http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ CityCyclingEdinburgh Forum » Topic: Ebikes & powered trailer legality? en Wed, 01 Jul 2026 07:58:47 +0000 http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=21414#post-372102 Tue, 05 Dec 2023 13:34:13 +0000 neddie 372102@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>A common sense approach would be a rule that any powered trailer cannot 'push' the towing bike, but only reduce the amount of effort required to pull it.</p> <p>But we don't do common sense in this country </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=21414#post-372101 Tue, 05 Dec 2023 13:23:27 +0000 fimm 372101@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>What do PedalMeApp in London use? Don't they have powered bikes and powered trailers? </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=21414#post-372100 Tue, 05 Dec 2023 12:57:35 +0000 Morningsider 372100@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>Interesting! I've had a quick trawl through the relevant legislation and can't see anything. My gut feeling is this would be such a niche set-up that there simply isn't specific legislation. The retailers have probably added a disclaimer just in case there is some legal blowback.</p> <p>I reckon you would be fine, but I fear that there is a growing mood against e-bikes and scooters (largely created by maniac delivery riders on illegal e-motorbikes) and you could always run into an over-zealous police officer who took a dislike to what they saw. </p> http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/topic.php?id=21414#post-372098 Tue, 05 Dec 2023 11:56:37 +0000 Yodhrin 372098@http://citycyclingedinburgh.info/bbpress/ <p>I've been mulling over a powered trailer DIY project for picking up decent sized loads of wood, but when idly checking the pricing on a proper Carla powered trailer(yowza, DIY for sure) I found one retailer claiming it's illegal to use a powered trailer with an ebike as under UK law despite both being legal 250w motors it counts as being combined into a single 500w one once you hitch one to the other, which seems extraordinarily dumb, but not so dumb I'd put it past our lawmakers.</p> <p>Is that actually correct, because they don't specify a source and a casual google hasn't turned anything up, but you'd assume they're not deliberately sabotaging their own business needlessly... </p>