RadPowerBike RadCity Commuter

[Alan B]

I just tested the throttle onset and it does have a little more deadband than some, but not all that much. We could adjust the position of the paddle on the half-twist and change the feel that way to some degree. A more programmable controller would really open things up for adjustment.

Traditional cyclists are accustomed to spending a lot of money on things that don't matter much on an ebike. Buying lighter brakes, wheels, frames and other parts gets very expensive and benefits the rider when using their own few watts of leg power to propel the machine. All this changes when a motor is added to the bike. Riders coming from this background have a hard time understanding the change in priority and return on investment. A large proportion of the ebikes on Endless Sphere were built from the $100 to $200 bicycle shaped objects from big box stores, or old used mountain bikes that were far behind the norm (like our Canyon Express). Rather than spend hundreds to thousands on lighter components, a fraction of that spent improving the controller, battery and motor yields greater overall benefits. This is now reflected in many of the commercial products. They don't have a lot of budget to spend on the bike parts when they have to buy expensive lithium batteries and all the other things that an ebike requires. The end result is optimization for what's important. For a commuter that doesn't pedal much, investing in top of the range shifters, cogs and chains is a waste of money. That money is better spent on the battery, motor, etc. By the time you get down to $1500 ebikes there isn't a lot of funding to be inefficient with. Sondors found out the hard way, you can aim too low. One of the nice things about bicycles is how easy it is to change some components. Swapping out seats, brakes, chains, shifters, handgrips, etc is trivial. You can make serious upgrades for a small investment as long as you avoid the overpriced bicycle components that don't really help an ebike that much. Buy an ebike for the bones you want, not the glitz. This is nothing like buying a car. With an ebike you can upgrade most of the bits for pocket change, less than a tank of gas in that big SUV or Pickup Truck.

The RadCity is quite a step up from the big box store BSO at $100-200. It isn't quite up to the level of a $700 bicycle, but what should we expect from this price point? There are plenty of $5,000 pedal bikes if you want to start there. Of course they have the wrong optimizations for an ebike.

If we look at the RadCity as a basis, what is good about it? We will be pretty much stuck with things that are too hard to change, those need to be "good enough" for the purpose. We're not looking for "best in class". This ebike is going to be commuted to death, and it might even be stolen. Do we want to titanium plate it? Not really. We want to make it "adequate" for a reasonable overall cost. The bits that we don't care for we can upgrade, as we didn't spend too much to start with. One thing a commuter values is a good rack. The RadCity has a very good rack. It doesn't twist around or shake loose, it is part of the frame and rated to carry several times as much weight as a typical aftermarket rack. Any bike with a lesser rack is not as good a commuter. Another is a good kickstand, and functional fenders. Aftermarket racks, fenders and kickstands are pretty lame compared to the ones on the RadCity. The frame is adequate. This isn't for cross country racing. The fork isn't very advanced, but a great fork costs more than the whole bike, and all we're trying to do here is soak up some pavement bumps, not absorb falls from leaping ravines. This is something that can easily be upgraded, too, but isn't on our list. It is adequate.

If you really want a great bicycle underneath your ebike (not something we are looking for in this commuter), buying a new ebike is absolutely the wrong way to do it. Instead you buy a great used downhill or mountain (or whatever) bike and you DIY it into your ebike. It can be a lot of work but the end result can exceed most of the commercial products and fit your goals better, if you are a decent craftsman. Or you can weld up your own frame and do it all from the ground up as one friend of mine does, using the best parts and spend $20K to get exactly what you want for each and every component. There are many paths through the ebike wilderness. I've done that and didn't want to do it here.

Another friend of mine used his bike to ride everywhere - he had no car. This was years ago, before the ebike craze, and he had a decent bike that was totally camouflaged with scars and bad paint (and a lot of money in the bank rather than bike and car). He didn't need a lock, no one ever bothered it. High end parts and pretty paint job make your ride a target. Point being that the mediocre paint may be an advantage here... We're not looking for a flashy "steal me" look here..

In terms of motor, the mid drives require too much maintenance and have some very bad failure modes for a commuter. They wear out chains and sprockets and if the chain snaps you have lost both propulsion systems at once. Mid drives are also pricey and have a ton of moving parts.

Next are the geared hubmotors. Those give better acceleration and climbing performance than a direct drive hub at the same power level. They also have a lot more moving parts, shed heat poorly, cost more (for all those moving parts) and require maintenance. If you dump a few more watts into a DD motor it will outperform the geared motors, and the DD motor can dissipate the heat far better.

The DD motor has essentially no moving parts - the bearings that it has are required of any wheel. No brushes, with the magic of controller electronics it just works. It is a bit heavier and needs a bit more power to get equal performance, but it will take it, and much more.

So cross out all the geared hubmotors and mid drives for our reliable commuter application. We may need a little bigger battery and controller, but the increase in reliability due to the direct drive's simplicity is worthwhile.

On the plus side the RadCity comes with a reliable DD hubmotor, a good rack and kickstand, adequate fenders and a decent frame. It is paid for, we're not shopping other bikes anymore. We're working with this one. It has proven a more than adequate starting point.

The stock controller is a bit weak, but that's because they follow the most conservative interpretation of the ebike regulations across the states, and they detune it from there for other markets. That's a marketing decision. Most wide market ebikes do the same. If you want something much "faster" your going to have to push beyond that. Remember the $15,000 Optibike was outperformed by a DD hubmotor very similar to the one on the RadCity when it was "well fed". Note that after that embarrassment Optibike came out with some "special" models that had a lot more power. Off road only, right. They cost even more. Optibike is a good example of an ebike that spends a lot of money optimizing the stuff that isn't important to a commuter. It cost 10X as much, does it get to work 10X faster? or on 10X less energy? Hardly. It certainly doesn't require 10x less maintenance. I'm sure they are fun, but for a different market, folks who probably don't commute on them. That's why RadPowerBikes sells more bikes than OptiBike and pretty much everyone else. We want to get our money's worth, and that's where the RadCity wins.

We're not looking for a faster machine on the level or downhill, we just want decent speed going uphill. Well within the ebike speed limits. Class III doesn't guarantee anything other than higher on the level speed, so is pretty meaningless in terms of climbing speeds. A Class I or II may have better performance than a Class III on some gradient, 20 mph on a grade is a pretty good speed. They all have the same power limits, Class III has no actual benefits. So I don't put much value in the Class designation. One requirement here, stated from the start, is throttle. A fully Class III bike requires pedaling, which is not where this bike's user-commuter wants to be. I don't mind pedaling, but this bike is not for me. I have plenty of other ebikes to ride already. So Class III is out by definition. Most commuters want to get to work safely and efficiently. Requiring pedaling isn't necessary or helpful for that.

I think we're pretty much there at this point with regards to climbing rate with the upgrades thus far. He would like more but it is at least adequate now. Out of the box it was lacking. It slowed too much on the hills and became a safety hazard, like a pedal bike on a steep ascent with cars whizzing by a few feet away. (Safety may be inversely proportional to the number of cars that pass you, the fewer the better.) The upgraded motor controller has helped out there without increasing the system voltage. To go further would require either higher voltage or a lower Kv (or lower resistance) motor. I think if we do go any further that raising the voltage might be a better next step. Selling the 48V battery, controller, display and chargers and either using the existing 52V battery or getting a newer higher capacity one. The existing 52V battery from the Canyon Express is already slightly higher capacity in terms of watt hours, but this could be improved further with other pack choices. This also allows interchange with other battery packs we have in our ebike fleet including larger 20AH triangle packs or the small 6AH pack which would give many options for extended range or lighter weight for short trips.

Riding a few ebikes around for an hour or a day doesn't give much perspective to work from. My commute route was a fairly good testbed over 26 miles and almost two thousand feet of climbing up to 15% gradient, and over it I rode many ebikes from DD hubmotors to Geared to Mid Drives for many years. I found what worked best for me. It was absolutely not what I thought at the start, even with a lot of advice from ES. Anyone who thinks they know at the start where this journey will end is either prescient or mistaken. Especially in terms of knowing what is the best choice for someone else. It's probably best to understand that and not spend too much on your first ebike - save it for the ebikes and upgrades you'll want later on.

 

[formula101]

I just tested the throttle onset and it does have a little more deadband than some, but not all that much. We could adjust the position of the paddle on the half-twist and change the feel that way to some degree. A more programmable controller would really open things up for adjustment.

Traditional cyclists are accustomed to spending a lot of money on things that don't matter much on an ebike. Buying lighter brakes, wheels, frames and other parts gets very expensive and benefits the rider when using their own few watts of leg power to propel the machine. All this changes when a motor is added to the bike. Riders coming from this background have a hard time understanding the change in priority and return on investment. A large proportion of the ebikes on Endless Sphere were built from the $100 to $200 bicycle shaped objects from big box stores, or old used mountain bikes that were far behind the norm (like our Canyon Express). Rather than spend hundreds to thousands on lighter components, a fraction of that spent improving the controller, battery and motor yields greater overall benefits. This is now reflected in many of the commercial products. They don't have a lot of budget to spend on the bike parts when they have to buy expensive lithium batteries and all the other things that an ebike requires. The end result is optimization for what's important. For a commuter that doesn't pedal much,

This is a huge assumption. I enjoy pedaling and riding the throttle on an e-bike exclusively or nearly so, just feels lame and boring.

investing in top of the range shifters, cogs and chains is a waste of money.

Where did I ever advocate that? You seem to enjoy winning against arguments that you've fabricated out of thin air, instead of actually thinking through what someone else has stated. Marginally more difficult I'm sure, but hardly an overwhelming task.

I stated the obvious: I have NEVER seen the shifter rad power specs on it's bikes. It simply never existed as far as I could tell on ANY bike at ANY price. EVER. It is bulky, cheaply, functions very, very poorly, has rock bottom ergonomics, and appears to be exceedingly easy to break. It is a rock bottom price point component invented specifically for low end e-bikes.

Rad upgraded the freewheel this past model year. Take a look at the freewheels on rads from previous years. They are made of steel and rust very easily. This makes for super crappy shifting.

The frames are generic, common on dozens of other brands of bikes. The single size means it fits no one except folks with very long inseams (over 32"), and then the ridiculously short top tube and high rise stem and bar compromise battery range severely.

Anyway, the facts don't matter to you, and for whatever reason, you neither acknowledge the facts nor are able to move on, as another poster suggested. Instead, you engage in weird, passive aggressive baiting with zero evidence to substantiate whatever straw man you happen to pull out of thin air.

That money is better spent on the battery, motor, etc.

As already stated, any additional money spent on the battery is now severely compromised by the single frame size and overly upright riding position.

By the time you get down to $1500 ebikes there isn't a lot of funding to be inefficient with. Sondors found out the hard way, you can aim too low.

Again, as stated before, so did Rad. They spend far more on marketing than any other brand, which has been the crux of their success.

One of the nice things about bicycles is how easy it is to change some components. Swapping out seats, brakes, chains, shifters, handgrips, etc is trivial. You can make serious upgrades for a small investment as long as you avoid the overpriced bicycle components that don't really help an ebike that much. Buy an ebike for the bones you want, not the glitz. This is nothing like buying a car. With an ebike you can upgrade most of the bits for pocket change, less than a tank of gas in that big SUV or Pickup Truck.

This is neither here nor there.

The RadCity is quite a step up from the big box store BSO at $100-200. It isn't quite up to the level of a $700 bicycle, but what should we expect from this price point? There are plenty of $5,000 pedal bikes if you want to start there. Of course they have the wrong optimizations for an ebike.

That's not saying much. And they're not directly comparable anyway. As I have pointed out, the shifter was expressly built for crappy e-bikes at the very lowest price possible.

I bought a mail order bike for $250. The paint's a little thinner than I'd like, but 4 years of riding later, the frame is still in very good shape, with lots and lots of coastal and rain riding. It's been abused on bike racks several days a week as well. The paint on used rad bikes only a few years old are often in far worse condition and I don't baby my commuter by any stretch of the imagination.

If we look at the RadCity as a basis, what is good about it? We will be pretty much stuck with things that are too hard to change, those need to be "good enough" for the purpose. We're not looking for "best in class". This ebike is going to be commuted to death, and it might even be stolen. Do we want to titanium plate it? Not really. We want to make it "adequate" for a reasonable overall cost. The bits that we don't care for we can upgrade, as we didn't spend too much to start with. One thing a commuter values is a good rack. The RadCity has a very good rack. It doesn't twist around or shake loose, it is part of the frame and rated to carry several times as much weight as a typical aftermarket rack. Any bike with a lesser rack is not as good a commuter. Another is a good kickstand, and functional fenders. Aftermarket racks, fenders and kickstands are pretty lame compared to the ones on the RadCity.

The rack on the radcity is generic. And anyone trying to praise a bike's kickstand must be truly desperate lol.

The frame is adequate. This isn't for cross country racing. The fork isn't very advanced, but a great fork costs more than the whole bike, and all we're trying to do here is soak up some pavement bumps, not absorb falls from leaping ravines. This is something that can easily be upgraded, too, but isn't on our list. It is adequate.

The problem isn't so much with the frame, aside from the finish, but the overall fit of the bike. It's not designed to fit ANYONE. Tall people will be stuck in a completely upright position. Short people can't stand over the bike. This is a common problem with cheap e-bikes though so I don't penalize rad in particular.

If you really want a great bicycle underneath your ebike, buying a new ebike is absolutely the wrong way to do it.

Now you are changing your argument. You say non electrical components don't make a difference on an bike but now you say that there are differences between adequate and "great" bikes.

Instead you buy a great used downhill or mountain (or whatever) bike

But the components that makes these bikes "great" are irrelevant on an ebike, remember? Of course not. Amnesia is your friend in writing up overly long, rambling posts.

and you DIY it into your ebike.

OK, now you've gone off the deep end. You can't "DIY" a bafang ultra mid drive motor on to a stump jumper s works carbon full suspension. The only "DIY" hack possible is with a crappy rear hub motor throwing off the balance of the bike and making it ride like a cheap bike with a rear hub motor.

It can be a lot of work

No it's not because it's not even possible, as per above.

but the end result can exceed most of the commercial products and fit your goals better, if you are a decent craftsman. Or you can weld up your own frame and do it all from the ground up as one friend of mine does, using the best parts and spend $20K to get exactly what you want for each and every component. There are many paths through the ebike wilderness. I've done that and didn't want to do it here.

You can't just tape velcro strap a bafang ultra onto an existing bike. You can add a mid drive to a bike, but then you have severely compromised your ability to hop logs and other obstacles, and the odds of damage to the strap on if you will, are very high. An ugly, expensive solution with high risk of turning your bike into fubar with any real off road riding.

Another friend of mine used his bike to ride everywhere - he had no car. This was years ago, before the ebike craze, and he had a decent bike that was totally camouflaged with scars and bad paint (and a lot of money in the bank rather than bike and car). He didn't need a lock, no one ever bothered it. High end parts and pretty paint job make your ride a target. We're not looking for that.

Random, pointless anecdote. The rads are ugly. I get that, but so are most cheap ebikes.

In terms of motor, the mid drives require too much maintenance and have some very bad failure modes for a commuter. They wear out chains and sprockets and if the chain snaps you have lost both propulsion systems at once. Mid drives are also pricey and have a ton of moving parts.

Yeah, you have absolutely no evidence to back this up. 100% speculation on your part.

Next are the geared hubmotors. Those give better acceleration and climbing performance than a direct drive hub at the same power level. They also have a lot more moving parts, shed heat poorly, cost more (for all those moving parts) and require maintenance. If you dump a few more watts into a DD motor it will outperform the geared motors, and the DD motor can dissipate the heat far better.

Again, zero evidence.

The DD motor has essentially no moving parts - the bearings that it has are required of any wheel. No brushes, with the magic of controller electronics it just works. It is a bit heavier and needs a bit more power to get equal performance, but it will take it, and much more.

It doesn't matter. The rad is a cheap ebike that only gets you to 24 mph, and that's only modded, with $2K in cost and many hours of labor. That's a ripoff if I've ever heard of one.

So cross out all the geared hubmotors and mid drives for our reliable commuter application. We may need a little bigger battery and controller, but the increase in reliability due to the direct drive's simplicity is worthwhile.

As I've stated, you have zero evidence that DD is functionally superior.

On the plus side the RadCity comes with a reliable DD hubmotor, a good rack and kickstand, adequate fenders and a decent frame. It is paid for, we're not shopping other bikes anymore. We're working with this one. It has proven a more than adequate starting point.

YOU WROTE ALL THIS TO TRY TO PROVE (WITH ZERO EVIDENCE) YOUR LAME CASE THAT THE RADCITY IS MEDIOCRE? LMAO!

Riding a few ebikes around for an hour or a day doesn't give much perspective to work from. My commute route was a fairly good testbed over 26 miles and almost two thousand feet of climbing up to 15% gradient, and over it I rode many ebikes from DD hubmotors to Geared to Mid Drives for many years. I found what worked best for me. It was absolutely not what I thought at the start, even with a lot of advice from ES. Anyone who thinks they know at the start where this journey will end is either prescient or mistaken. Especially in terms of knowing what is the best choice for someone else. It's probably best to understand that and not spend too much on your first ebike - save it for the ebikes and upgrades you'll want later on.

Yeah, I've ridden several dozen. Too lazy to type it all out. If you have 3 decades of riding experience like I do, riding multiple road centuries, 100-200 miles of road riding a week in my 20's, 100+ miles weekly of commuting currently, you can get a feel for what works and what sucks very quickly. I know within a few seconds whether a bike fits properly or not. It doesn't take much longer to figure out if the bike is fun to ride or not.

And the rads can't fit properly because they are single size bikes.

Anyway, you've proven your point. The rads are in fact mediocre (at best), and rideable. Too bad they fit poorly, exhibit shoddy workmanship, come stock with the cheapest components you can find and have contradictory design goals in which the design team cuts off it's nose to spite it's face.

No one is choosing the rad for superior value or functionality. They've chosen it because of price point and SPAM marketing.

Just posting a photo as reference. As anyone can clearly see, the bike screams "cheap ugly commuter." There is absolutely not a single iota of R&D invested in this bike. It's a generic, off the shelf e-bike with the cheapest components possible.

 

[Alan B]

A great looking commuting machine.

Clearly some people want to argue rather than add real value to this thread or to ES. There is no requirement that we prove anything. This is not a debate. The experience of maintenance and reliability of different drive system types are well covered elsewhere in ES. If they are not known to the reader then insufficient reading and experience is indicated. I have seen, experienced and read plenty of evidence myself. If the reader wants "proof" they can read a few thousand posts or buy a few ebikes and ride and maintain them for a few years. Anyone that thinks plastic gears running in grease on a bicycle are maintenance free has not ridden ebikes very long. I provide summary information in this thread for the reader who wants it. The reader who expects proof will have to seek it elsewhere (and ES has plenty of it). For those who tire of seeing particular posters you can add them to your "foes" list and their postings will be filtered out.

The previous posting is preserved below, in case it gets deleted. It is so full of errors it is just amazing. The poster clearly missed many of the points I was making or interpreted them completely wrong and is attempting to trigger emotional responses. But this thread isn't really the place to prove the general characteristics of ebike systems. Reading brochures and test driving ebikes doesn't educate us about the reality of long term maintenance. Threads like this one about people's actual experiences provide us, over the long run, with actual data. If you want to learn about long term reliability and maintenance of mid drives or gear drive hubmotors then seek out threads that have those details. There are plenty of those here on ES.

The RadCity actually does come in more than one size, unlike a lot of low end ebikes. The 16 and 19" sizes cover a wide range of riders. Precise sizing of a commuter ebike is less critical than for a pedal only bike, this is not a machine for riding centuries. Practical commutes are limited to the battery capacity so time and distance are constrained, and the fit of a bike becomes less critical when pedaling is not the main power source. So it depends on how you use the ebike, and your personal taste in bike fit. In our case 16 miles and one hour are the current use-case, and the user is happy with the fit. I think he sets the seat too low, but this is common for riders who don't pedal a lot and favor the safety of feet flat on the pavement rather than optimal pedaling geometry. The seat is easily to adjust. Seat comfort is adequate so no upgrades have been needed there.

Adding a $200 upgrade that plugs into the wiring is hardly a big job. Takes about as much effort as fixing a flat tire on a hubmotor wheel. Cheaper and provides more value than a cell phone upgrade. The benefit of this kit is to lift the performance of this ebike well above other bikes in its price class. Buying a $200 more expensive bike will not give this much improvement.

I have ridden this bike a few times and adjusted it on the repair stand, and the Shimano Acera shifter works fine. Given that the owner doesn't actually shift very often, or even care about that part of the bike, the shifter is perfect. It has a display of what gear it is in, a pushbutton for shifting to the next higher speed gear, and a lever for shifting to lower speed gears that can shift several gears at once. The seven speed rear freewheel is exactly the same one used on many other ebikes. People who are serious about riding their ebikes often report that they only use a single gear anymore so shifting is a rare event. My primary commute ebike has only two gears and zero derailleurs and it gets the job done extremely well. Constant shifting and having lots of gears are pedal bike needs. Most ebikes have a single chainring and seven or so rear cogs because it is adequate. If more are wanted there are some choices, but going to the requisite narrow chains costs more and reduce system durability. The seven speed parts are a little beefier and inherently solid.

The aftermarket sidestand on the Canyon Express (my son's other ebike) failed the other day and dumped his bike over while it was stored in his workplace's back room. This type of failure could lead to his loss of inside storage which is critical to an ebike commuter. So mundane things like the effectiveness and reliability of the kickstand are actually important to him. Pedal bikers don't generally care about kickstands and racks. Understanding what is actually important is key. This commuter cares about transportation and practicality. Riding is not a hobby (for my son), it is essential low cost transportation. The bus or train doesn't work for this commute, and uber is too costly.

The RadCity is a fairly solid commuting machine at a reasonable price point. It can be even better with a few upgrades. This thread is about our experience with this ebike, not to debate buying something else. Perhaps we should split that into a separate thread, it is a valid discussion on it's own, just not on topic here.



Preserving the previous posting below for reference. (this user has apparently been banned as of 6/2020)

I just tested the throttle onset and it does have a little more deadband than some, but not all that much. We could adjust the position of the paddle on the half-twist and change the feel that way to some degree. A more programmable controller would really open things up for adjustment.

Traditional cyclists are accustomed to spending a lot of money on things that don't matter much on an ebike. Buying lighter brakes, wheels, frames and other parts gets very expensive and benefits the rider when using their own few watts of leg power to propel the machine. All this changes when a motor is added to the bike. Riders coming from this background have a hard time understanding the change in priority and return on investment. A large proportion of the ebikes on Endless Sphere were built from the $100 to $200 bicycle shaped objects from big box stores, or old used mountain bikes that were far behind the norm (like our Canyon Express). Rather than spend hundreds to thousands on lighter components, a fraction of that spent improving the controller, battery and motor yields greater overall benefits. This is now reflected in many of the commercial products. They don't have a lot of budget to spend on the bike parts when they have to buy expensive lithium batteries and all the other things that an ebike requires. The end result is optimization for what's important. For a commuter that doesn't pedal much,

This is a huge assumption. I enjoy pedaling and riding the throttle on an e-bike exclusively or nearly so, just feels lame and boring.

investing in top of the range shifters, cogs and chains is a waste of money.

Where did I ever advocate that? You seem to enjoy winning against arguments that you've fabricated out of thin air, instead of actually thinking through what someone else has stated. Marginally more difficult I'm sure, but hardly an overwhelming task.

I stated the obvious: I have NEVER seen the shifter rad power specs on it's bikes. It simply never existed as far as I could tell on ANY bike at ANY price. EVER. It is bulky, cheaply, functions very, very poorly, has rock bottom ergonomics, and appears to be exceedingly easy to break. It is a rock bottom price point component invented specifically for low end e-bikes.

Rad upgraded the freewheel this past model year. Take a look at the freewheels on rads from previous years. They are made of steel and rust very easily. This makes for super crappy shifting.

The frames are generic, common on dozens of other brands of bikes. The single size means it fits no one except folks with very long inseams (over 32"), and then the ridiculously short top tube and high rise stem and bar compromise battery range severely.

Anyway, the facts don't matter to you, and for whatever reason, you neither acknowledge the facts nor are able to move on, as another poster suggested. Instead, you engage in weird, passive aggressive baiting with zero evidence to substantiate whatever straw man you happen to pull out of thin air.

That money is better spent on the battery, motor, etc.

As already stated, any additional money spent on the battery is now severely compromised by the single frame size and overly upright riding position.

By the time you get down to $1500 ebikes there isn't a lot of funding to be inefficient with. Sondors found out the hard way, you can aim too low.

Again, as stated before, so did Rad. They spend far more on marketing than any other brand, which has been the crux of their success.

One of the nice things about bicycles is how easy it is to change some components. Swapping out seats, brakes, chains, shifters, handgrips, etc is trivial. You can make serious upgrades for a small investment as long as you avoid the overpriced bicycle components that don't really help an ebike that much. Buy an ebike for the bones you want, not the glitz. This is nothing like buying a car. With an ebike you can upgrade most of the bits for pocket change, less than a tank of gas in that big SUV or Pickup Truck.

This is neither here nor there.

The RadCity is quite a step up from the big box store BSO at $100-200. It isn't quite up to the level of a $700 bicycle, but what should we expect from this price point? There are plenty of $5,000 pedal bikes if you want to start there. Of course they have the wrong optimizations for an ebike.

That's not saying much. And they're not directly comparable anyway. As I have pointed out, the shifter was expressly built for crappy e-bikes at the very lowest price possible.

I bought a mail order bike for $250. The paint's a little thinner than I'd like, but 4 years of riding later, the frame is still in very good shape, with lots and lots of coastal and rain riding. It's been abused on bike racks several days a week as well. The paint on used rad bikes only a few years old are often in far worse condition and I don't baby my commuter by any stretch of the imagination.

If we look at the RadCity as a basis, what is good about it? We will be pretty much stuck with things that are too hard to change, those need to be "good enough" for the purpose. We're not looking for "best in class". This ebike is going to be commuted to death, and it might even be stolen. Do we want to titanium plate it? Not really. We want to make it "adequate" for a reasonable overall cost. The bits that we don't care for we can upgrade, as we didn't spend too much to start with. One thing a commuter values is a good rack. The RadCity has a very good rack. It doesn't twist around or shake loose, it is part of the frame and rated to carry several times as much weight as a typical aftermarket rack. Any bike with a lesser rack is not as good a commuter. Another is a good kickstand, and functional fenders. Aftermarket racks, fenders and kickstands are pretty lame compared to the ones on the RadCity.

The rack on the radcity is generic. And anyone trying to praise a bike's kickstand must be truly desperate lol.

The frame is adequate. This isn't for cross country racing. The fork isn't very advanced, but a great fork costs more than the whole bike, and all we're trying to do here is soak up some pavement bumps, not absorb falls from leaping ravines. This is something that can easily be upgraded, too, but isn't on our list. It is adequate.

The problem isn't so much with the frame, aside from the finish, but the overall fit of the bike. It's not designed to fit ANYONE. Tall people will be stuck in a completely upright position. Short people can't stand over the bike. This is a common problem with cheap e-bikes though so I don't penalize rad in particular.

If you really want a great bicycle underneath your ebike, buying a new ebike is absolutely the wrong way to do it.

Now you are changing your argument. You say non electrical components don't make a difference on an bike but now you say that there are differences between adequate and "great" bikes.

Instead you buy a great used downhill or mountain (or whatever) bike

But the components that makes these bikes "great" are irrelevant on an ebike, remember? Of course not. Amnesia is your friend in writing up overly long, rambling posts.

and you DIY it into your ebike.

OK, now you've gone off the deep end. You can't "DIY" a bafang ultra mid drive motor on to a stump jumper s works carbon full suspension. The only "DIY" hack possible is with a crappy rear hub motor throwing off the balance of the bike and making it ride like a cheap bike with a rear hub motor.

It can be a lot of work

No it's not because it's not even possible, as per above.

but the end result can exceed most of the commercial products and fit your goals better, if you are a decent craftsman. Or you can weld up your own frame and do it all from the ground up as one friend of mine does, using the best parts and spend $20K to get exactly what you want for each and every component. There are many paths through the ebike wilderness. I've done that and didn't want to do it here.

You can't just tape velcro strap a bafang ultra onto an existing bike. You can add a mid drive to a bike, but then you have severely compromised your ability to hop logs and other obstacles, and the odds of damage to the strap on if you will, are very high. An ugly, expensive solution with high risk of turning your bike into fubar with any real off road riding.

Another friend of mine used his bike to ride everywhere - he had no car. This was years ago, before the ebike craze, and he had a decent bike that was totally camouflaged with scars and bad paint (and a lot of money in the bank rather than bike and car). He didn't need a lock, no one ever bothered it. High end parts and pretty paint job make your ride a target. We're not looking for that.

Random, pointless anecdote. The rads are ugly. I get that, but so are most cheap ebikes.

In terms of motor, the mid drives require too much maintenance and have some very bad failure modes for a commuter. They wear out chains and sprockets and if the chain snaps you have lost both propulsion systems at once. Mid drives are also pricey and have a ton of moving parts.

Yeah, you have absolutely no evidence to back this up. 100% speculation on your part.

Next are the geared hubmotors. Those give better acceleration and climbing performance than a direct drive hub at the same power level. They also have a lot more moving parts, shed heat poorly, cost more (for all those moving parts) and require maintenance. If you dump a few more watts into a DD motor it will outperform the geared motors, and the DD motor can dissipate the heat far better.

Again, zero evidence.

The DD motor has essentially no moving parts - the bearings that it has are required of any wheel. No brushes, with the magic of controller electronics it just works. It is a bit heavier and needs a bit more power to get equal performance, but it will take it, and much more.

It doesn't matter. The rad is a cheap ebike that only gets you to 24 mph, and that's only modded, with $2K in cost and many hours of labor. That's a ripoff if I've ever heard of one.

So cross out all the geared hubmotors and mid drives for our reliable commuter application. We may need a little bigger battery and controller, but the increase in reliability due to the direct drive's simplicity is worthwhile.

As I've stated, you have zero evidence that DD is functionally superior.

On the plus side the RadCity comes with a reliable DD hubmotor, a good rack and kickstand, adequate fenders and a decent frame. It is paid for, we're not shopping other bikes anymore. We're working with this one. It has proven a more than adequate starting point.

YOU WROTE ALL THIS TO TRY TO PROVE (WITH ZERO EVIDENCE) YOUR LAME CASE THAT THE RADCITY IS MEDIOCRE? LMAO!

Riding a few ebikes around for an hour or a day doesn't give much perspective to work from. My commute route was a fairly good testbed over 26 miles and almost two thousand feet of climbing up to 15% gradient, and over it I rode many ebikes from DD hubmotors to Geared to Mid Drives for many years. I found what worked best for me. It was absolutely not what I thought at the start, even with a lot of advice from ES. Anyone who thinks they know at the start where this journey will end is either prescient or mistaken. Especially in terms of knowing what is the best choice for someone else. It's probably best to understand that and not spend too much on your first ebike - save it for the ebikes and upgrades you'll want later on.

Yeah, I've ridden several dozen. Too lazy to type it all out. If you have 3 decades of riding experience like I do, riding multiple road centuries, 100-200 miles of road riding a week in my 20's, 100+ miles weekly of commuting currently, you can get a feel for what works and what sucks very quickly. I know within a few seconds whether a bike fits properly or not. It doesn't take much longer to figure out if the bike is fun to ride or not.

And the rads can't fit properly because they are single size bikes.

Anyway, you've proven your point. The rads are in fact mediocre (at best), and rideable. Too bad they fit poorly, exhibit shoddy workmanship, come stock with the cheapest components you can find and have contradictory design goals in which the design team cuts off it's nose to spite it's face.

No one is choosing the rad for superior value or functionality. They've chosen it because of price point and SPAM marketing.

Just posting a photo as reference. As anyone can clearly see, the bike screams "cheap ugly commuter." There is absolutely not a single iota of R&D invested in this bike. It's a generic, off the shelf e-bike with the cheapest components possible.

 

[Alan B]

I ordered an adapter cable from Bolton ebikes so we could try upgrading the battery on this RadCity without hacking up the cables, allowing it to be easily reversed. We've already upgraded the controller with the Bolton unit which helped some with hill climbing, but we wanted to try the 14 cell 52 volt battery on this bike and see how it changed things compared to the 13 cell 48 volt stock battery. So now it can use the exact same battery we are using on the old Peugeot Canyon Express Commuter that has a 9C motor and the usual 12 FET China type controller (similar to a Lyen controller but this one is not from him). The first commute report from my son is that it doesn't perform any better at 14 cells than it did with 13 cells. I suspect the difference is there but it is pretty small. The range should be increased and the speed and power on a hill should improve by 5% to 10%. The motor that RadBike is using on the RadCity seems slightly inferior to the old 9C. To be accurate we do have a different controller on the RadCity that is part of the equation.

The RadCity does have a better frame, kickstand, fenders, and a bunch of other things going for it. I think it is a good platform for upgrading.

I noticed that there's a new version of the RadCity on the RadBike website. I didn't look too carefully but it does not look better than this version, for one thing the integrated rear rack has been significantly downgraded. I was looking for some saddlebags that were perhaps suited to the RadCity, but it doesn't appear RadBike is doing much in the accessory area for the RadCity. They have some bags but not much of a selection. One shortcoming of the RadCity rack we have is there's no low attachments for the panniers. The rack is good and solid with a nice upper pannier bar, but not so easy to mount to. The newer version is missing even more crossbars. Commuters need to carry a lot of bulky clothing when one commute is very early or very late and cold while the other commute is during the day, or even raingear in the wet season. Plus the usual stuff like shoes and lunch. For near level commutes the RadCity is a good machine, in the hills it is lacking torque to keep to 20 mph. The geared motors seem to do better here, at the cost of more maintenance and moving parts. I really like the simplicity of direct drive motors for commuting, you don't have to worry about broken clutches, stripped gears and grease. With the right battery, controller and motor the direct drives can do fine on the hills.

What's next? We're at the voltage limit of the controller so we can't easily raise the voltage (which makes a big improvement). Plus it is hard to keep changing voltages, and there are not a lot of batteries above 52 volts in the removable format. This bike has to be charged at work to make the return commute, and the battery must be removed to accomplish that so triangle batteries are not practical. One next step might be to upgrade the controller. This probably requires hacking the wiring as maintaining all those connectors is difficult. Perhaps cannibalize the Bolton controller to get the connectors. However some of the wiring is inadequate in my opinion. The wire used to the battery and motor is pretty small. One logical thing to try is a 12 FET controller just like the Peugeot. I have several Lyen controllers already in hand. But we'll run this for awhile and see how it does. It's a good commuter aside from some of the steeper hills that slow it more than is desirable for traffic safety.

 

[Bking]

Alan B
I had to bring this thread back to life so others will know what was wrong with your son’s Radcity performance. You had around 35-40 psi and wondered why the battery performance and climbing speed was bad. The Radcity must have 60-65 psi to get any performance at all unless you weigh 100lbs. Unless you have slime or a special tube it will also need the air topped off every few weeks. If the ride is too hard on the rear get a shock absorber seat post.

 

[Alan B]

Thanks for your thoughts and welcome to ES Bking.

I don't believe that the tire pressure is the issue. My son is comparing it to a very old mountain bike with a 2010 generic 9 Continents DD hubmotor, and the RadCity motor is just weaker when climbing hills, with either the stock or the aftermarket controllers. This is pretty low speed work slogging uphill on very modest gradients, so the tire losses are not a major factor. Perhaps it is partly due to the sensorless setup, the 9 Continents is a sensored motor so it may be more efficient with more precise motor angle information. Without comparing it to another bike the RadCity might seem perfectly fine, but when comparing there is clearly a difference. He rides the route several times a week so he can easily feel and see it. The RadCity is ok on the flats but underwhelming on modest hills.

One of these days we'll try a different motor and controller on it.

 

[Bking]

The Radcity does have hall sensors. The cable ends have the 3 large pins but also if you look real close the perimeter has several pads that engage with pads on the other connector. Put in 65psi and ride the bike up a hill. You will be amazed. You will also be amazed on the flats too at all speeds.

 

[E-HP]

The Radcity must have 60-65 psi to get any performance at all unless you weigh 100lbs.

That's too bad. I guess that supports the observation about the bike being underpowered, if it struggles to overcome rolling resistance.

 

[Alan B]

The 9C mountain bike has the same 40 psi and is much faster up the hills with the same battery. Probably more copper in the 9C motor as well. Anyone have photos of the internals of the RadCity motor?

The RadCity does indeed have hall sensor connections, little pads around the periphery of the 3 pin connector. The cable isn't very thick in the first place and with all these extra conductors the motor wires must be quite thin, so another issue is high cable resistance, these motors need a lot of current at low speeds when climbing. The battery current gets multiplied, so the motor current is higher than the battery current. To keep from melting this cable they must limit current and therefore torque.

 

[Bking]

I keep my wife’s tires near 60-65 and she zooms up steep hills on her Radcity. 150lbs.
Case closed.

 

[E-HP]

I keep my wife’s tires near 60-65 and she zooms up steep hills on her Radcity. 150lbs.
Case closed.

What case? Alan provided a lot of data, and you provided some subjective descriptions. What are the values for "zooms" and "steep"?

 

[markz]

All very subjective indeed.
Might be steep for Bking's area, but we are all in different area's. To me 8% might be steep yet your steepness is 15%. Also, how long are those hills. Case Closed :lol:

What case? Alan provided a lot of data, and you provided some subjective descriptions. What are the values for "zooms" and "steep"?

 

[E-HP]

All very subjective indeed.
Might be steep for Bking's area, but we are all in different area's. To me 8% might be steep yet your steepness is 15%. Also, how long are those hills. Case Closed :lol:

Reading through the threads on Alan B's ebikes, I'm familiar with the roads/trails in that area, so that provides a good frame of reference when reading the review. I think something around 2000W peak would be good on those hills, if using a hub motor. I see a few of the Rad bikes around, but mostly on the flatter ground paths/roads. Maybe something like the Luna mini sine wave controller would fit in the same spot and give it a boost, but not sure the battery could handle that.

 

[Bking]

:lol:
You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make them drink.
The issue is that AlanB is analyzing a Radcity without the correct manufactures instructions ie. Tire pressure at 65.
Who would do that?

 

[Bking]

Another thing AlanB said that is wrong:
“ The battery current gets multiplied, so the motor current is higher than the battery current. To keep from melting this cable they must limit current and therefore torque.”
Incorrect.
Three phase power on each leg is 1/3 the battery current. That’s why the wires to the motor can be smaller and why Tesla, the man is so famous.

 

[BlueSeas]

Another thing AlanB said that is wrong:
“ The battery current gets multiplied, so the motor current is higher than the battery current. To keep from melting this cable they must limit current and therefore torque.”
Incorrect.
Three phase power on each leg is 1/3 the battery current. That’s why the wires to the motor can be smaller and why Tesla, the man is so famous.

Actually the opposite is true and Alan is correct. Generally the phase current is higher than the battery current. The phase voltage is generally lower than battery voltage. Mr Tesla is in part famous because he didn't speak about what he didn't know.

 

[Bking]

That’s only true at full power and low speed which is not very often if the bike is ridden correctly. Tesla knew that he could use smaller wires because with his system the load would be managed properly and never over current the 3 phases.

 

[Bking]

To prove my point about tire pressure. You guy’s with geared hub motors. Put less than half your usual air pressure in both tires and ride it enough to encounter a decent hill. No one will admit the results but let’s just see.
You might get up the hill but it will take a hefty controller to do it. Riders must weigh at least 150 for this test.

 

[E-HP]

:lol:
You can lead a horse to water but you can’t make them drink.
The issue is that AlanB is analyzing a Radcity without the correct manufactures instructions ie. Tire pressure at 65.
Who would do that?

There's lots of data out there, even for each tire, on rolling resistance at various tire pressures. The differences are in tens of watts. Maybe 40W for the differences on this example. If you think 40W makes a difference on a steep hill, then you must be talking about a speed bump. 400W would make a difference.

 

[Bking]

Try it. Prove it to yourself if you have a regular controller. High powered controller’s can be pushed higher to hide the problem. We notice it everytime I forget to top off the pressures. It’s a different bike at low pressure with a direct drive radcity hub which is the main one with a problem that is overstated with a 150 lb rider using extremely low air pressure.
Also the rolling resistance vs watts is higher on the rear tire based on angle of loading and rider weight when going up hills.

 

[E-HP]

Try it. Prove it to yourself if you have a regular controller. High powered controller’s can be pushed higher to hide the problem. We notice it everytime I forget to top off the pressures. It’s a different bike at low pressure with a direct drive radcity hub which is the main one with a problem that is overstated with a 150 lb rider using extremely low air pressure.
Also the rolling resistance vs watts is higher on the rear tire based on angle of loading and rider weight when going up hills.

OK, I'm going to have to stop you right there, since that's strike 3. I realize that customs and values differ around the world, but I've met a pretty diverse population of people in my lifetime. But, I don't recall any where a wife is OK with her husband advertising her weight to the world on the internet. Maybe it's OK in your case, but mine would kill me while I'm sleeping if I did that. She wouldn't care if I called it a "test" or not. I would suggest going back and making some edits, or asking the mods.

OK, back to ebike stuff.

 

[Bking]

She is not short and we are 60 so don’t care about some things that younger people care about. She knows all about this thread and is shaking her head because she has learned when her tires need air just by riding around. She has 3k mikes and I have 4K miles. Rider weight is a very important piece of the equation when talking ebike performance. She rides in PAS 1 here and 2 or 3 in the mountains. She does pedal a good amount with strong legs. I’m 245 and can’t catch her on the steeper hills even at full power. If I had half flat tires it would be a joke.

 

[E-HP]

You just broke the second rule. Sleep with one eye open.

 

[Bking]

There are supermodels that weigh almost 150 lbs. we are not anywhere near fat for 60 year olds. I told this because AlanB’s son is guess what, 150lbs and riding on nearly flat tires and complaining. Look dudes I found this lengthy thread about his complaints and figured out exactly what is wrong. Is that what is really bothering you? New guy knows more about the RadCity. Yes sir I do. Just trying to help and don’t need anyone’s opinions except the guy I am helping. Thanks anyway.

 

[Alan B]

1) The sum of the currents in the three motor wires is zero, when you include current direction. How exactly would three currents of 1/3 work? That's not a possible condition. If 2 wires each have the same current in opposite directions the third wire must be zero. A 2 wire system has full current in each wire, in opposite directions. Depending on the controller design there is either current in only 2 wires at a time (trapezoidal), and the third is zero; or there is some current in each of the three wires, but the sum must always be zero (sinusoidal).

2) Ebike Motor current is greater than battery current almost all the time. The only condition where it is equal is when the throttle is full open and there is no limiting or PWM switching going on in the controller, which is quite rare. All the rest of the time the switching of the controller causes current multiplication. The tiny wires in the Radcity motor cable are so small they must limit the current to keep from melting them which causes poor hill climbing.

3) The fraction of total energy used in tire losses when climbing a hill is very small. The majority goes to lifting the bike and rider against gravity. Tire losses dominate on level ground at low speed. As speed increases air drag losses dominate and again tire losses are a small fraction. If you pedal at 5mph on level ground you will feel tire losses. It's pretty small with quality tires. I don't think the supplied tires on the Radcity are junk, but perhaps they are, in which case replacing them would be more advantageous than pumping them up.