[15rms]

My local Schwinn dealer tells me their electric bike is availble. Has anybody ridden one of these yet? Since they are peddle assist only I just wonder if they have any power you can actually feel? Thanks

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[The7]

What is the model in your mind?

[Abneycat]

PAS bikes are typically designed more to regulate your riding experience (smooth out the hills and headwinds), more than they are to put power beneath your feet. Considering that the Schwinn bikes are set to be 180w motors, they won't be the most powerful offerings out there.

Personally, I find them disappointing. These bikes were on Treehugger probably a year and a half ago when I read about them, and now finding out the price is a let down: $1899 for the Campus for instance, which comes with nothing special - in fact, it comes with *low* level Tourney and Microshift components. Even the "leather" saddle is actually made of Vinyl.

You could go out, buy an eZee kit and an REI Novara Buzz for less, and end up with a *way* better component package.

[15rms]

I am considering the World GSE. All 3 seem to have the same electric system. Abneycat I know this sounds excentric however I am thinking on putting a bionx on it also. I am soon to retire in the Denver area and would like a electric bike to not only flatten out the hills but have the staying power to spend several hours on. I figure the Schwinn geared hub won't drag when the battery runs dead and I can set the Bionx on a very low setting to make it last the duration. Any thoughts? Thanks

[cerewa]

buy a big lifepo4 battery with your 1000 bucks, stead of a bionx.

one motor is enough.

enough battery capacity, and you can run your motor at 180W (high throttle for the schwinn, i guess) for 5 hours easy.

[Abneycat]

The only thing that'll put a kink in Cerewa's suggestion is that the Schwinn is using a proprietary battery system according to their website. That doesn't necessarily mean that its going to be a big deal, but it could be, depending on how proprietary Schwinn has designed their system to be - if the battery has a custom BMS and controller which are linked to each other, it would be a major deal to work around.

I don't really know how proprietary Schwinn's system is, you'd probably just have to be up front and ask them - could just be that the battery is built in and you don't need any custom work at all other than to pack your battery on a rack. In that case, it would work just fine :)

Thats correct that a geared motor shouldn't be generating any extra drag, it would just count for additional weight. But like Cerewa says, if you get a motor that doesn't use a proprietary system you can just go for a custom battery configuration that would handle a long distance ride without needing any additional bulk or fuss. Most kits are able to, BionX cannot.

I would suggest looking into an eZee, Heinzmann, or geared frame mount motor.