I purchased an e-bike (tobabikes.com) and I'm having problems with the gear shifting. Shifting from 2nd to 1st is not reliable - the chain keeps getting stuck. And this may happen in a downward slope.

The pedal is blocked from moving forward and I have to stop and get off the bike and after a while walking with the bike, I can get back on and the pedal moves forward.

When I'm not so lucky, the chain becomes loose. The rear of this bike is too heavy (with motor and battery) to lift and try to get the chain back on my own. I cannot fix it until I get somebody to help me, which is usually my husband who has to drive to where I'm stranded.

I took the bicycle back to the store and I quickly reproduced the problem in front of them (riding it downhill). The person who sold it to me, looked at it and said the rivet is defective, and cannot be fixed and I can only ride on 1x7 or 2x7 or shift first from 2x8 down to 2x7 before going to 1x7.

Not being satisfied with his explanation, as I've never had this problem with previous bikes, including my recumbents, I decided to write the bicycle company.

He basically agreed with the Bike Shop salesperson:


...avoid riding both gears which were opposed (small gear on the back and small gear on the front)

I can confirm, what they (bike shop salesperson) said was right. Having your chain crossed like this may damage the derailleur and the sprockets faster and also give a bad shifting.

This is not specific to the Toba bike, it’s the same situation for every bike on the market.

Here is a draw of shifting that you should avoid:



It’s always better to have your chain as straight as possible from back to front gears.

As a distributor, we don’t provide direct service on products sold, it’s the bike store’s job to fix the situation.


I'm not a bike mechanic, and this has been boggling my mind. So I'm exposing this here to hopefully get some answers from more knowledgeable bike mechanics/experts.

Thanks for reading.

Denise.

I have no idea what the person in the bike shop means by a defective rivet, and if whatever he is talking about is defective it should be replaced. I looked your bike up but have no idea which model you have, there are several different models from that company, I will assume that yours is the Edwin step through frame model. Frankly, you need to find a better bike shop where they can explain what your problem is in a way that you can understand what they are talking about. You do not say what part of the city you live in, there are lots of good bike shops in Montreal and your problem has nothing to do with the Bionix system, any decent bike shop can work on the derailleurs and shifters. I am very familiar with the e drive system on your bike, in fact I just did a Bionix conversion for one of our customers today
Where did you buy the bike?

It is the Toba Edwin I'm talking about, their only other e-bike is the Toba Edison. I'm short at 5'1" and this bicycle was perfect for me. Thanks for reassuring me that it has nothing to do with Bion-X. I'm quite happy with Bion-X actually - it has been performing very well.

Unfortunately, I cannot transfer the Bion-x system to my older bike, because the wheel is of different size and it would be too rear heavy for a bike that's not a step-through or low entry like the Edwin.

I live in Sherbrooke and the bike shop is sports4saisons.com

I offered to go to Levis, QC to get this problem solved. Getting the bike replaced would be ideal, but I'm not getting much help from the company (Cycle Lambert) which makes me wonder if every other Toba bicycle has this same issue. I was hoping I just got a dud that needed a replacement, instead of hearing "well, you're just going to have to avoid using the 1x8, 2x8 and 3x8 gears".

I need to act fast - I purchased it July this year and it comes with only 1 year warranty.

I could take a picture of the part (rivet) the salesperson was pointing at, while explaining the problem to my husband, if you'd like to take a look.

Your information shows you as living in Montreal. You probably just need some adjustments to your derailleurs, and you also need to learn how to use your gears more effectively. Your Bionix system was manufactured in Sherbrooke, and it is very good quality. The company I work sells many bikes converted to the Bionix system, but we haven't done any with 24 speed derailleur drivetrains like your bike has. A picture of the "rivet" might be helpful. If the shop that sold you the bike tells you that one of the components on the bike is defective and the bike is under warranty, it should be repaired. Looking at the bike, I am sure that it was pretty expensive, there is no excuse for not repairing a defective part. Cycles Lambert is the distributor, not the manufacturer of the bike
A warranty repair would replace the defective component, not the whole bike. It is however true that certain gear combinations should be used as little as possible, they cause excessive wear to components and pretty much the same gear ratio can be obtained using different gear combinations. On a 24 gear bike there are really only about 18 gears that work well. Don't think of this as a defect, this is how derailleur setups work
Your recumbent probably had a much longer chain. The longer the chain the less the chain will have to deflect when using extreme gear combinations

Most of my previous bicycles were hybrids, not recumbents, like the Minelli 21 speed and none presented this kind of problem.

Picture I was referring to:

Don't know exactly what you are referring to in the picture. All I can see is a closeup picture of the chainring area of your bike. 21 speed bikes use a narrower cassette than 24 speed bikes, so chain angles at the extremes are worse on your current bike than they were on your older ones. even then, using those extreme angle gear combinations isn't good for your drivetrain. You need to have your derailleur adjustments checked by a good bike mechanic. It is your bike shop's responsibility to repair the problem you are having, they are supposed to repair or replace the defective part which they will send back to the distributor for warranty replacement. Cycles Lambert can be difficult to deal with for a retailer, but you have to be persistent with them to have the problem repaired