Met a fellow electric biker

[Jay Russell]

At the local co-op this afternoon I noticed an electric bike in the rack so I went to have a nosey. Rear hub driven MTB.

Spotted the owner in the shop and said hi. Turns out it was a 1kw motor! The conversion done by a mate. Top assist speed of about thirty mph!

Now, obviously this is illegal and to be frowned upon and tutted at but, that does sound fun! (Tut, frown etc)
The guy said he went for a hub drive over a crank drive because of reliability issues. I've done my googling and the reliability issues of Bosch seen to be fewer than the happy customers.

 

[flecc]

The guy said he went for a hub drive over a crank drive because of reliability issues. I've done my googling and the reliability issues of Bosch seen to be fewer than the happy customers.

Maintenance needs are sometimes considered part of reliability Jay, so that might have been in part what he meant.

Crank drive units can greatly increase the wear and stress on the bike's transmission, leading to many more changes of chains and sprockets than if only the rider power went through them.

Today's crank units commonly exceed 500 watts of peak drive power, while most riders won't put in more than 200 watts and many much less. Combine the two and you'll see the transmission can be worked up to four times as hard with a crank drive unit.
.

 

[KirstinS]

You have to balance your needs.

A good hub is cheap and very reliable.

Crank drives are more expensive and may be considered less reliable for high mileage users (taking full account of maintenance vs reliability in fleccs post)

But, a legal 250w crank can climb just about anything using gears . Even the bpm 250w cannot compete with the high climbing ability

So it depends what you need. Hill climbing vs reliability

I'll stick with my hub for year round commuting on the flat. But my crank drive mtb for south downs trails

 

[footpump]

I have never tried a crank drive, but a couple of years back after purchase of vita uno 36v 250 hub tried a very hilly journey of 10 miles.
and then 4 miles of hilly road mainly downhill to take a flatter journey home canal path.

I spoke to someone localy on giant eprime crank drive who said he could go mup the 4 miles in eco mode, (I don't think I could get up there in highest assisrt level.

also near my home there is a very steep hill about 3/4 mile ,rather narrow road lots of traffic and no footpath should i fail to get up the hill , so i have never attemted it..


some one else who uses the route regually and also includes other steep hills about 8 miles in total weighs about 18 stone but has a kalkoff crank drive don't know the model, has no problems as regards power for hill climbing,

that said i think these are £2000 ebikes

 

[EddiePJ]

footpump, don't forget that final drive gearing has a major part in a bikes hill climbing ability.

With the correct gearing, I'm sure that your bike would climb equally as well, if you approached using a slow but consistent pace.