Making it faster

1Look

The little box

That machine still has the same frame, the same label and the same name as the day it arrived. It is not the same machine, and the label on it is now describing something that no longer exists.

2The idea

What derestricting produces

Removing the speed limit or raising the power is usually simple, often a small part or an app, and it is sold as unlocking what the machine could always do. Surgeons who see the results describe what comes out the other end: illegally modified machines exceed 50 mph.

Every number you have worked with on this course came apart at that point. Fifty is not a faster version of twenty. It is a different vehicle, with a different stopping distance, on the same brakes, the same tyres and the same frame that was designed and certified for twenty.

3The idea

Over 750 watts, it stops being an e-bike

You met this in Badge 1 from the buying end. Here is the modifying end. From 2027 in Illinois, anything over 750 watts is not an e-bike. It becomes a motor driven cycle, which needs a driver’s licence, registration, insurance and a title, and it is barred from bike paths, trails and bike lanes.

A modification can push a machine across that line without anybody meaning to cross it. The machine looks identical afterwards. The classification on the frame label is the one that stops being true, and nothing about the way it rides will tell you.

4Your turn

Two labels, one machine

Drag it back and forth a few times. The picture never changes, which is the entire point of the exercise.

5The idea

What another state did, and what ours recommends

California is not your law, and nothing here binds you, but it shows where this is going. California’s AB 1774, signed on 2 July 2024, banned illegal speed modifications and barred shops, distributors and online sellers from selling any product that lets an e-bike exceed the legal speed or power limit.

Closer to home, Ride Illinois’ guidance for towns writing their own rules recommends a flat prohibition on device modification. That is a recommendation to municipalities rather than a state law, so the rule that applies to you is whatever your own town has adopted.

6Decide

Somebody offers to unlock your machine in an afternoon, free, and says it just removes a software limit.

7The idea

The person who can find out is you

A state patrol officer who works on this said the thing that is most often true: far too many parents and caregivers are unaware of what their child is actually riding. Not unwilling. Unaware. Most of them have never seen the label and would not know what the wattage meant.

You have read the label, you know what the three classes are, and you know where 750 sits. That makes you the person in your house who can answer the question, which is a strange amount of responsibility for a badge to hand you, and it is still true.

8Say it

The question to ask before anybody touches it

Ask it about your own machine, and ask it about any machine somebody offers to lend you. It is also the exact question to ask in a shop, and a shop that cannot answer it has told you something useful.

9Find them

Which of these are true in Illinois from 2027?

Tap the ones that count.

10Do it

Before you leave this page