Power Assisted Bicycle

Overview

Power assisted bicycles use an electric motor to reduce the force required to peddle, including situations in which the most force is required, such as when starting or when climbing a hill. These bikes are rapidly growing in popularity, with elderly persons and women being eager adopters. A bicycle equipped with a power-assist system requires an MCU to control the drive motor and an MCU to display the operating state of the motor.

Renesas Electronics supplies MCUs suitable for controlling motor torque and rotation and for functions such as power regeneration when braking. The MCUs in the R8C family and V850E/Ix3 are ideal for motor-control use, and some of those chips, along with MCUs in 78K0/Lx3, the M16C/60 series and the R8C family are recommended for system control applications. Renesas Electronics also supplies products such as power MOSFETs for efficiently driving motors powered by rechargeable batteries. Our components provide advanced functionality and high performance at reduced levels of power consumption and at lower cost.