The Right Stuff?

[oldpiper]

Whether this is "General," or "Technical," take your pick. It has been often said on these boards that the ebikes by the premiere builders ride much better than many (if not just about all) of the ones built by us amateurs. Maybe not faster, or even with a better range (but maybe both), but usually smoother, and the bike will hold together longer when ridden hard (several recent posts have been warning about frames falling apart at 40 mph/65 kph). An obvious reason is that the manufacturers (again, the really good ones) engineer their bikes specifically to be an ebike and many, if not most, of us get whatever bike we can and e-it.

So, if you were going to make an ebike for ride and durability (OK, and style, too) and had your choice of bike (current model or one of the oldies/classics) to start with (except for the monstrously expensive ones made out of unobtainium-alloy-fiber), you decided to use a hub motor, didn't have any issues with batteries, etc., and weren't into racing, what would you use: [EDIT] and why?

1. for a street cruiser capable of 35-40 mph (but still riding well @ 20 mph)?

2. for an off-road bike?

Thanx,

Cameron

 

[dogman dan]

For me, it's a decent quality full suspension MTB for the win in both categories. Not a particulary expensive one, but something in the $1000 or less MSRP category.

On the street, 30-40 mph is not cruising, it's racing so you better build like it. 20-30 mph, different story, most bikes of any grade can handle 30. In either case, 20 mph loaded with cargo or stripped to the bone and going 40 mph, you need at least better grade canti brakes and preferably at least one disk. And you need the good frame, so you don't have the thing flexing like crazy with every pedal stroke if you load up panniers. And at my age, and the condition of my bones, I simply love FS. Even more important, my spokes and rims REALLY love full suspension. I only break an occasional spoke every 2-3 thousand miles. You simply don't see and avoid every pothole by the time you put 2,000 on the odometer. At least half decent front shocks help, but any used bike shop owner will tell you that the rear rim is always the bent one.

Why not a longtail? My bones, and I do sometimes carry my bike to a riding location on a bike rack. Both the bus, and my car have racks the wheels set into, and longtails don't fit. If I break down theoretically I could bus home. In practice, in three years every single breakdown has happend just after the bus passed me. :lol: At that point, I can walk the bike home faster than it comes back. But if a good deal on a longtail comes along, I'll likely buy it. But I won't ride it further than 8-10 miles. My FS commuter sees 30 miles a day.

Why not a recumbent? Nervous about being seen at stoplights. I don't like the idea of being hidden behind a honda civic or other tiny car. they won't see a flag. I think a recumbent would be perfect for a cross continent ride though! Not so much riding in a city then.


Dirt riding bike is a can of worms. You really want better quality suspension, nice stiff frame, etc. But the really plush bikes are built to race, and have everything shaved to the bone. But what you want on an E-dirtbike is stout thick steel dropouts so you can pump huge watts into it. And those are found often only on the cheaper bikes. Again, the less than top o the line bike seems to be the answer, followed by some top o the line components added. Primarily replace both shocks with better stuff. You want to find a bike that may be quite heavy, but has thicker, flatter rear dropouts so you can add a nice torque plate.

My personal solution is the mongoose blackcomb. A cheap bike, but I don't really care if the shifters are so so. I have to admit to not upgrading the shocks yet, but the big feature of this old school design is a nice big flat steel dropout on the rear swingarm. 8) It has 4 bar suspension linkage, so with a better shock it should ride pretty nice. Stock, well, so far I can stand the cheap shock on it for now. Happily, you can still buy this bike new, for about $350 at wallmart online.

Some will say the 24" BMX is the thing for dirt. It depends on the dirt, depends on the rider. Personally I just have to have suspension or my ride gets shortened too much. The dirt riding in my area can be very rocky, and nobody has build ramps with nice soft landings.

 

[Drunkskunk]

....It has been often said on these boards that the ebikes by the premiere builders ride much better than many (if not just about all) of the ones built by us amateurs. ..........

Who's been spewing that nonsense? Even the best manufactured bikes are torn apart and built better by users here. Check out the stelth bomber and A2B threads, for examples. I can't think of anyone, on these boards, who wouldn't say the best bikes are built by US, The Amatures!



As Dogman points out, a bike that will go 35-40 is a racer, not a cruiser. So I'll answer for each of those seperatly

A basic Neiborhood cruiser, or basic commuter capable of 20 to 25mph, I'd pick something like a Trek 800. ( Or Scwhinn, Specalized, Kona, Motobecane, Cannondale, ect ) No suspension, solid componant list. Light, strong, dependable. A basic, ruggad, dependable bike, like 90% of the bikes of the world, but with a top end componant list. Stick a basic 9C 9X7 kit in the front or rear, depending on your kink, and ride it for years.

For a 40mph racer, assuming all street, I'd start with a Kona Dawg, Trek Fuel, Cannondale Jekyl, or similar high end full suspension Mountian bike with 4-5 inches suspension travel. Tire choice would be based on the local road conditions, but likely one of the Maxxis street tires.

For an off road bike, I'd pick a an XC, All Mountian, or DH Style bike frame, and build it up from there. Something like a Kona Stab, Stinky, or Cowan from around 2005, because of the open triangle frame. But with creative mounting of the batteries, a Norco would also be good. The high end frames are built for serious professional compatition riding, so they can handle the extra weight of the motor, along with the extra power on more normal off road tracks. Shocks would be Air, or Air/hydrolic. Tripple crown forks to take the extra abuse, and tires of at lease 2.5"

Any bike conversion, set up propperly, will ride as well or better that it did before conversion. If it doesn't, fix it.

 

[RallySTX]

First, I wanna make it plain, I think doggiedude said it all, and said it well. I would only have added the words, down hill, to the FS bike. AHEM, now that the conventional crowd has spoken, I feel compelled to address the one issue not covered in DM's blurb, and that dear fellow riders, is STYLE. Now, each of us has their own way of filling in the worlds empty spaces, physically or otherwise! I prefer the simple addition of two [or more] feet of chrome tubing between me and the front wheel.
Alas however, nobody building bikes has yet figured out that a Spoiler isn't properly spoiled until it has the rear end off a Blackcomb on it. So I guess that makes me a bit odd. Pardon me while I skulk back into my hole in the floor.
E-CHOPPERS RULE! 8)
Brian L.

 

[oldpiper]

Thanx, guys, I appreciate it all.

dogman, I'm really not into racing, the reason I was asking about a 35-40 mph bike was really for some overengineering, so that if/when I should go 30 or so, I'd have a cushion and not have to be looking over my shoulder (or up from the asphalt ) to see what was falling off from the vibrations/potholes.

And, Drunkskunk, I said the premiere makers are better than most of us, not all of us. There are obviously some mechanical (and electrical, and artistic) marvels on these boards, as well as people who work for/own (?) the premiere makers. And, yep, I've read the posts from the members who take the stealth and A2B and other bikes and make them better, but they're starting out with a great frame and tweaking it from there.

Brian, sounds like you've got yourself a project there. Was that an announcement that once you've got one ebike outfitted, you're going to take your other bike and make it an OCC (or Spoiler)-Blackcomb hybrid? I'm looking forward to seeing that one.

Thanks again, (maybe this Friday's lottery ticket will pay off, I could use the $67M)

Cameron

 

[Jeremy Harris]

The market is probably a bit different in different parts of the world, but here in the UK the vast majority of "name brand" ebikes are just collections of Chinese components slapped together with varying degrees of success. The exceptions that come to mind are those that use the Panasonic BB drive and the Bionx that are at least "custom designed" from the ground up as ebikes.

Both the Panasonic drive bikes sold here and the Bionx are a bit anemic, particularly the Panasonic drive ones, as that drive has severe limits built in that stop it providing assist above the Japanese/German legal limits. These bikes are also ludicrously expensive for what they are, for example, the Kalkhoff Pro Connect S10 DL, with its 25kmh speed restriction, reduced electric assist above 9.4mph (WTF?) and a 26V, 18Ah Li Ion battery, sells here for well over $5000, a completely crazy price for a extremely low performance ebike.

We also have some truly appalling ebikes here. The absolutely dreadful, heavy, crappily made and over-priced Sagura range were amongst the first to be marketed here, together with the equally appalling Powerbyke. Both were very heavy (lead acid batteries) made from the very cheapest and nastiest Chinese components and marketed as if they were high end products. Between them, these two ebikes have probably done more to damage the reputation of electric bikes than anything else, particularly with the dealers who sold them and had to deal with the inevitable flood of customer problems.

My view is that there are, at the moment, very few commercially available ebikes here that I'd want to buy, particularly given the crazy prices beings asked for bikes with cheap components. When I can buy all the parts to build a bike from a reliable shop 7000 miles away for half the price I have to pay for those same components from a UK seller it's perhaps not surprising that the prices are as high as they are.

In my view, what we need is someone to sell a "crossover" ebike here, one that's capable of serious off-road use whilst delimited, yet can be legally limited at the flick of a switch for on-road use. There's a healthy market for off-road MTBs and DH bikes here, and the prices people are prepared to pay for these seems high enough that an ebike version could be made for not a lot more. Although I don't think these would sell in large numbers, they would establish electric power amongst an influential target group, helping to overcome the dreadful "old man's transport" image that the Powerbyke and Sagura models have established here.

I suppose the difficult area is the youth market. There are some great advantages in getting youngsters on to ebikes, primarily the fact that once addicted to quiet and clean and cheap electric power they may be less inclined to want to shift to ICE powered machines. The obvious disadvantages centre around safety, as there are bound to be some who view putting youngsters on powered bikes as a major safety issue (even though there is an age restriction here that means you have to be over 14 to ride an ebike).

Overall, I don't wholly agree with the premise that commercially available ebikes are better than DIY ones, as the vast majority of commercially available ebikes are either massively over-priced for what they are or are built to a poor standard. A competent DIY'er could build a better ebike than many of the commercial offerings, without a doubt.

Jeremy

 

[oldpiper]

Guess I hit a nerve with this one, I should have been specific when I said "ebikes by the premiere builders ride much better than many (if not just about all) of the ones built by us amateurs." I didn't mean anything about the e-end of it, just the frame and/or suspension. And I didn't mean just "name brand" bikes, we all know that most of these are just often mediocre motors slapped on an often mediocre frame to make a few quick extra bucks, but the maddeningly few which cause the "Ooh, aah" response, the Stealth models, or the Optibike and A2B frames (which seem to be admired often here, although the power aspect of the ebikes as purchased are not special), maybe one or two more.

If/when I go to my number 2, 3, etc., I don't want to end up with a self-destructing frame so my e-parts (or my biological ones) go skidding down the road. I've been away from the bicycling scene for far too many years to rely too much on my own judgment for a starting point. (Whose sig on these boards is it which has that quote from FDR, something like "I'm not real smart, but I can find very smart colleagues"?)

Cameron

 

[dogman dan]

That concept of build to take 40 mph, and then put a motor on it that goes 30 is very very wise thinking.

That's where I come from, advising avoiding the cheaper frames that flex too much. If you had said ride 25, but up to 30, then the list gets longer. Cheap MTB's can do for that, or beach cruisers that have decent canti brakes. But I found to go 30 all the time, the bikes that retail at $300 and above make a better ride for sure. More for the frame than the components, and components can always be upgraded. I've pitched quite a few cranks right away for instance. Above $1000 retail even better, but, you have to choose carefully to avoid ones that have the dropouts shaved down too light, or have awkwardly tight geometry that makes installing good torque arms difficult.

So that's why the less expensive models with steel can be so attractive. My mongoose blackcomb retails for $350, weighs a ton, has crap shocks on it, but the frame is very very stiff, and look how easy it was to make a pinch dropout on it's steel rear end.