Richtea70

Looking at the remains of that bike it looks like a ‘Stealth’ type bike or copy of. These type of bikes generally have a ‘custom’ battery pack to fit inside the frame so often these are built to order or homemade with individual cells and costs are cut. Generally speaking any references to self builds on here point people in the direction of bottle/shark type batteries, which when charged correctly are pretty safe. But just buying a ’brand’ bike/battery doesn’t negate the risk. A few years ago Samsung had a PR disaster when the batteries in one of their flagship phones started randomly exploding.

Swytch is an over priced, over hyped, basic ebike kit. My first ebike I bought in 2010 had better specs. Sorry to say it but almost any other kit would have been better than buying from these clowns. And don’t get me started on that ridiculously annoying ‘This a swytch bike…’ ad !!

Sad thing is, there’s quite a nice bike being hidden under all that eBay tat

Great story and pictures, well done!

Hi all, Had a 52v 20ah downtube battery that I hadnt used for some time (6 months plus), was doing a new a new build yesterday so thought I’d use the battery. Put it on charge for the charger to click from red to green almost instantly. Checked the voltage of the battery and it was showing just over 22 volts, which i know is very bad. I was working outside all day so just left the charger on it for about 4 hours. During this time the charger continued to keep clicking between red and green in approximately 30 second intervals. I also have another 52v charger which showed the same behaviour. I didn’t want to leave on charge without me being there, so turned off and checked voltage again which was then showing as just over 34v. Is the pack completely wasted or is it worth persisting with the charging? Ive never opened a battery pack before so if there isn’t a simple fix I think I will just bin it, Thanks for any advice, Rich

Really good tips there, thanks very much, I've bought a few spares so I'll give your methods a try before I go for the wheel off./ Just got to wait a couple of days for the spokes to be delivered :-(

I'll check when I get it but I think one has broken off with the thread still in the nipple. In order to get one of the broken ones off last night (on the cassette side, which also had one of this crappy plastic chain guards behind it) I had to almost bend it to a right angle. I'm guessing that this amount of bending would be a no no with a new spoke?

Thanks Neath! Theres no obvious buckle to it as the bike was stored as soon as the spokes went so hopefully not too much truing required. I've removed a good spoke, measured up and have ordered a few bespoke ones online (235mm length). I'll have a go myself in the first instance but I think I'll have to remove the wheel and cassette to get the spokes on without any serious bending. So I'll take off wheel, remove cassette thread the new spokes in and then place back on the bike to try to true the wheel? To be honest the spokes all seem to be at varying tension so they will all need a bit of work I think, is there any way of telling what tension spokes should be at (as I'm fairly certain Halfords wont know). If worse comes to the worst I'll just take to the LBS but would like to have a go in the first instance.

Hi all, On a bit of a whim last night, I bought a 2nd hand Carrera Vulcan E. Was advertised on Gumtree (I know!), no description, with one blurred photo but was only about a mile from me so went to take a look. The bike was bought new in Oct 18, the guy had all receipts and extended warranty (although I dont think this passes on to second owner). I was aware of all the issues with the Suntour hub, the bike needed the brakes bleeding, slight wobble in the bottom bracket and had 3 broken spokes on the rear wheel. I took a very short test ride to check the motor cut in as it should (not wanting to stress the wheel anymore) and all was good. The guy said he'd never had an issue with the motor cutting out as it was the 'revised' LCD display, not sure if that was correct or not but after a bit of negotiating came away with it for £340. Im not afraid of getting the spanners out so will sort the brakes and bottom bracket, but not sure about the spoke replacement? They are not standard size and I've heard that spoke tension on a hub motor is key. Is it worth me trying to source and fit these spokes myself or just turn it over to a bike shop to fix and true the wheel? Also does anyone know of a decent bike shop in or around Reading? Many thanks, Rich

Hi all, Ive been on the forum for a couple of years and thanks to advice here, went from a early Cyclotricity Stealth, to using the hub motor on a giant bike and then finally building my own hybrid with a 8fun 350w crank drive. I’ve used the hybrid for the last couple of years but whilst in the main I’ve loved it I had 2 issues with it. One was the whole ‘Heath Robinson’ look about it. Whilst I tried to make the bike as discreet as I could, on the whole I think the large battery and crank motor were, frankly, a bit of an eyesore. Secondly, the roads were I live (Reading) are actually in an appalling state. This, coupled with weight of the bike, made for a very uncomfortable ride. With reduction in tyre pressures and suspension forks making little difference. So I’ve taken the plunge, sold my bike and ordered a Cube Acid Hybrid 29er. With the bigger tyres hopefully it will soften up some of the bumps and the overall look of the bike is very slick with the intergrated battery and crank drive. I know that I loose some flat out speed but I’m over that now and I’m just looking for a more comfortable ride. As its fairly new I cant find many reviews on line so if anyone has one or tried one, I’d be interested in your thoughts? Failing that I may have to do a review when I get it!