Freego Eagle, my first E-Bike

[Eaglerider]

Hi all,
I thought it's time to note my experiences after my first month of E-Biking on my Freego Eagle. So far, I've been very impressed. It's a 2011, 17.5 amp version with 7 speed gears (includes the 'Megarange' extra low gear) and the 48T chain wheel. Its the Mountain bike version, very nice!

To put some perspective on matters, I'm 55 years old, around 90 kilos in weight and have been an avid motorcyclist all my life. My cycling has been fairly low key for some years since a Knee injury around 5 years ago during a major downhill pile up involving a tree, some brambles and a not inconsiderable amount of personal stupidity.

My first brief was to condition the battery as I have learned on this forum, so I set off to begin 'The Testing'.

The bike is a good deal heavier than my unpowered 11 kg Raleigh M-Trax, but this does provide a smooth and stable ride. The first stage of 'assist' in pedelec mode provides a gentle push and appears to reduce assistance as speed rises to 8.5 mph. "That's good" I thought to myself. After a couple of minutes, I felt I deserved a reward for my efforts so went for stage 2 assist. At once the bike accelerated to around 11.5 mph and with top gear selected and some pretty mediocre pedalling included, I was maintaining a steady 11 to 12 mph+ with very little (if any) effort from me.

But then, there was "Level 3 assist"! I was enjoying myself that much that I'd almost forgotten about a full bore run. On the flat I hit the button, the bike accelerated briskly to 17.5 mph and absolutely flew down the road. A little pedalling effort (hardly any really) 20 mph was easy. Level 3 is quite a jump from level 2 it seems.

I live on top of a 330 ft hill so wherever I go, it's always a long climb back home. I decided to do a proper test on the steepest of the local hills. Selected 3rd gear, pedalled fairly hard and went up the hill so easily I had a giggling fit at the top. Marvellous.
You can probably guess that I'm thoroughly enjoying this electric bike lark and I'm probably still in the euphoric 'honeymoon period' so its all very exciting.

I rode 30 miles that day on a mixture of medium and high assist. The battery was still showing 3 out of 4 lights, so in order to condition the battery I set about flattening it. I rode throttle only around my village, including some fair hills for what seemed like ages, that pesky battery just would not run out. Eventually, only one light remained, and although there was a noticeable drop in power available, it still did 14-15 mph on the flat, throttle only.

The controller cut the power (I assume for low voltage protection) for the first time at 41.4 miles and cut out altogether at 41.8. I switched the battery off and pedalled the 1 mile home for a 6 hour 10 minute recharge.

I haven't ridden 40 miles in one go for at least 5 years, and it was wonderful. And my bad knee was barely complaining at all although I could feel some slight discomfort. The Eagle is powerful, great at hill climbing, reasonably comfortable, nicely painted and finished off, and generally is a hoot to ride. The second charge, with less throttle only but a fair bit of medium and high assist did 46 miles. For my weight and comparatively poor fitness, that's a good range, and I estimate that on medium assist only, over 50 miles could be easily achieved, even for a fat lump like me. Hopefully thats enough conditioning of the battery, so I will now revert to topping up each trip.

Overall I am very pleased with the Freego. To date everything has worked as it should with no problems. I tried a homebuilt starter motor based bike, quite quick but very noisy and it tore a bit off my trousers! certainly not legal. I also rode a Powercycle, a Wisper and the Freego before making the decision to get the Eagle. It just seemed to have a little bit more grunt than the Wisper (that could have been down to charge state??) at hill climbing and with the 2 year warranty and being a tad less expensive, thats the way it went.

Sorry for going on a bit, but I have been inexorably smitten by E-Bikes, and I am looking forward to lengthy and enjoyable time on them.

I'll update again when further testing is complete, which might take some time!!

 

[steve.c]

Glad you enjoy

Hi. I am also a Freego Eagle owner and they are very good bikes although the first one I had was a bit of a lemon??. It was always going wrong and I used the loan bike more than my own??. I'm in the position where it's the only form of transport I can use so it had to be reliable as I ride 10 miles to work do 12hrs and then ride the 10mls back and the replacement bike does this brilliantly (fair doo,s to Freego they replaced the bike with a new one as their warrantee says but the new one is very good.

 

[kitchenman]

Welcome to the forum, thanks for the review. Its really useful to have reviews like this. Look forward to an update.

 

[tonyishuk]

We have just brought a couple of Freego Eagles to use whilst Motorhoming.

The review above echos our experience and better written than I could manage.

In addition to the comments above, Some of the useful items we have found about the Freego are:

A hand throttle which is very useful for pulling away from junctions, (Despite riding for many years, I still seem to arrive at a halt in the wrong gear)

Sensibly the throttle has an on/off switch and the twist length is about 3/8 ths of the hand grip length and does not get in the way of the hand when riding normally.

The bar ends have plugs, (unlike some grips which cover the ends) so fitting a mirror on either side (if using on the Continent) is easy to do.

The grips are moulded to fit the hands and are of a soft materail which absorbs shocks.

Brakes and levers are very good, the levers are angled and discourage full fist braking ! ( Which would probably have you over the handlebars !)

The rear light is powered by AA batteries so that if you have a main battery failure at night, you have some rear end lights. The front light is a small clear LED which is bright enough in dim light to show a presence on the road, powered from main battery.

A double leg stand which is great when loading paniers, very stable, not much heaver that a single leg which in my experience lets the bike move at the crucial moment of loading.

An easily adjustable head stock unit which alters the height and pitch of the handle bars.

Suspension front forks, first time I have used a bike with them,

Puncture proof tyres !

Tool kit with spanners, hex keys and screwdriver to cover most things that might shake lose.

Slight Niggles !

There are two instruction books, one which is not a lot of use as the diagrams and pictures show different controls and adjustments not really applicable to the bike.

The other book is totally opposite ! Clear and concise, with the important information printed in red.

A double sided A4 page of how to adjust the front forks, both sides in chinese script !

Hardly worth worrying about !


Very pleased with them and the service we have had from,

Kardinal Healthcare Limited
82 - 84 Broadwater Street West
Worthing
West Sussex


Seems a bit strange buying a bike from a Mobility (Scooter) specialist, but if you think a while, who better with a knowledge of batteries, electronic controls and gear boxes to maintain an electric bike !

(And we can trade our bikes in, for scooters when we get to that stage !)


Rgds

 

[flecc]

Seems a bit strange buying a bike from a Mobility (Scooter) specialist, but if you think a while, who better with a knowledge of batteries, electronic controls and gear boxes to maintain an electric bike !

Absolutely right, in fact the last British e-bike in production, the TGA-electrobike, was made by a mobility company. They weren't so good on the bicycle aspects though, so probably some sort of bicycle and mobility company partnership would be the ideal.

 

[steve.c]

Beware ??

Hi Toni ??.glad to here of some more Freego Eagle owners and I agree with most of the things you said but beware ???? When Freego replaced my first Eagle (it was realy bad everything went wrong with it!!!!). The new one was going to come to me with the condition that the throttle would be disconnected because they said that I was starting off on throttle alone which would ruin the motor??? and put to much strain on it ( which I never do ) and the tyres are puncture resistant and not puncture proof!!! as I had 2 punctures both in the back wheel which is not easy to get off??? (put some SLIME in them ASAP) but you enjoy the bike because they are very very good and my new one is without fault.

 

[tonyishuk]

SLIME (anyone ?)

beware ????

The new one was going to come to me with the condition that the throttle would be disconnected because they said that I was starting off on throttle alone which would ruin the motor??? and put to much strain on it

the tyres are puncture resistant and not puncture proof!!! as I had 2 punctures both in the back wheel which is not easy to get off??? (put some SLIME in them ASAP) but you enjoy the bike because they are very very good and my new one is without fault.

Thanks for the suggestions,

I note the comment about using the throttle, I must admit that I try not to, and am getting better at being in the right gear. More practice needed.

I must admit that looking at the tyres they seem to have more bulk to roll off and on the rim than some tyres I have dealt with in the past.

You mention Slime, is this something that others in the forum have tried / used ? (I know some m/home owners use similar stuff in their tyres with varying degrees of agreement about the effectiveness and cost of replacing tyres)


Rgds

 

[FreeGo]

Hi,
Thanks for the review on our Eagle, I am very sorry that you have been given the wrong manual, there is a useless Green coloured book that comes with the bikes that is a really dodgy chinese translation and even says that the bikes cannot be ridden in the wet!! absolute rubbish of course, you cannot ride them through 2' deep puddles but rain is no problem.
WE have printed unique FreeGo hand books which include service history and information for our bikes, this is blue in colour and if you have not been given these by Kardinal then please let me know and I will forward them to you.
I am delighted that you are happy with the bikes but should you need any further information or help then please do not hessitate to contact me of teh guys at Kardinal (Great Guys!!)

 

[HittheroadJ]

Thanks for your review.

I have owned my first eBike about a year and a half now and, in my opinion, the feeling stays largely the same.

I still get a smile on my face when I hop on the bike in the morning and I still enjoy cycling home (involving a 300 ft climb).

I hope you'll find it as enjoyable in a couple of months as you appear to do now.

Cheers,
J

 

[tonyishuk]

Trying to be helpful to Newbies (because I was one !)

I tried to link this thread a couple of times to a new thread in Bike Reviews so that visitors did not have to use the search machine. (Which they cannot unless they are members and am the only one having difficulty trying to read the security characters ?)

I recived a message that the entry would have accepted by the moderator (Not to sure why as these messages do not seem to be ?)

Nothing has appeared, Have I upset someone ?, or does it take a little time for stuff to appear ?

Rgds

 

[tonyishuk]

I take it all back, the link has appeared and no one apears upset!

My thanks to the moderator

rgds

 

[Eaglerider]

EAGLE UPDATE

Time for a quick update as there has been a fair amount of ‘Eagling’ going on.

I now have a little over 220 miles on the Eagle, and to date no problems have been encountered. Whilst bearing in mind I am still a newbie at E-Bikes, I continue to be enlightened with the fun opportunities my E-Bike provides.

Apropos the Freego, little has changed since my last post above, and nothing has fallen off. But I have learned some useful lessons about power consumption and management.

Strong headwinds can have a big effect on current usage, more than I had anticipated. Recently, the ‘urge to ride’ was strong, and I elected to go for a night ride as the weekend was too long to wait. It was really, very windy, and whilst I did consider my sanity might be in question I set off directly into wind, in the assumption that the return journey would involve a tailwind. After 19 miles, the battery meter thing showed 2 out of 4 four lights in a static no load state. Experience suggests that 2 lights remaining means the battery has about a quarter of a ‘tank’ remaining and I turned for home.

A very rapid return trip was completed for a total distance of 34 miles with the last 4 miles with just one light on and power well down. I had been on maximum assist in Pedelec mode the entire trip. On arrival back home I don’t think there was much left. It took 5 hours 30 minutes for a full recharge, that’s 40 minutes less than with a flat battery. In hindsight, whilst this range is well down on previous trips, the wind was very strong and the motor was pushing constantly. I returned home about 11.45 pm, feeling a bit strange that whilst all others were snuggled up in their homes, I was out having all this fun, and the solitude of the night in the roaring wind was exhilarating.

A contrasting ride took place at the weekend. An e-bike sceptic colleague of mine challenged me to meet him for a drink at a pub 22 miles away. The journey there is almost constant hills, but he had thrown down the gauntlet!

I made it there just fine, very little wind but hills aplenty. I had 3 lights showing, but felt I was getting near the limits of range for the return trip as the hills were largely unavoidable. I had taken my charger in the rucksack in the hope of an opportunist top up, and used the rucksack to conceal the battery, slipped into the pub, and found a table with a plug socket underneath. Whilst enjoying a couple of glasses of foaming ale I was able to snaffle 50 minutes worth of electrons, I’m sure the £3.65 a pint covered the 8Pence cost of the electricity!

For the return, I had 4 lights on the gauge and feeling pretty confidant, I flew home,
Max assist all the way. On arrival I still had 2 lights on the gauge with a total of 47 miles elapsed. I don’t know how much charge a 50 minute top up would provide as I suspect the charge rate is not linear, but I was chuffed to have met and exceeded my colleague’s challenge, and whilst he was a little mealy mouthed about my apparent success, his Mrs, (who had a go round the car park) said she wanted one for Christmas.

So there you have it, The Eagle continues to impress, so far, and in particular, for me, it is the long range that makes this such a useable and fun tool, and I can’t seem to get enough of it.

I’ve lost 4 lbs in weight, and my fitness is improving in leaps and bounds, and so, perhaps, there is a God!

I will continue with further updates if you have the stomach for it, and in the meantime,

Get out and ride, it’s later than you think.

 

[bazwaldo]

Eaglerider, it is good to read that your new Freego is working really well.
I bought a very similar Ebike received in October 2010 - a Bearprint with 16ah battery.

What sort of weekly commuting mileage are you expecting to do?
My work commute 5 days a week is about 26 miles and for just over a year I have been able to complete both to and from work legs on 1 charge.
Towards the end of the year I was getting occasional battery cut outs towards the end of the return trip.
I first started charging my battery at work on 02.11.11.
Currently my battery is struggling on the out bound journey as it is slightly longer at 13.4 miles and more up hill.
When hills are encountered the battery is more frequently cutting out requiring a turn on and off and then going down to middle assist to get up the hill. I have even on occcasion had the battery cut out on the last climb near work in middle assist and so have had to go down to low assist which is not much fun.

My battery is advertised with a 2 year warranty so I will have to speak to Bearprint about this quite soon now.
I will be very interested to see how your battery is performing after a year compared to mine.
I do have probably one of the longer work commutes and I suppose that anyone with more modest daily mileage would not experience any battery problems similar to my situation.

What warranty do you have on your battery?

Best wishes,
Barry.

 

[yselmike]

I have the same experience with the wind I only ride on the flat but the wind sucks the life out of the battery
I wont get 40km on a charge if its moderately windy and of course my speed suffers...on the other hand on a good road with the wind its 50kph.
The bikes are great a quick run round the block always turns into a 25km trip.

 

[Eaglerider]

Hi Bazwaldo,
I don't intend to do a great deal of commuting on the bike, it would be a 35 mile round trip and very hilly, and in a pinstripe suit! Some main roads would be involved where traffic is heavy and bad tempered, and despite 37 years of motorcycling experience, I find cycling on main roads at rush hour just too dangerous.

Many local roads have been 'made safe' by the idiotic installation of traffic islands where a large truck is a tight fit, and as I approach the chicane the sound of air brakes being heavily applied is just too scary. Ok, I'm a wimp, but commuting on a motorcycle is a great deal safer, very quick, and even with 1300cc I still get 55 mpg.

I purchased the bike because I had occasion to have a go on a homemade bike, and despite its shortcomings, a 5 minute ride had me completely hooked. So its all for fun, although I like it so much I tend to use the Eagle wherever possible.

I have a 2 year warranty on the battery, I think, so I will have to see how I get on. I believe a Freego replacement battery is around £380, still a lot of money, but I have no aspirations to amortise the costs to justify having an E-Bike. I have long subscribed to the philosophy that the only real wealth is the fun you've had, and not cash in the bank, although cash can certainly help facilitate the fun at times.

I will keep updating as events occur.
Best regards.

 

[hgbiker]

I have been considering purchasing a Freego Eagle myself just for leisure riding but unfortunately my nearest dealer only had the step through version to try and I really was more interested in the crossbar type.

I tried the one that he had and it certainly seemed to have quite a kick when the assistance started and I was quite impressed by the build quality. I am 6' and I was just wondering if the frame of the crossbar version at 18" would be a little small.

From your review it certainly seems to be a good bike and I think that the larger battery is the one to go for.

Thank you very much for a very informative and humorous review. Further updates would be appreciated.

 

[FreeGo]

Good afternoon,
I was wondering if you could tell me where you are situated so that I can organise a trial on a crossbar bike for you, our ethos is to try before you buy and I would like to facilitate that for you, to save giving too much information on here perhaps I could ask you to email me at martin@freegoelectricbikes.com
Thank you very much. Martin.

 

[funkylyn]

Great update eaglerider.....more please......and dont forget that with the imminent launch of our Cyclecharge scheme we will be hoping you can persuade the pub mentioned to join the scheme......then no more furtive connecting under tables

Lynda

 

[hgbiker]

Martin,

Thank you for contacting me regarding the Freego Eagle crossbar style. As suggested I have emailed you on this subject.

Kind regards

 

[Eaglerider]

Hi HGBiker,

The Freego is still going strong, its been through snow and slush, wind and rain,and a little sunshine as well. Its done close to 700 miles now, and nothing has fallen off.

I did have it cut out once after hitting a nasty pothole, but I just switched it off and back on again and its been fine ever since, which is more than can be said for the bruising I received during the same incident!

I have sealed up the holes in the controller box where the wires go in to prevent water ingress, although I didn't have any problem before. I think they do this at the factory now.

I would certainly recommend the Eagle. I've had it 6 months now and it has had a much greater influence on me than I had anticipated. I would certainly buy another one should the need arise.

Definitely go for the bigger battery, with some planning you can enjoy a whole day out riding. At 6 ft tall, you might want a longer seatpost.

Keep us posted as to how you get on.