turbo1889

Because the stock hub-motor used on the Juiced Riders bikes is internally gear reduced that means they have a freewheeling clutch so you don't have to turn the motor to turn the wheel.

Therefore, yes, its a very "pedal able option" with the only "sucks to pedal" part being the additional weight of the electric drive components and the fact its only got a three speed IGH for pedal gears. Not only that but it has classic upright cruiser bicycle slightly relaxed crank forward geometry and a pedal location and Q-factor set-up for strong human pedaling with a gearing range that although a little narrower then I would like allows effective pedaling at any speed between 8.5-mph (60-rpm pedal cadence in low gear) up to 26.5-mph (100-rpm pedal cadence in high gear). (Run the math, 52t chain-wheel, 16t sprocket, SRAM three speed with 37% even split under-drive/over-drive gear steps on a 20" diameter BMX drive wheel). That isn't exactly what I would consider a "pathetic" human drive power system.

I do personally own one bike with a direct drive hub motor (a big Crystallite Brute thats a 1.4-Kw motor) and that is very much a PITA to pedal with the motor turned off. I also have a couple bikes with internally gear reduced hub motors on them and they are a dream to pedal only with the motor off compared to the direct drive hub motor.

One should realize though that I'm not a "weight weenie", quite to the contrary I run a lot of cargo bikes several of which I regularly haul or tow hundreds of pounds of cargo with. I'm not one who minds a little extra weight, even when just pedaling only. Now a constant drag I can feel in the vibration pulsation resistance in the pedals as the motor rotor of a direct drive hub rotate past each permanent magnet pole, that is extremely obnoxious in my opinion. Thus I almost never ride the one bike I have with a direct drive hub motor under pedal power alone and thus always keep it charged and never run it beyond its range.

I like to pedal and even when I'm running the motor on any of my builds I'm doing my part as well with pedaling. This can be done on any decent build using any of the motor styles available so long as the human drive system isn't ignored and is built to be fully functional just like a pedal only bicycle. And from the OP's description of his situation it sounded like that is what he wants to do too, namely both pedal and run the motor both, thus so long as he gets a big enough battery for the distances he is going to covering he should never have to just pedal only unless he really want too. That combined with his flat lands situation makes me think a hub motor would work just fine for his needs. Juiced Rider comes stock with a geared hub which is freewheeling with no drag from the motor when pedaling only and for at least the first couple years or so of use if its not abused that is how it will remain. Then comes motor replacement time since a geared hub does eventually wear out its gears and you usually can't just buy replacement gears for them only. As with any e-bike under pedal power only he is going to have the extra weight of the electric drive components to haul around, shouldn't be any worse then that.

I should mention that I personally don't own a Juiced Rider but I do have one bike that uses the exact same motor it comes with stock from the factory and my battery for it weighs just as much if not more then theirs does. I do have a different pedal drive arrangement consisting of a standard 7-speed derailer gearing instead of IGH three speed though. I also have several custom home built frames that use a geometry set-up very similar to the Juiced Rider frame which I would consider a "mini-long tail" with slightly relaxed cruiser type geometry.



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NOW, it is true that there are certainly "e-bikes" out there that totally sabotage the human drive capability and the pedals are just there for "show" and I personally find scoffing haughty insults the very notion of a hybrid human/electric drive system that should not ignore the human motor and should take full advantage of it as well.

The most obnoxious of these in my personal opinion are those fre-fab electric scooters with their plastic bodies that have a platform for your feet to sit up forward of the seat just plain doing nothing and then as an after thought have these pathetic little short arm pedals mounted a couple inches back behind the seat that go through a single (usually hardly usable) gear ratio and are mounted way too wide and too close to obstructions to be actually used in any kind of effective way and will make your hips sore if you do try to use them due to being mounted so wide appart (large Q-factor). Stuff like this:



That is not a human/electric hybrid vehicle. That is an electric vehicle that has had pedals added to it so that it can squeak by and just barely meet legal requirements. Try actually pedaling one of those things with or without using the motor at the same time and you will see what I mean, the human motor as part of the drive system was never taken even remotely seriously.

Not that I'm against such vehicles in principle being operated on the public roadways as low speed vehicles that if charged off of clean energy resources are much better and wiser for our planet then their gasoline burning counterparts. But for goodness sakes if your going to mount pedals then take them seriously and do it right and respect the human motor as an important part of the drive system. Or don't put pedals on it at all !!!


Next up, are those e-bike builds that the pedal drive is only useful at low speeds. One of my buddies has one of those that I sort of helped him out with finding and buying something that would fit his needs. It was on crag's list across the state border in Idaho and I went along with him to look at it and tell him whether he should buy it or not (since he knew nothing about e-bikes at all). It was an old home-built job where someone had taken a 48v electric scooter 13" wheel direct drive heavy duty mini-monster hub motor and taken an old steel frame mountain bike and cut off the back triangle and welded steel tubing to made a new rear triangle on the bike forming a slightly longer tail with wide low drop-outs to mount that smaller diameter rear wheel hub motor back there and then cut threads on the motors right side outer shaft bearing cover to take a single speed bicycle freewheel and hooked up a single speed pedal drive to the big chain-ring on the mountain bike crank with two 50-cal ammo boxes mounted above the rear wheel on each side to hold the batteries which were worn old Ni-Cd packs. The original builder had done a pretty good job and the motor and controller were all good and sound and the frame was certainly plenty strong and we were able to ride it around for 15-minutes or so on the little charge the old Ni-Cd packs would still hold and the price was right. So he bought it and we recycled the old Ni-Cd packs and replaced them first with one Ping pack that fit in one of the two 50-cal ammo cans and then later on he bought another Ping pack to put in the other ammo can when he had saved up more money to pay for the second pack so he would have double the range. He is still riding it around town to this day (he lives in town unlike me).

Point being though that the single speed pedal drive with that small diameter 13" scooter size rear wheel is geared low enough you can't pedal fast enough to keep up at much more then about 12 mph or so. Basically with that bike whenever you take off from a dead stop like when the red light turns green you pedal along with hitting the motor throttle to help you get up to speed quicker but once your up to speed its pointless to pedal because you can't keep up with the motor anyway. With the motor turned off the low gearing works just fine because that bike is fairly heavy anyway plus the slight drag because the motor is a direct drive hub motor (but surprisingly doesn't have much drag that you can feel, significantly less then my one direct drive hub motor bike where its hub motor was made for bicycle conversion and isn't a re-purposed electric scooter hub) so it really isn't that bad to pedal only, just a little slow due to the low gearing as a result of the small sized rear wheel and then occasionally when you hit a hill big enough to slow down that bikes electric motor enough then you can pedal along with the motor to add your power to help get up the hill.

Although that specific bike is a very clear example of this kind of situation it is not uncommon in the least to find e-bikes where the pedal drive is fully functional just as on any other bicycle but the gearing on the pedal drive is significantly lower ratio then the gearing on the motor such that once your up to speed with the electric motor you can't pedal fast enough to keep up with the motor and add your own power as well.

Those kind of e-bikes I do not consider to be true human/electric hybrids but are certainly a much better solution in my opinion then when the pedal drive is a pathetic joke that isn't even hardly usable and is just there for show and to meet legal requirements.


Finally, there are the true human/electric hybrids which is what I think an e-bike should be. Namely where the human pedal drive is fully functional and effective across the vehicles entire speed range and the rider can always be pedaling and always have their power output be fully utilized along with the power output of the motor.

There is of course some variation within this spectrum, mainly consisting of how well you can move the vehicle under pedal power alone with the motor turned off. But so long as the human motor is not ignored and is taken full advantage of when the motor is running then its a perfectly acceptable design to my way of thinking.

The Juiced Riders offering falls into this category as far as I'm concerned. Especially since when under pedal power alone the hub motor they use has a freewheeling clutch so their is no drag from the motor and its only the extra weight and being limited to just three gears that provide a little narrow gearing range then I would like that have any hindrance on riding under human power alone. As a testament to the fact that their frame design is set-up with a fully functional human pedal drive is the fact that they sell a pedal only non-electric version that uses the exact same frame only without the hub motor and battery and electric drive components.

So, yes, the Juiced Rider bike may be not as nice to pedal only with the motor off as a light weight road bike that has no electric drive whatsoever because your hauling around more weight and your seating position in an upright cruiser style makes for more wind drag and a slight reduction in how much force you can put into the pedals but it shouldn't be any worse then pedaling around a three speed beach cruiser with a picnic lunch in a rear cargo basket over the rear wheel that's equal to the extra weight of the electric drive system. Not a problem at least not in my line of thinking. But then I don't shave and oil my legs and dress in spandex and ride in a tight low tuck with my head craned up so I can see in front of me so long I get neck aches like some weight weenie roadies do fretting about every single gram of weight and every tiny bit of wind and rolling resistance either, so you have to take my viewing point perspective into account as well.