Weekend Project: This guy made an electric bike snowplow out of garbage
They say that necessity is the mother of invention. And one Canadian man had a serious need for Vietnamese takeout. But since the bike paths hadn’t been plowed, he turned his e-bike into a DIY snow plow to go get his fix.
His evening ride for Vietnamese food went viral and made it on the news, but it’s far from the first time he’s taken his e-bike snow plow to the streets.
Phil Marciniak of Saanich, British Columbia built the intrepid device after working through a few prototype designs.
He uses a cargo electric bike for his job as an appliance repair man, so he already had a large e-bike on hand that he uses for transporting tools. He also works with electric bikes, so he knows the ins and outs of the devices.
And with a background in handiness and repair work, he was able to easily fashion up a snowplow for his cargo e-bike.
The current design he’s showing off uses a split plow made from two sections of a 200L polyethylene rainwater barrel (something akin to a 55 gallon plastic drum, for the Americans in the room).
The design is already a few iterations deep. Last year he experimented with earlier prototypes like a single angled plow, but found that it would push him sideways and tended to make it harder to steer. He concedes that the split plow isn’t ideal for clearing bike paths as it’d be better to push all of the snow to one side, but it makes it much easier to control the bike, and thus, more effective.
In fact, he can hit speeds as high as 20 km/h (12 mph) while slinging snow in both directions.
Marciniak reports that his e-bike snow plow works best in snow depths of around 10 cm (4 inches), but that it could work in as much as 15 cm (6 inches) of snow. He tried it in 30 cm (12 inches) but found that to be too much.
When passing over areas that have already been cleared, the e-bike’s snow plow can be lifted above the road surface with a strap that also helps makes it easier to cycle.
So far Marciniak has kept to the bike lanes and avoided plowing on streets and near traffic. “I don’t want to be anywhere near cars in the snow,” he explained.
For those wanting to follow along and build their own e-bike snow plow, Marciniak shared a YouTube video yesterday showing how he built his setup.
In addition to the bucket that forms the plow blades, he used a wooden 2×4 frame to give it support and connect the plow to the bike.
Using a heavier cargo bike likely helps keep the bike so stable while plowing through heavy snow, so your milage my vary if you try to do this with a lightweight folder.
If you want to try your own hand at building an electric bike snow plow, be sure to take lots of pictures and videos to let us all know how it went! We’d also recommend that you check out our winter e-biking tips to stay safe out there too!
While cities probably won’t be enlisting these DIY designs into their fleets anytime soon, they sure do make a nice addition to bike lanes that are often neglected after snowfalls!
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Tesla has partnered with Steak ‘n Shake to deploy Superchargers at up to more than 100 restaurant locations.
The partnership between Tesla and the American fast food chain has been revealed through a strange series of posts on X.
First, Tesla CEO Elon Musk commented on Steak ‘n Shake’s announcement that it is switching from using seed oils to beef tallow.
The restaurant responded by proposing “Tesla charging stations at Steak n Shake”, but they apparently didn’t know that it was already happening as Tesla responded that they had already signed on 6 sites and they have over 20 more in review:
The Steak n Shake account responded by suggesting that the partnership extend to over 100 locations:
Thank you Tesla Charging! Let’s do over 100 locations. Consider all sites approved!
The chain operates over 400 locations around the world – many of them in the midwest. A lot of these locations are located near highways, where Tesla prefers to deploy charging stations.
It’s not the first time that Tesla has partnered with a restaurant for multiple Supercharger locations. It also has a deal with Ruby Tuesday.
Tesla is currently deploying its latest V4 Superchargers capable of 500 kW – with the first stations expected to come online in the US later this year.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Volkswagen’s electric SUV is making a comeback. Last month, the Volkswagen ID.4 topped Tesla’s Model Y to become the best-selling EV in Europe, and it was even in the top three in the US.
Volkswagen ID.4 was EU’s best-selling EV, top 3 in the US
Although new vehicle registrations fell 2% in Europe last month, electric vehicles were a bright spot, with BEV sales up 37% from the year prior.
According to JATO Dynamics, 165,473 EVs were registered in Europe in January. The Volkswagen ID.4 took the top spot after registrations surged 195% to 7,177, overtaking the Tesla Model Y.
Tesla Model Y registrations plunged 46% in Europe last month to 6,155. The Model 3 refresh, which was launched in late 2023, had a 44% decline in registrations. Overall, Tesla registered only 9,913 vehicles in January 2025, a 45% decline from last year.
While the arrival of the new Model Y plays a role, backlash against Elon Musk’s increasingly outspoken political antics is also causing widespread hate among owners in the US and Europe.
Felipe Munoz, Global Analyst at JATO said the solid performance of EVs is “particularly impressive given the significant dip in sales that Tesla experienced” in January.
He explained, “it’s not unusual for sales to drop just before a new generation or an updated model is introduced to the market.”
Although sales are expected to pick up again, Munoz added, “The performance of both the Model 3 and Model Y is an indication of the declining popularity of Tesla in Europe overall.”
Volkswagen is taking advantage with the ID.4 taking the top spot, and the ID.7 placing third with 5,879 registrations, up 657% from January 2024.
Kia’s mass-market EV3h launched in late 2024, took fourth with 5,792, while the Skoda Enyaq rounded out the top five.
Chinese automakers, like BYD and MG, are starting to gain some real traction in Europe. With 37,134 vehicles registered last month, up 52% from January 2024, Chinese brands accounted for 3.7% of the market. That’s up from the 2.4% market share in January 2024.
Although still a relatively small number, combined, it would put them ahead of Ford, which registered 35,790 vehicles in Europe last month.
Electrek’s Take
The ID.4 appears to be making a comeback. After it went back on sale early last month, Volkswagen’s ID.4 was already the third best-selling EV in the US in January behind Tesla’s Model Y and Model 3.
Despite its success in Europe and the US, Volkswagen, like most global OEMs, is struggling in China. VW’s Chinese joint venture with SAIC cut the price of the ID.4 X, its version of the electric SUV sold in China, to under $20,000 (139,900 yuan) this week.
With leases starting as low as $189 per month in the US, it’s no wonder the ID.4 is already a top seller. If you’re ready to check it out for yourself, you can use our link to find deals on the Volkswagen ID.4 in your area.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
Elon Musk has reportedly ‘canceled’ a Tesla engineer for complaining about the CEO’s behaviors on social media.
As we recently reported, Tesla insiders are finally starting to speak out against Elon Musk over his increasingly unhinged social media presence.
For example, just today, he called CNN legal analyst Norm Eisen’s family a “crime family” because someone wrongly claimed that his daughter received millions of dollars from USAID when it was just someone with the same last name.
However, it looks like Musk and Tesla are actively suppressing employees speaking out.
The New York Times reports that Tesla has fired Jared Ottmann, a manager of battery thermal supplier industrialization engineering, over his complaints about Musk.
Ottmann, who has been at Tesla for 6 years, says that he has been raising concerns internally about Musk’s use of social media for the last 3 years, but he ramped up his effort last month after Musk’s salute at the Trump inauguration.
The engineer specifically took offense to a tweet that Musk posted in the aftermath of the inauguration. Instead of apologizing and saying that he didn’t mean to make a Nazi salute, Musk decided to attack the media for even suggesting that the gesture was a Sieg Heiland tweeted this:
Ottmann commented on the post:
This post by Tesla’s current CEO name drops genocidal assholes as a joke and has 308,000 likes.
The engineer says that he raised the issue with Tesla and while he gets “personally support”, he says the company remains silent about Musk’s behavior:
Starting in 2022 and especially the last week I’ve raised the issue internally multiple times, with managers, HR, legal compliance, investor relations. And while overwhelmingly people offer personal support, Tesla as a company has remained silent.
Ottmann, who has been promoted 4 times in 6 years at Tesla, has now been let go.
Electrek’s Take
For a guy who calls himself a “free speech absolutist” and “anti-cancel culture”, he canceled this engineer pretty quickly when he didn’t like how he was exercising his free speech.
This is obviously an attempt at scaring other Tesla employees from speaking out at Tesla.
It’s one of my main concerns about the automaker: it’s not a meritocracy that attracts top engineering talent anymore. One of the main criteria to work at Tesla now is to support its CEO, who is off the deep end.
FTC: We use income earning auto affiliate links. More.
-
Sports2 years ago‘Storybook stuff’: Inside the night Bryce Harper sent the Phillies to the World Series
-
Sports11 months agoStory injured on diving stop, exits Red Sox game
-
Sports1 year agoGame 1 of WS least-watched in recorded history
-
Sports2 years agoMLB Rank 2023: Ranking baseball’s top 100 players
-
Sports3 years ago
Team Europe easily wins 4th straight Laver Cup
-
Environment2 years agoJapan and South Korea have a lot at stake in a free and open South China Sea
-
Environment2 years agoGame-changing Lectric XPedition launched as affordable electric cargo bike
-
Business2 years agoBank of England’s extraordinary response to government policy is almost unthinkable | Ed Conway