Originally Posted by
Tourist in MSN
Thanks for posting your customer service experience with replacement parts.
Nothing against the USB Werk or Cinq5, but I bought a Sinewave Revolution about eight years ago. It is usually under a roof in rainy weather, but it has seen a few untimely downpours. It also saw about ten weeks of continuous outdoor use on a couple tours in rainy places. The revolution has outstanding waterproofing. It is the black box with a white label in the photo where it is attached to the handlebar bag bracket with a zip tie. In the photo, the USB port is on top, the red cable is plugged into it. Later I changed that, now put the USB port on the bottom so rain water does not collect in the port. It is less convenient on the bottom, I can't see the port when I am plugging a cable into it, but it only takes a few extra seconds to plug a cable into it.
Initially I strapped it to my top tube where I could plug things in with my left hand. Later changed that to my handlebar bag bracket which is much closer to anything I would want to plug into it, which usually is my pass through cache battery, or powerbank that is stored in the handlebar bag.
And looking close at the photo, there are a few drops of rain on everything.
I was (and still am) impressed by the waterproofness of the Revolution, doubly so due to living coastal where salt air has the potential to quickly corrode not just bicycle parts but generally anything electronic, so I was quick to cast my eyes over it, early in the piece when it was announced.
The only reason it wasn’t an upgrade for me was that having toured with a friend who has the same bike (as I do), it quickly became obvious that my E-works charging kicked in a few km/ph quicker which much better (for me) suited my very slow style of meandering whilst on tour.
From memory there was less than 3 mph in it, but I only tour heavily laden and usually with a trailer so I stuck with what I has despite being envious of the gold plated USB fitting and superior internal component sealing of the Revolution.
I’ve had to replace a couple of the cables over the years, due to the aforementioned corrosion issues, but luckily this hasn’t been a problem due to online shopping and overseas stores like sjscycles.
https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/search/?term=Ewerk
Which reminds me, I need to choose a new cache battery for my bike as the E-werk one is once again kaput and there are cheaper, larger and more technically advanced batteries now available than there was when I made my purchase decision.
I’ve replaced it with the original E-werk twice before but there are now many much more superior options available so it’s mainly about finding a no less elegant solution as the genuine article, whilst no longer as readily available, came with its own sturdy frame bag.
https://www.sjscycles.co.uk/dynamos/busch-muller-cache-battery-for-ewerk