Hello everyone - just bought a e-bike kit

[Pob]

Hi everyone - my first post on here. I have been lurking for a while reading posts for information, thankyou so far for being helpful

I have just bought a Sunlova e-bike kit. 26" Wheel with 8Fun brushless motor and 36v9Ah Lithium battery. I intend on fitting this over Christmas.

I have a Trek mountain bike which I have had for 8 years and I am going to give it a freshen up and fit the e-bike kit to it. It is a sprung front with rigid back end. It cost me about £400 8 years ago and it is a nice bike to use for my conversion I think. I have ordered a new pair of Suntour XCR suspension forks and new headset bearings as my forks were leaking a little, these Suntours are adjustable and seem better quality than the RST's that came on my Trek as standard.

Having had a couple of back operations and keen to get fitter and strengthen muscles I want to ride my mountain bike to work and back (6 miles a day that's all) but it's uphill (steep) all the way home. It will be too much for my back to do now, I have tried a few times before my last operation and it is a killer riding nearly 3 miles up hills. I was trying to think of what I can do as I don't do gyms. I was looking on the "tinternet" and I saw a few electric bikes but I don't like the step through frames most seem to have so I thought why not convert my bike to electric and use the motor to help with my bad back on the uphill ride home but pedal as normal where I can.

Sunlova have been great to deal with so far (questions and delivery) and the kit is in my garage ready to go now. The kit looks nicely made, the motor and front wheel seem very nice, the battery pack and all the bits and bobs do not look cheap - they look very well put together in fact, well packed and all looks straightforward to fit - I hope.


Couple of questions if I may:-

Do I have to use the pedelec system on my crank? Can I just not fit it and not connect it and everything still work? And can I not fit the brakes with cut-off switches?

I will have a look closely soon but don't want too much clutter and excess wires on the bike unless they are necessary.


Thanks in advance, I hope to give some feedback on this kit as I fit it and use it.


Pob

 

[Deleted member 4366]

THe motor will work on the throttle without the pedal sensor, but you'll find it a lot easier with the pedal sensor, so fit it if you can. If you have a tripple chainwheel, you might want to think about using a single one, as 6-8 gears are enough with electric assist and it'll make room for the pedal sensor. The supplied rear rack is also very heavy - that's if they're still supplying the steel one. If you have this one, you might want to think about removing the battery and socket from the rack and fitting it to a light weight aluminium one with some home-made brackets or a couple of big jubilee clips, or just put a couple of bungees around it to allow quick removal.

 

[NRG]

If the kit doesn't have a 3 speed switch you'll find the throttle will provide better control as the bike on pedelec alone will always be trying to travel at it's top speed.

Brake cut outs are advisable or the connection can be used as a disable / on / off switch

 

[Deleted member 4366]

My Sunlova kit didn't come with a three speed switch. You're right about the Sunlova pedelec being a bit fierce on it's own. I don't know whether it gives full torque, but it doesn't give full speed. I found that it gives about 12mph, but if you then open up the throttle to full, you can feel an increase in power, and speed increases to around 17mph. The throttle takes precedence over the pedelec, so if you only want to trickle along slowly, you can open the throttle to about 1/4 and it effectively cuts off the pedelec. When I first tried it, I thought the pedelec wasn't working properly because it's easy to inadvertently open the throttle a little bit when pulling away until I figured out what was happening.