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Does anyone know why quality e-bikes are so hugely expensive? I'd like one, but I wouldn't be comfortable leaving it anywhere due to risk of theft. A good qua

by RobinL 5y ago

Does anyone know why quality e-bikes are so hugely expensive? I'd like one, but I wouldn't be comfortable leaving it anywhere due to risk of theft. A good quality ordinary bicycle is around £1,000. Spend much more and maybe it's lighter, or you get a fancy style, but it won't be dramatically more reliable. The batteries on e-bikes are surprisingly small relative to an electric car. e.g. a Kia e-Nero is 64 kWh and about £35k list price. Even the largest battery on the linked bike is 625Wh (0.625 kWh) i.e. one hundredth of the capacity of the car. So even if the cost of the Kia was all battery, the equivalent cost for the bike battery would be just £350. Are the electric motor and the other electrical components really that expensive? What am I missing?

DonHopkins 5y ago
They're giant gadgets so there's really no ceiling on the kinds of features they can add to a high end bike. That Harley Davidson eBike has elegant inline accelerometer actuated break lights! They must add a bit to the price. And you probably pay a premium just for the cool brand name, too. It's a matter of picking the features that will actually benefit you, and shopping around for a brand that has the right combination of features important to you. I took a test ride on a different, less expensive brand of bike that had the automatic Enviolo stepless automatic transmission, and really loved it. And the silent belt drive went really well with the smooth transmission. Then I shopped around a lot and found a Koga that had the Enviolo, who makes high quality hand made seamless frames, and that drove up the price a lot. If I was going to pop for a good transmission, it would be a pity to have it on a crappy frame. And the Koga has other useful features like good brakes and crank, shock absorbers, lighting, internal cabling and battery, all seamlessly integrated, etc. I was getting a bike instead of a car as a primary means of transportation, and I fully insured it in case it's stolen. I'd recently moved away from the center of the city to the outskirts of town where there's more space, and now I have a whole car-free locked garage to park it in and keep it safe and dry. It's really made the rest of the city seem much closer, even though I'm now further away from the center! But it would really suck without a safe parking garage, if I had to lock it out front on the street regularly, like where I used to live in the center.

by RobinL 5y ago

DonHopkins 5y ago

They're giant gadgets so there's really no ceiling on the kinds of features they can add to a high end bike. That Harley Davidson eBike has elegant inline accelerometer actuated break lights! They must add a bit to the price. And you probably pay a premium just for the cool brand name, too. It's a matter of picking the features that will actually benefit you, and shopping around for a brand that has the right combination of features important to you. I took a test ride on a different, less expensive brand of bike that had the automatic Enviolo stepless automatic transmission, and really loved it. And the silent belt drive went really well with the smooth transmission. Then I shopped around a lot and found a Koga that had the Enviolo, who makes high quality hand made seamless frames, and that drove up the price a lot. If I was going to pop for a good transmission, it would be a pity to have it on a crappy frame. And the Koga has other useful features like good brakes and crank, shock absorbers, lighting, internal cabling and battery, all seamlessly integrated, etc. I was getting a bike instead of a car as a primary means of transportation, and I fully insured it in case it's stolen. I'd recently moved away from the center of the city to the outskirts of town where there's more space, and now I have a whole car-free locked garage to park it in and keep it safe and dry. It's really made the rest of the city seem much closer, even though I'm now further away from the center! But it would really suck without a safe parking garage, if I had to lock it out front on the street regularly, like where I used to live in the center.