also found that one of the white-painted legs was heavily scratched when I unpacked it. It also crushed a bit when I tightened the securing screw so I may have to add some filler under the head of the screw to improve its appearance. I’ll have to touch up several areas with white paint anyway where the coverage is poor so it won’t require much more effort to make it look better.

Apart from the problems with screws not lining up, assembly required much more time and effort than I’d anticipated and my guess is that there will be some purchasers who’ll give up before completing the job. The instructions were almost too small to read without a magnifying glass and parts labelling was non-existent. I had to dis and re-assemble parts I’d put together three or four times after I’d realised what was required and the manufacturer also had the bright idea of chucking several different types of screws all together in one plastic bag. Oh what fun it was finding just the two of one type I needed at one point from among the 150 or more that were in the bag.

Despite all this, it didn’t look too bad when I’d finished. The mattress for it is due to be delivered in four days time but in the meantime I threw the duvet and pillows onto it to see how they’ll look when the bed’s ready to be used.

I’m very pleased. If I said that I’d painted the wall to match the duvet cover I’d be lying. It was pure luck. I couldn’t even remember having a duvet cover and matching pillow cases in these colours until I unpacked the bedding that I placed in storage when I moved out of my old house and I can’t for the life of me recall when they were last used. It could be years and probably is. I’ll certainly hang onto them for now though, but may end up buying a new, better ‘sommier’ for this bedroom and moving this one into bedroom three where it will get much less use. But it’ll do for now 😉

Today was all about my ride-on mower. I needed the repair that I’d done to work because although today was a good day to be working outside (sunny all day, temperature 22 degrees C) and tomorrow will be similar, I really need a break. And if I could get my grass mown today, that would be possible tomorrow. I’ve been going non-stop for several days and loading and unloading stuff single-handedly to move it round to my house from storage has, quite honestly, taken a bit out of me.

I started by cleaning off all the dried mud and other debris that had collected on the underside of the deck and was surprised by just how much had accumulated. No wonder the deck was so heavy – it was far lighter to manhandle afterwards.

This was the deck after being cleaned and ready to be mounted back on the mower. I’d lubricated what I could but major things like bearings were sealed of course. I thought that it all looked pretty good after the repair.

It took me longer than I’d expected to get the deck installed. I’d forgotten how the cables and springs went and had to find a Youtube video that showed me and it didn’t help that my ride-on mower lifting mechanism is still in storage. But I was super relieved when I’d finished and was able to test it out, with the result that even with its old, worn blades, my ride-on is now cutting as well as it ever has and considerably better than it was up to recently.

I finished all the grass at the back so with a bit of luck I’ll get the break I want tomorrow. If I do, I think I’ll have earned it 😉

By way of summary, in order to use my new bike on public roads here in France it has to be registered and conform to various other legal requirements. For it to be registered it has to have a Certificate of Conformity signed by the manufacturer to confirm that it meets the necessary standards of roadworthiness and safety and it didn’t have one. So I set about researching what the regulations and standards are, produced a Certificate that I believe met them and sent a copy off to the manufacturer, Dakeya, in China for them to add their official stamp and return it to me in order to try to get the registration through.

Then it all went deadly quiet and despite further messages from me it seemed to be impossible to get a response from Dakeya. This seemed weird because what I’d done was to help them out and would, if successful, also be of value to them by making all of their bikes of the same model legal for use in France. In the end it got to the point when on Tuesday I sent a registered letter off to CDiscount, from whose web site I’d purchased my bike, saying that if I couldn’t register it I’d be looking to return it and would seek a full refund from them.

So, of course, what happened was the vey next day I eventually received a very nice reply from China saying that they were very grateful for the information and suggestions that I’d provided and that they had carefully read through all of the paperwork I’d sent. And attached to the email was the Declaration of Conformity that I’d submitted to them, officially stamped and dated.

I immediately uploaded a copy to the French registration web site and now await a response. It’s been a few days and at least my application hasn’t been thrown out again, so with a bit of luck it’s now going through. I guess I’ll have to wait a little while longer to know for sure.

Have you noticed how just when you need your car for a special reason, that’s when it always lets you down? This year it was the same with my ride-on mower. Just as the grass began growing furiously and needed to be cut before it got too long, my ride-on stopped cutting. Luckily only a smallish area was left at the back and I was able to finish it off with my ‘débroussailleuse’ (brush cutter) but that was only a short-term solution as the grass was only just getting into its stride and was going to continue growing at a fast rate, especially with all the showers we’ve been getting.

I had the possibility of another temporary solution while my ride-on is out of commission in the form of a self-propelled rotary motor mower which I put into storage nearly three years ago when I moved out of my old house. This, however, was always going to be a desperate lifeline as it was never reliable when I was using, or trying to use, it regularly. Once it was running it was a good worker but getting it started was always a frustrating business.

Anyway, I removed it from storage and it spent last night in my living room before I took it outside to see whether I could start it and keep it running for long enough to cut my grass front and back. This is it before I tried to see if I could remove, strip and clean its carburettor, which I suspected to be the source of the starting problem.

After checking, cleaning and re-gapping the spark plug the ruddy thing would not start. I couldn’t remove its carburettor because it’s held on by what appear to be 9.5mm bolts (I guess they are an AF size but the spanner(s) I need are in another tool box that’s still in storage) and one of them is impossible to get to anyway, so all I could do was remove the carburettor bowl (which was perfectly clean) and blow up into it the best I could.

After reassembling everything I kept pulling on the starter cord until I got a blister on my right index finger (even with gloves on) and just as I was about to give up and consign the machine to the ‘déchetterie’ it started out of the blue. I kept it going long enough even with a restart to refuel until I’d done the grass in the front by which time I thought it time to have something to eat and a cold beer before starting on the grass at the back. But it was not to be because I could not get the damn thing to run again no matter how many times I pulled on the starter cord.

When I’d dismantled my ride-on to investigate why it had stopped cutting I’d found that the problem was more serious than I’d thought. The spindle of one of the cutting belt pulleys on the cutting bed is mounted in a bracket which evidently is subject to considerable load because over time not only had the hole in the bracket been extremely ovalled by the bolt that forms the spindle but the bolt itself had actually sheared off. When I measured the thickness of the metal bracket I found it to be 5mm which gives some indication of the extent of the load it is designed to take.

My searches on the internet turned up that I could buy a complete new cutting bed, bare so I’d have to transfer over all of the parts from my old bed, for just over 250€ and I’d seriously considered doing that as my mower has been really good and trouble-free the whole time that I’ve had it and a new bed would, I’m sure, keep it going for many more years.

However, I thought that if I cut out the damaged section of the bracket, I could weld in a new piece that would, after drilling, make the bracket virtually as good as new. I’d ordered a small piece of 5mm thick steel which arrived today so I thought that as it was fine and I’d taken my welder out of storage in anticipation, I’d get cracking straight away today so I’d know sooner rather than later if a new cutting bed was actually going to be needed.

The next couple of pictures show the damaged section of bracket that I cut out. It’s standing on a piece of white paper on the repaired bracket because I didn’t take a picture before starting work.

The next couple of shots show the repair that I did. I’m no welder by any stretch of the imagination and it took me a while to weld, grind off the excess and repeat the process before I eventually got to what I thought was an acceptable result.

Once I’d cleaned up and cleared away I turned up a can of matt black spray paint in my ‘abris’ (tool shed) so although I didn’t have enough time to do a proper job, I rubbed off several areas of surface rust and gave them a coat, including the drilled and finished repaired bracket.

And finally, a couple of shots of the repaired cutting bed ready for the belt pulley system to be reassembled and the bed remounted on my ride-on.

It looks as though we’ve got a couple of dry days coming up with afternoon temperatures of 22 and 23 degrees C respectively, so with a bit of luck I’ll be able to put everything back together and try the repair out on my grass. I just hope that it works OK because I don’t fancy stripping and rebuilding the machine again. I’ve ordered a new spark plug for the old machine and if that doesn’t solve its starting issue I think that it’ll be time to send it off to the rest home in the sky for elderly mowers, especially as I don’t really have enough space for it anyway 🙁

Our home before our divorce was big enough to accommodate our dining room furniture but since then the houses I’ve lived in have not been. After coming to live in France coming up to 12 years ago, my last home in Plazac was much too small and the dining room table and chairs that I’d brought with me from England were never used as my living room was far too small.

So they’ve been unused for the whole of that time and have been in storage during the construction of my new house for the best part of three years since I moved out of the old place. But no longer! Since I finished my new cloaks cupboard which represents the last area of interior storage that I’ll have, I’ve been gradually removing stuff from the storage space I’ve been hiring over that time and yesterday that included my dining room table and chairs.

Here’s how my living room looked this morning. Yes, that is a lawn mower that I want to use to cut my grass while my ride-on is out of commission. It needs to be indoors until I can strip and clean its carburettor as I’ve no room in my ‘abris’ while my ride-on is in bits and it can’t be left outside because we keep getting passing showers.

But my dining room table and chairs have found their permanent home at last, permanent during my lifetime anyway. They fit perfectly into the space I planned for them, even including the table centre extension, and all that now remains is for me to bring the two matching floor cabinets out of storage to join them, which were too heavy for me to also bring over yesterday.

It’s been a tiring job because I’ve loaded several car and trailer loads single-handedly over the past couple of days and I didn’t think for a moment how much effort would be involved in putting it all in cupboards and on shelves, mainly because there was no place to store it all in my old house and much of it remained unpacked in boxes for all the years since I arrived in France. But it’ll be worth it because little by little everything is falling into place and my new house is becoming the home that I wanted. At last!

My new e-bike needs to be registered as a Speed Bike in France and has to carry a registration plate on its rear. I sent the necessary paperwork off the day after it was delivered – uploaded it on line actually, it’s a good system – and soon after received an acknowledgement and the news that it was being processed.

Then it went quiet, until two days ago when I received a message saying that my paperwork was incomplete and that a declaration of conformity was required. I thought that I’d sent a copy of the necessary CE certification, as had been provided to me by the seller, but it seemed that this was not enough. So yesterday I began to investigate and my searches initially came across the following web site which gave the clue as to what was required.

levelomad certificats

So I dashed off messages to both the supplier of my bike and Dakeya in China and it soon transpired that neither could supply any such document. This I found to be somewhat surprising, because it means that none of the bikes that they are currently supplying into Europe can be used legally on public roads and anyone doing so would be subject to stiff penalties.

But it’s more complicated than that. The two Dakeya models, the DA06 that I have and the DA03 that has rear suspension, in common with all similar high power bikes with a top speed exceeding 25 kmh, are not subject to the same legislation as standard e-bikes. Instead they are subject to cyclomoteur legislation.

I therefore embarked on a quite lengthy project to delve into the legislative requirements and firstly found that Dakeya, as well as needing to have a ‘Certificat d’Homologation’ for the bikes they are selling in Europe, also need to make certain small changes to the bike kits they are sending out in order to allow them to conform when they do have one. I then went on to review the legislation and the legislative requirements and created a ‘certificat’ for them which I believe will meet the standards set by the authorities.

I’ve sent it to Dakeya in China together with the list of modifications they need to make to their kits in order for them to conform and am now awaiting a reply. This isn’t just about being charitable because I need this paperwork to register my bike and I’ve asked them to stamp and sign the document I’ve sent and email it back to me.

On the other hand, they need it for all the bikes they are selling into Europe to be ridden legally on public roads so it would be worth quite a bit to them and I’ve suggested that if my proposed certificate does meet the requirements of the authorities, they might like to consider compensating me for the time and effort I’ve put into it 😐

I was supposed to refit the belt that drives the cutters on my ride-on mower yesterday so I could mow my grass before the rain started again today (which it has done) but couldn’t because I’d found that a bolt holding a pulley had sheared clean off. I tried to buy another locally without much expectation that I’d be able to and sure enough I couldn’t, so after I’d downloaded a parts list and ordered one on line that’ll take several days to arrive, I decided that I’d take the opportunity to go for a bike ride.

My first mistake was that I didn’t put my warm jacket on and soon regretted it because while I was out it became much cooler and more cloudy and the wind cut through the top I was wearing like a knife. But by then it was too late and I had to keep going, so lesson learned. On the road from my house leading to Fleurac I’d noticed a turn-off to the right that I’d gone down previously on my old e-bike but had then turned round on because it had become too steep down-hill and I hadn’t fancied the drag back up again. This time on my new bike with its much greater power, I thought I’d give it a go.

And what an experience it was! Like many such tracks, it led off-road into open country consisting of woodland and rough open spaces. These ‘chemins rurals’ are open to the public but are not supported by the local communes and are used by farmers, hunters, off-roaders and adventurous bikers, much like I was going to become although I didn’t know it. After descending a few hundred metres, quite steeply in places with heavy braking, I came to a cross-roads with signs indicating that if I continued straight ahead I’d eventually arrive in Plazac, but if I turned left, I’d get to Plazac via the ‘short route’.

So given how chilly it was already becoming, I decided to go left. The surface was mainly dry but it was fairly evident that when wet it had been used by heavy farm traffic and/or some serious off-roaders because it was fairly heavily rutted and some of the ruts had become hard set like concrete making riding a bit tricky to say the least. But this was only the start. For the first hundred metres or so after I’d turned left the surface was fairly level and it was just a matter of dodging from side to side to stay out of the main ruts. But then the track suddenly took a steep roller-coaster-like down-turn and I stopped, wondering whether it might be more prudent to turn back rather than continue as the surface continued to be heavily rutted.

Predominantly, there was light woodland on both sides so there wasn’t an option to leave the track on either side – I’d just have to press on and make the best of it. But what the heck, in for a penny, in for a pound, I decided to continue. And what an experience it became! In some places the track had been cut away by traffic to leave narrow platforms at the sides and these might have been a good option to take. However, most of the ruts were so deep that if you rode off the platform you’d fall into them, and in many places the height difference between the edge platform and the bottom of the adjacent rut was 30 or so centimetres, so not something you’d want to do.

And all the while by that time the track was going down and down and at that point I hit the wet part where there was still standing water and thick mud as well as the ruts. Obviously I wasn’t having to pedal at all and in fact the challenge was to stand up out of the saddle on the pedals. Luckily I was wearing my walking boots and I decided that the best way to overcome the mud was to do as I’d been doing in some of the heavily rutted parts, which was to hang my legs out to either side in case I started to fall in either direction and move ahead under power. This was OK on the less steep bits, but there were several very steep stretches in which I almost felt that I was taking my life in my hands!

But all things must end and as the track began to level off and I turned a bend a house appeared in the front of which there was the beginning of a road with a proper hard surface. It was also less steep and I was able to continue downhill in a far more controlled way just with modest continuous braking. There were several more houses on each side of the road, one or two quite new, and eventually I got to the bottom of the hill at a junction which I’d passed by hundreds of time on the road leading up from Plazac’s market area to Fleurac, and what an experience it had been.

But it wasn’t over because now I had to get back up to Fleurac. I could have just turned left and headed for home but despite the cold I decided not to. Instead I continued right into Plazac, turned left into the centre of the village and continued on to return home via Rouffignac. I didn’t take a note of the time or the distance but it was undoubtedly the longest ride that I’d done so far. And certainly the coldest. I’d been thinking about taking my new bike off road and had been wondering where would be suitable for the first time. I’d thought I’d take it fairly gently initially to get the feel of it and I certainly hadn’t thought that I’d be trying to do anything anywhere near as extreme as I just had done. But you’ve got to live a little, haven’t you. Life’s too short for pipe and slippers 😀

Today I finished the new cloaks cupboard that I’ve been constructing in my house since last month. It’s appearance is deceptive as it belies the number of hours that I’ve put into it, partly because I do not have access to a workshop with automatic tools and have had to rely the whole time on simple hand tools and partly because a bespoke build of anything always takes much more time and effort than just assembling a kit bought from a supplier such as Brico Depot.

The images below show the space as it was handed over to me by the builder of my house and the transition to what it has become today and I am very happy with the results.

You my be wondering why this is a milestone for me and this is the reason. I see a distinction between ‘projects’ and ‘jobs’. A project consists of a series of tasks carried out over a period of time in order to achieve a final result, so decorating my house’s interior was a project as was installing my kitchen. A job is a ‘one off’ that can be carried out in a day, or maybe two, so mowing the grass I see as a job.

I’ve been working virtually non-stop on projects in order to complete the interior and exterior construction of my house since last June and this cloaks cupboard is the very last one. All that’s left are jobs – bits of tiling in the kitchen and ‘cellier’, applying beading around the interior door frames, painting the shutters – all things that I can more or less do at my leisure, without pressure and it’s a great feeling as it’ll give me more time to take on more pleasurable activities, like flying and riding my new e-bike.

But first I’ll have to mow the grass for the second time and before I can do that I’ll have to refit the cutter belt on my ride-on mower that somehow managed to jump off its pulleys last time. And as I look forward to getting out into the fresh air I noticed this morning that after being in my garden for about three years and never having borne fruit, my little apple tree that had a trunk with a diameter of 2-3 cms has been bitten off about 10 cms above the ground and the two cherry trees reduced to mere twigs. So everything in the garden isn’t lovely after all, far from it… 🙁

I did a video of the ride I did yesterday from my house to Manaurie, a small commune near Fleurac, and back.

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Wind noise affected some of the sound unfortunately, but I expected that and I’ve already ordered some wireless mics for my Go-Pros.

At about 2 or 3 kms from here there’s a chateau – Chateau du Peuch. It’s more or less downhill all the way from my house and in summer when the tourists are here you often see middle-aged couples who have hired or borrowed bikes struggling to get up the slope which is quite steep in places. It’s a wonder there aren’t more heart attacks!

I would never have attempted it on my old electric bike but hit the hill yesterday afternoon. Going down was quite an experience as after the recent rains there was a lot of loose gravel on the road surface, but coming back up was exhilarating.

There’s a flattish bit at the start in front of the chateau entrance and then it’s more or less up-hill all the way with windy bends in places that I had to slow down for. Otherwise I hit 40 kmh in places and never went below 37 kmh – with no pedalling! This bike is totally amazing 😀

My new Dakeya e-bike arrived as expected yesterday afternoon and I assembled it in my living room. By the time I’d finished it was beginning to get darker outside so I only had time for a quick test ride, down to Victor and Madeleine’s and back, before returning and putting its battery on charge.

I have a motor-bike licence and used to ride a lot when I was younger, much younger, so whizzing along under power was an experience that I’ve become unaccustomed to after all that time. And it was a bit scary, but fun scary, to be doing it again after so long. The main reason was that if you set the ‘pedal assist’ level to the highest setting and open the throttle the bike takes off like a scalded cat!

I was out again this morning, this time with helmet and gloves on, but the air was a bit chilly and I didn’t go too far before turning back. Knowing what to expect I felt a bit more secure, although it’s going to take a week or so to get used to the bike’s functions and operation before I’ll feel fully in control. Even so I hit 47 kmh (just under 30 mph) on the way back to my house!

The first picture shows the bike in my living room before going out again this morning. The others show it in its natural environment.

I’ve now got to do all the tedious bureaucratic stuff to get it registered and insured before venturing out over long distances on the open road. I’ve also ordered some elbow and knee pads to be on the safe side, so in the meantime I’ll only be doing short local trips around the immediate area until I’ve sorted everything out. But I have to say, I already love it 😀

At last the doors are on my new cloaks cupboard.

I’ve been waiting weeks to use that title 😀

That’s the worst bit over. Now I’ve only got to build the internal shelving system but that will just be a bit tedious and time-consuming as it’ll only be all about cutting and screwing together lengths of 18mm white melamine board.

Tricky one this. I don’t want big gaps between the doors of my new cloaks cupboard so I’m now trimming the door widths down to get the fit I want. Quite time-consuming.

My new cloaks cupboard is now painted and ready for the bi-fold doors to be mounted. That’s for tomorrow as I’ve had a sound bar for my Panasonic TV delivered today and I want to install that and get it working during the rest of the day today.

I got the ceiling coving above the new cloaks cupboard up, undercoated and top-coated yesterday and I’m very pleased with the results.

All I have to do today is paint the walls and woodwork green and I’ll be ready to hang the doors.

Bad news about my new e-bike though. UPS have put the delivery back to Monday afternoon, so disappointing but not a disaster. But at least I’ll be able to press on with the cloaks cupboard over the week-end without being distracted and I also hope to be able to cut my grass, which is now beginning to get a bit long.

I’m glad to say. For a change. The side walls/wings of my new cloaks cupboard that I’m building are now more or less perfect, ready for painting, which I’ll do later today in the form of a sealer-undercoat. I now realise that I didn’t help myself with my initial choice of plaster which I grabbed at Leroy Merlin because it was nearby and convenient, when I picked up the metal edging pieces.

I knew at the time that it was labelled ‘Enduit pour joints de plaques de plâtre’ (mortar for plasterboard joints) and I thought it would be suitable. But now I think it actually wasn’t. While using it I found that it was drying very quickly and I had to keep wetting it down and also it seemed to consist of rather large grains. But the worst thing was that it always seemed ‘sticky’, which made it difficult to get a smooth surface as when I trowelled it, it tended to lift back off again.

I think I was lucky to get it as smooth as I did and I now realise that I should really have bought ‘Enduit de lissage’ (smoothing mortar) which would have made the job far easier. Anyway, after rubbing down the original plaster and finishing off the bad patches with ‘enduit de lissage’ I’ve now got surfaces which I’m very happy with. Here are the results after I’ve undercoated everything.

To be honest, it’s been a rough ride but I couldn’t be more happy. The other good news concerns my new e-bike, which I was expecting to be delivered some time after March 11th. The good news is that UPS have now informed me that it’ll be delivered this Friday afternoon, March 8th.

And here’s a good picture, at last, of what’s coming.

I can’t wait for it to arrive. It has received very good reviews because it’s a well-built machine. Unlike some others of its type it has metal mudguards, rather than flimsy plastic, and a good, strong rear parcel carrier which’ll be very handy for popping up to the shops 🙂

All we need now is for it to stop raining…

Or the start of a new chapter? Hopefully both. After playing hard-ball with the Chinese supplier on Aliexpress and a wait of 48 hours, I was today informed that the money I’d paid is to be refunded and will arrive back in my bank account in the next 2-3 days. So that has allowed me to do a further search for a suitable model, hopefully with more certainty that it will actually be delivered this time.

As mentioned in a previous post, I’d found another ‘Keteles K800 clone’ (who seem to be the Chinese manufacturer of all these similar single and dual motor e-bikes) on the French Cdiscount web site, called a Dakeya DA06, at a much lower price – 1099€ – and if I could have placed an order at the time I’d have also been eligible for a 45€ ‘loyalty discount’ and delivery for only 20€.

At the time, however, due to the debacle involving the Chinese supplier, I didn’t think that would be a wise thing to do. So I left things in abeyance and lo and behold, when I searched again today I found a second German supplier of the same model but with a twist when it came to the price.

The Dakeya comes in three colours – black, green and blue. The French supplier on Cdiscount offers all three at 1099€ with a delivery charge as of today of 60€. The German supplier, on the other hand, offers free delivery but demands premiums for green and blue.

So the black version is on offer from the German supplier for 1099€ with free delivery, so although I’d tried to order a green bike from Aliexpress, how could I resist the German supplier’s offer? The answer is, I couldn’t, so today I’ve gone ahead and placed an order for a black Dakeya DA06 which is due for delivery some time between 11th and 20th March.

My order has now been validated so hopefully this will be the end of this particular saga and the start of a new chapter as I enjoy my new e-bike. My experiences tell me that scammers are swarming around these popular, high value, fast selling items on Aliexpress like wasps around a honey pot just waiting to sting you. I found a comment left by another buyer on the web site of the seller from whom I’m awaiting my refund as follows (using Google translate).

“Some scammers… I bought a bike and he started telling me that this model is not in stock and then he tells me I am sending you this bike. Different… I told him to return the money and he tells me that’s not possible, then it is listed as delivered and nothing ever came.”

So it appears that my experiences of this seller’s behaviour was typical, but luckily I proved yet again the value of using Paypal as it looks as though the other buyer was not so lucky and may have ended up with no bike and no refund.

I don’t have very good plastering skills and by its very nature I knew that plastering the side wings of my new cloaks cupboard would not be an easy job. But I had no idea just what a nightmare it would be. The main problem was that the staples I used to fix the metal edge pieces were a bit thick and even though I’d hammered them in as much as I could without damaging the plasterboard they still stuck out a bit too much.

That made it difficult getting enough plaster in the right places to cover them and I had to use a bit of advice that I was given to me by someone with more experience than me many years ago. That was if it’s a tricky little job, like this one, don’t try to get it perfect from the outset. Do the best you can then when the plaster’s dry enough come back and sand it to flatten it off. Then come back again with a thin, wet coat of plaster to skim it over and make it perfect.

So that’s what I’ve done. All of the surfaces that I wanted to cover are covered but their finish is not to a high standard, as the images show. But that doesn’t matter because they’ll be fine to skim over once I’ve sanded them.

They are jobs for tomorrow, but at least I have the satisfaction of knowing that I’ve broken the back of the job and the worst part of the project, or at least what I think is the worst part, is now behind me. Onwards my friends!

Progress on my new cloaks cupboard has been very slow but it hasn’t just been due to messing around with e-bike stuff. I’ve also had setbacks due to poor materials not working as they were supposed to (primarily fixings, which I’ve found to be of poor quality wherever I’ve sourced them from) and availability of items that I’ve needed for the construction.

But I’ve at last got the basic structure in place in the form of the two side-wall wings that create the aperture for the doors and the ceiling cross-beam on which the track will be mounted in which the door rollers will run.

The next job will be to plaster the two side-wings but before that can be done their exposed edges have had to be reinforced with metal edging pieces.

Fixing the edging pieces was quite tricky. The pros use compressed air powered stapling guns and do the job in a matter of minutes. I have a manual stapling gun and thought that would be suitable but it isn’t, so I’ve had to look for another method. I tried plasterboard nails of different lengths but they weren’t effective and I’ve ended up using small zinc plated staples, as shown in the above images.

This was easier said than done and very tedious as each staple had to be gripped in long-nosed pliers and then hammered in. The job took ages but after plastering them, the side-wings will be painted and finished to match the existing walls.

The ceiling mounted cross-beam will not have to support any significant weight as the main supports for the bi-fold doors will be on the floor. I bought a length of square section timber for it with enough height to take the ceiling coving that will finish the unit off, but afterwards decided to increase its depth by glueing and screwing a second piece of timber to it.

The fixings holding it to the ceiling plasterboard proved to be particularly problematic as three out of the seven of them failed and I had to spend hours making fixings that worked. The following shots show each of the cross-beams ends.

As well as working on the cloaks cupboard I’ve also spent some time today playing hard-ball with the supplier on which I placed an order yesterday for a new e-bike. I’m not prepared to wait for delivery of a more expensive bike with ‘extras’ and would be happy with the one on the Cdiscount web site, the more so as Cdiscount are offering me an additional discount voucher as a result of my previous purchases.

I told the Chinese supplier that I wanted to cancel the order and they accused me of breaking my word, which after my recent experiences I thought was a bit rich coming from a Chinese supplier on Aliexpress. The supplier took umbrage and I went ahead and cancelled it anyway.

Now I’ll have to wait for up to 48 hours to ensure that the cancellation goes through and I am ensured of a refund of the sums I’ve paid before going ahead and ordering the less expensive bike on Cdiscount. I just hope the offer stays available in the meantime.

I just can’t seem to catch a break at the moment. After all the messing about yesterday with the Chinese supplier (which I now bitterly regret as I’m about to explain), when I had a few moments to spare I took another look at the e-bikes that are on offer on Cdiscount, the French web site which I’ve used quite a bit with considerable success. And know what, this is what I found – although the name’s different it’s instantly recognisable as yet another cloned Keteles K800.

But look at the price – 1099€. If you read the ad you can see that this bike is identical to the two motor, 2000W 48V one for 1298€ without rear suspension that the Chinese supplier said was out of stock. But it gets even better (or worse depending on how you look at it) when you dig deeper and check on its full price including delivery. You’ll probably have to click on the following image to see the figures.

I took the screenshot today and the delivery charge is only 20€. Yesterday when I saw the ad for the first time it was 50€, so today you can have the bike delivered in about a week for the princely sum of only 1119€. So now how do I feel about the price of 1360€ that I agreed yesterday with the Chinese seller?

Sure, my new bike will have rear suspension and upgraded front forks, but do I think they’re worth 241€? No I certainly do not, especially as I could have had this bike within a week whereas I’m now committed to waiting weeks for my new bike to be delivered. To say I’m feeling sick this morning is an understatement 🙁

What can I say? I made a mistake in my last post when I said that I’ve ordered the e-bike that I want for 938€. When I looked more closely at the order I’d placed I realised that what I’d ordered was a single motor 1000W model rather than the twin motor 2000W that I wanted.

It was an easy mistake to make because the Chinese sellers’ ads show a range of models of different specs and prices on the Aliexpress web site but all under the main heading and/or description of the highest spec one.

When you click on the model/colour combination that you are interested in only a sub-heading in small type actually changes, as shown in the following screen shot taken from the seller’s web site of the model that I’d placed an order for.

I realised soon afterwards when I had time to look at things more closely that I’d made a mistake and should have ordered the twin motor, 2000W model shown below, which was more expensive obviously.

One of the things to note is that the two bikes in the above images are not of the same brand – the cross-bar is a dead giveaway. I’ve found that the Chinese e-bike sellers on Aliexpress are very cavalier with the images that they post on their web pages but I don’t know if they or Aliexpress are responsible for just putting up any image that’s close to what they are selling because they know that under the skin they are all the same bikes and come out of the same factory.

As soon as I realised that I’d made a mistake I messaged the seller on the Aliexpress web site in order to ensure that the order was not progressed, let alone sent out. My initial message was sent yesterday and as a result I got into a live interchange today on the Aliexpress messaging system. Here are the interchanges that I’ve copied and pasted directly from our conversation.

Me:
Hello, I think I have purchased a single motor bike. This is not what I want. Please do not send this order . I will have to cancel. I need a 2 motor 2000W bike. Thank you. Please confirm you are not sending this order.

Seller:
2000W bicycle with 2 Motors is more expensive

Me:
Yes, I know. I made a mistake when I placed the order. The bike I want I think is 1298€. Need to pay difference by Paypal.

Seller:
But the 2000W one is out of stock. The price of the other 2000W is very high. It requires 1488 euros.

Me:
No that’s beyond my budget. I reluctantly suggest that the order is therefore cancelled and I reorder when the 1298€ bike is back in stock.

Seller:
There is a 1398 euro bicycle, but it takes 45 days to wait

Me:
No, still too high.

Seller:
Do you need 1000W now?

Me:
No please cancel that order. It was my mistake. I want 2 motor 2000W

Seller:
I sent 1000W before, then you have to pay 140 euros for intercepting express delivery

Me:
No, I told you before you had a chance to send. Paypal will see the timing of the messages and will refund anyway. Please do not behave badly as I will still buy from you when you have the bike I want. Otherwise I will not. Aliexpress also allow free return if the bike I cancelled is delivered. Then I will receive the full refund. Please think carefully before you do the wrong thing.

Seller:
OK

Me:
OK, let us work this out sensibly. How long before the 1298€ 200W LaFly is available? I mean 2000W of course

Seller:
It takes 40-50 days, but it is an upgraded version

Me:
In what way?

Seller:
Lafly, which arrived at the European warehouse 50 days later, is an upgraded version. It will be upgraded to this

Seller:
Upgraded to double shoulder front fork and double suspension.

Me:
OK but the big question is the price…

Seller:
The price is already the lowest 1398 euros. Look, the price is 1598 (the next image is of the comparable current model on the seller’s web site)

Seller:
If you are willing to wait for Lafly’s upgraded bike, its price is 1398

Me:
I see what you are saying. Can we agree a price of 1350€??

Seller:
The price is 1378 euros, the lowest

Me:
Come on, you are pushing too much. 1360€ and we have a deal. Don’t forget you are asking me to wait for 50 days!!

Seller:
OK

Me:
OK let’s do it

Seller:
OK

The seller then posted a link on the Aliexpress web site for the difference between the 938€ that I’d paid against my original order and the cost of the new bike (1360€) with two 1000W motors, a 48V 23AH battery and front and rear suspension.

Me:
OK I’ve paid the difference. So we can confirm this is for the Lafly upgrade 2 motor 2000W with front and rear suspension, right?

Seller:
yes

Me:
Thank you. I look forward very much to receiving it as soon as possible.

Seller:
I will contact you in 50 days

Me:
OK I guess I’ll just have to be patient

Seller:
yes, wish you a wonderful day

So how have things worked out? Apart from the delay in receiving my bike, I think pretty well. The bike that I wanted to change my order for (1298€) which the seller now says is out of stock is a mid-range model with non-lockable front suspension and no rear suspension. The upgraded model that I’ve now ordered for 1360€ has both and the Keteles factory web site (I think Keteles manufactures all these bikes under different brand names) is currently showing it for 1699€.

This is higher than other independent sellers are advertising it for but obviously Keteles would not be looking to undercut them as they are the ones bringing in the great majority of their sales. So I think that the price I’ve got (1360€) is pretty good.

In conclusion, today I found the same bike that I told the seller I’d pay 1298€ for (two motors, 2000W, 48V 23 AH battery but no rear suspension) on the CDiscount web site here in France – for 1278€, ie at a lower price if it includes delivery. So if I’d ordered from them, all of the above saga could probably have been avoided.

I was surprised to find the ad as I’ve been doing lots of internet searches, so I think that Cdiscount has only just put the bike on their web site in the last few hours if I’m correct.

But on the other hand, I’ll be getting a higher spec bike for only 82€ more rather than the 200€ or so that it usually costs for the ‘extras’ that I’ll be getting and I’m happy with that. That’s if in the meantime Cdiscount don’t start selling the upgraded model for a lower price than the 1360€ that I’ve agreed with the Chinese seller. You never know, do you 😕

I received my refund from Aliexpress today for my new e-bike that never materialised so have jumped straight in again. There are two ‘sellers’ with similar names who are offering the same bike as I ordered last time for 399,99€ and funnily enough their Aliexpress certificates show that they were both registered in Spain, one in late December 2023 and the other in late January 2024.

I already know from previous searches that the true prices of the bikes are in the range 1000€ – 1499€ so my conclusion is that both are working the same scam as my original seller. I think that anyone placing orders will be unlikely to get their money back if they use a non-guaranteed payment method, despite Aliexpress saying they will, and although the ‘sellers’ know that other monies they receive will be refunded, they can use the funds in their business for free in the meantime.

So this time I’ve gone for another supplier and another model bike, although it’s pretty apparent by now that all of these bikes of similar design are coming from the same factory and are just branded differently. Here’s what we’re talking about – very much the same as I originally ordered but this time I’ve gone for the bright green!

This time, though, I’ve paid quite a bit more, although still below the average price being demanded for the same/similar model by other suppliers – 938€.

I’ve done the same as before – paid using Paypal, although this time I’ve opted for 4 x payments over the next four months, meaning my initial outlay is roughly half what it was before. The bike is also due to be delivered a lot quicker – by March 7th – so if this one goes t*ts up as well, at least I’ll get my money back quicker than before 🙂

I can’t quite understand what’s going on. After contacting la Poste this morning to find out why I haven’t received a parcel that it said had been delivered into my mailbox, out of the blue I’ve just received an email from Aliexpress saying that my order has been cancelled and I’m being refunded the full purchase amount.

There can’t be any connection between the two events because there’s no reason why la Poste should have been in contact with Aliexpress so it would appear that Aliexpress has itself become involved independently behind the scenes with the seller.

When I checked my order status on the Aliexpress web site the information given is to the effect that the order was cancelled and refunded due to an incorrect order tracking number having been provided by the seller who will be sanctioned in accordance with the platform’s (Aliexpress’s) rules.

OK, that’s good as far as it goes, but although the original web page for the bike I ordered has now been taken down, there are still several in a similar style on Aliexpress, probably from the same ‘seller’, for similar bikes several of which are now even cheaper than the price of the one I ordered. If the ‘seller’ is a scammer, surely Aliexpress should have picked that up, closed them all down and booted the ‘seller’ off?

And there’s another thing. How come la Poste could provide tracking data for ‘my’ parcel right up to the point of delivery? There’s one explanation I can think of, which is that a legitimate label was created by this, or another legitimate, seller for a real bike being delivered to a buyer in France. The scam ‘seller’ then spoofed a copy of the label with my name and address on it and sent it to me.

Are you with me so far? The legitimate sale would then track properly through the system until it was delivered into its buyer’s mailbox – which wouldn’t have been mine, which is why it wasn’t in my mailbox even though I had been told that it had been delivered. It would also explain why my ‘delivery’ appeared to be early, as the label that had been spoofed was probably by then a few days old.

I don’t know how Aliexpress got onto this but fortunately I paid using Paypal so I’ll get my refund in a couple of days, although buyers who used other payment methods could have more difficulty. I’ll be able to relax once I’ve received it and then I’ll be able to decide whether to go for another new e-bike at the proper price, especially as I’ve already bought my safety helmet 🙂

It’ll also be interesting to hear what la Poste have to say when they come back to me as I think they’ll say yes, the parcel I queried was delivered correctly – just not to me 😕

Still no sign of my new e-bike but it appears that my assumption about the postman confusing the two parcels that were being delivered to me in the depot was incorrect. La Poste had applied its own postage label over the original Chinese one on the packaging that had contained the bike helmet that was delivered on Saturday and when I took a closer look at it I found another delivery reference. When I checked that I found that the system is confirming delivery of that parcel.

So according to la Poste, two parcels were dropped off into my mailbox on Saturday – the helmet and my new e-bike. This is total nonsense, of course, because the Chinese supplier of the bike had already sent me a copy of the label confirming despatch of the bike which showed a gross weight for the package of 38.6 kg and there’s no way that that would anything like fit into my mailbox.

So what’s going on? La Poste has a help line which I’ve tried using several times today but, surprise surprise, it doesn’t work properly. When you key in a number in the multi-choice menu it just keeps talking to you, which isn’t that surprising because such systems operated by public sector businesses in France rarely do function as intended. I think it’s a ploy to stop you contacting them with problems, but you must draw your own conclusions…

But luckily I’ve got a la Poste on line account and in it I can access a virtual assistant. Amazingly, on this occasion I do seem to have succeeded in making a claim for non-delivery of a parcel. La Poste has said that the delivery service will get back to me with a detailed response within 48 hours and have given me a claim reference. However, I’m used to playing this game with EDF and Enedis and I’ll be pleasantly surprised if this will be enough to resolve the situation. I’ll have to wait and see.