Cheapest viable conversion? (not including battery)

[TheGnarlyCenturion]

Just curious what people thought the cheapest possible conversion available was? I had originally thought that by ordering each part individually from various sources you could get the cheapest, however, I just found this beaut - shipped from inside the UK no less...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/26-250W-1000W-Electric-Bicycle-Conversion-E-Bike-Front-Rear-Wheel-Kit-36V-48V-/122617260267

250W front motor kit - £100. Damn. Looks to me like a small geared hub, but could be wrong.

Can we do any cheaper? Anyone tried it?

 

[flecc]

The front wheel one illustrated is a direct drive 1000 watt, the outer one illustrated with a multi-sprocket freewheel is a geared 250 watt hub. The whole advert is confusing but appears to offer choice of either at the same price.

There's no battery or charger included though, so for a motorised wheel kit only, quite good but not especially a bargain.
.

 

[TheGnarlyCenturion]

There are seperate adverts for each motor, and it's explained below It is a chinese company with a UK warehouse, so willing to be lenient with quality of written english.

 

[Deleted member 4366]

Those kits have a shortcoming that you need to be aware of. the pedal assist is one level (maximum), which makes it difficult to control the bike in some circumstances. It's worth paying a little more to get one with an LCD IMHO.

The front kit will need additional torque arms and the rear one will need a £25 freewheel.

 

[TheGnarlyCenturion]

Yes indeed they do - is it possible to put together a similiarly priced build using seperate parts, or is the extra complexity of the controller/screen required always going to add on a large % do you think?

 

[Deleted member 4366]

It's always going to be more expensive to buy stuff separately rather than together. The normal reason to buy stuff separately is to get exactly the bits you want with the characteristics and features you want.

 

[Nealh]

The 15nm torque of the 250w hub is quite weedy any decent ascent will see it struggle.
The offerings from Elifeshop and YSBattery both have kt controllers and lcd which gives 5 levels of assist also hubs have 30nm torque so will be better for ascents. Although double the price will give more control and oomph.

 

[DynatechFan]

What do you want it for? If you have any hills then a geared hub is the way to go

Got a YSBattery kit myself, seems as good a place as any for a newb to start

For £200 you can get the geared rear hub kit (8/9 speed cassette one, so likely no extra expense there), the connectors, LCD and PAS module are all really neat. Not so sure I am impressed with the 10.4Ah battery, my commute is only 12 miles return (with some steep bits the kit flies up admittedly) but I doubt it would do 2 return trips. The 17Ah isnt much more money or you could look elsewhere

 

[Nealh]

I saw a new Ananda 200w kit with battery on ebay for £250.

 

[DouglasXK]

There are seperate adverts for each motor, and it's explained below It is a chinese company with a UK warehouse, so willing to be lenient with quality of written english.

The difference between ebay “easylivingus” and Whoosh and others is that they earn their living off bikes whereas this character very definitely doesn’t. Even for £100 I’d not touch it.

 

[DynatechFan]

The difference between ebay “easylivingus” and Whoosh and others is that they earn their living off bikes whereas this character very definitely doesn’t. Even for £100 I’d not touch it.

True enough, what my dad used to call a "fancy goods" shop - inferring it was all fancy and no function - but who knows. For me, as an ebike newb this year I ended up with a "reputable" ebay seller who seem to have been around a while and *might* be able to help if something wasnt working as it should

UK based EBC was my other choice and was only swayed from them by the lack of cassette wheel in their kit (being a bike geek I could not live with the marginal bearing layout of a freewheel hub wheel)

Seems to me ebike kits are a bit like wine. With the really cheap stuff you are paying as much for the transport / packaging / profit as you are for the stuff in the box (or bottle with £4 wine). Moving up to the more popular price point (say £6 or £7 wine) and quality improves quite quickly. You can spend a tenner plus but it can take a bit more a connoisseur to appreciate it. My (£2300) Merida e600 loan bike was lovely but I like my own MTB with £400 ebay kit just as much, maybe even more

 

[Charliefox]

Just curious what people thought the cheapest possible conversion available was? I had originally thought that by ordering each part individually from various sources you could get the cheapest, however, I just found this beaut - shipped from inside the UK no less...

https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/26-250W-1000W-Electric-Bicycle-Conversion-E-Bike-Front-Rear-Wheel-Kit-36V-48V-/122617260267

250W front motor kit - £100. Damn. Looks to me like a small geared hub, but could be wrong.

Can we do any cheaper? Anyone tried it?

I fitted this kit a short while ago to my wife's old Muddy Fox Mixte frame. Cost me £109 and had it sent to a friend in Edinburgh as aparently Inverness is not part of the UK as far as couriers go! No matter. I am well pleased with the result. The front motor is geared and pulls well with a 73kg rider.It buzzes slightly at high load/slow speed but manages our local 450' hill no bother. The wheel it was laced into was very well put together. All the spokes firm and no wiggles (I put it on my wheel trueing stand to check) Speed up to 19mph on the level before running out of puff. It is not as powerful as the 350W Bafang CST rear hub I have on another bike, but costing half the price it is a bargain if you have a donor bike and have a spare 36v battery as I had. I wonder if I can put 48volts through the rear wheel version? Perhaps with a beefed up sine wave controller? For MY old muddy fox (it has a nice Tange double butted Mega tubing and fork)

 

[Charliefox]

Those kits have a shortcoming that you need to be aware of. the pedal assist is one level (maximum), which makes it difficult to control the bike in some circumstances. It's worth paying a little more to get one with an LCD IMHO.

The front kit will need additional torque arms and the rear one will need a £25 freewheel.

It does have a throttle though. The motor is not that powerful, so it is easy to control. Throttle has an off/on button and 3 leds. Just have to watch your thumb doesn't accidently switch it off when changing gear! As you may have guessed, I am no fan of Pedal assist!

 

[Deleted member 4366]

It does have a throttle though. The motor is not that powerful, so it is easy to control. Throttle has an off/on button and 3 leds. Just have to watch your thumb doesn't accidently switch it off when changing gear! As you may have guessed, I am no fan of Pedal assist!

A decent PAS is much more convenient than a throttle for normal riding. Also, there's some legality issues without PAS.

 

[j123456]

I actually bought the 36v 250W rear wheel version from Easylivingus a few weeks ago. The kit is labelled Voilamart so may be sold by other vendors. Impressions so far a very favourable. It was a very inexpensive kit so it's not perfect but it is fantastic value.

The kit arrived from Germany just a few days after ordering preceded by a 10.4Ahr bottle battery ordered from another seller. I chose to buy a used 21 speed Raleigh mountain bike with aluminium frame. It took me a day to install the kit and battery and since then I've tinkered for the odd hour. The bike is a good fit and far more comfortable and more powerful than my old Powacycle Salisbury.

I didn't fancy fitting the downtube bottle on two very close together screws so drilled and added a rivnut to provide a better fixing. I also treated the bike to a pair of new Swalbe tyres for road and light track use. Performance seems good although the Pedelec function is poor having far too much lag starting and stopping, acceptable on a run but not great in traffic or around obstacles. Off road I tend to switch to throttle mode which is responsive and sensitive and far nicer than the power on power off feature delivered by the controller. I may change the controller for one with a better Pedelec assisted function if I can find one at a good price.

However I have to say that overall I am delighted with my new ebike which cost less than £400 to achieve.

 

[gnscloz]

Have you a link?

 

[j123456]

The seller isn't currently on eBay which is where I bought mine. It was like this one though https://www.amazon.co.uk/Voilamart-Electric-Conversion-Brushless-Throttle/dp/B0711TYQ19

You may also want to look at https://www.yosepower.com

J

 

[j123456]

Just found this one from a different seller than I used. The are several adverts of you search voilamart. I chose a rear wheel 36v version. https://m.ebay.co.uk/itm/Voilamart-26-Electric-Bicycle-E-Bike-Conversion-Kit-250W-1000W-Front-Rear-Wheel-/112497011093

Also look at.
https://www.yosepower.com

 

[mags2]

Having gone for the cheap option at first myself i recommend people just pay the extra for a yosepower kit. Honestly it's a lot nicer overall. It comes with an lcd and is waterproof plus easier to setup with better cables and free tools also.

Sometimes going cheap can be too cheap and even paying just a bit more makes a surprising difference. Those ebay hubs go for between £125 to £140 yet the yosepower is £185.

If you're already paying £125 the extra on top isn't much for the kind of improvement and quality you get. Trust me i've been there and was a bit disappointed. Sure those cheap ebay kits aren't terrible but i just don't see the point in them now.

 

[j123456]

I've so much enjoyed doing my new bike I think I'll do another one. I'll probably be a little more picky in choosing my frame and I'll surely look at the yosepower option. Thanks for the suggestion. Might even have gone for it if I'd seen this thread earlier.