3 ms·

I have an off the shelf ebike (rad expand 5). I'd say that their stock breaks on this model are woefully under powered. I swapped them with hydraulics within th

I have an off the shelf ebike (rad expand 5). I'd say that their stock breaks on this model are woefully under powered. I swapped them with hydraulics within the first year. Ebikes are generally pretty heavy, even i this case where you are converting an old bike, that aluminum box of batteries is going to add a ton of weight.. and given that there are many older bikes with caliper breaks out there... that's pretty scary. At least the expand ships with disk breaks (still not up to the task but a caliper break would be totally ineffective).

mauvehaus 2y ago
The heaviest thing on a bike is the rider, generally by a pretty good margin. I've seen plenty of bikes with shitty brakes, but very few where the straw that broke the camel's back was the weight of the ebike componentry. For most e-bikes, you're looking at maybe an extra 30lb/14kg. That's generally within the envelope of reasonable rider weights. If the combined bike and rider weight is too much for the brakes, it's probably also too much for the whole bike. Again, not that there aren't worthless brakes in the world, but it's usually not the weight of the battery and motor that pushes a set of brakes over the edge.
prmoustache 2y ago
A setup with a 220lbs rider on a stock "muscular bike" is still heavier and will stress bikes more than a setup with a 132lbs rider on an e-bike. Fact is most department store bikes comes with shitty brakes, or brakes not setup by professionals (lacking cable tension, shitty stock brake pads) but the very same happen when an high end bike is badly maintained by its owner. But this is a tangential problem. I rate Rad Power bikes as shitty department store quality bikes anyway. They are successful because they are cheap and people know they can easily bypass the set assistance limits. They are cheap because the brand spec them with the cheapest components available. It doesn't help that most bikes are delivered to the owner's door without being revised by professional and appart from googling how to change the assistance limit speed Rad Power owners are rarely knowledgeable enough in bikes to correct any setup issue.

mauvehaus 2y ago

The heaviest thing on a bike is the rider, generally by a pretty good margin. I've seen plenty of bikes with shitty brakes, but very few where the straw that broke the camel's back was the weight of the ebike componentry. For most e-bikes, you're looking at maybe an extra 30lb/14kg. That's generally within the envelope of reasonable rider weights. If the combined bike and rider weight is too much for the brakes, it's probably also too much for the whole bike. Again, not that there aren't worthless brakes in the world, but it's usually not the weight of the battery and motor that pushes a set of brakes over the edge.

prmoustache 2y ago

A setup with a 220lbs rider on a stock "muscular bike" is still heavier and will stress bikes more than a setup with a 132lbs rider on an e-bike. Fact is most department store bikes comes with shitty brakes, or brakes not setup by professionals (lacking cable tension, shitty stock brake pads) but the very same happen when an high end bike is badly maintained by its owner. But this is a tangential problem. I rate Rad Power bikes as shitty department store quality bikes anyway. They are successful because they are cheap and people know they can easily bypass the set assistance limits. They are cheap because the brand spec them with the cheapest components available. It doesn't help that most bikes are delivered to the owner's door without being revised by professional and appart from googling how to change the assistance limit speed Rad Power owners are rarely knowledgeable enough in bikes to correct any setup issue.