I just took it home yesterday. Went for a 16 mile ride in the dark, you know, to test the durability against our potholes that I could no longer see to avoid.


Day 1, evening ride


FIRST IMPRESSIONS:

+ I really like the hardware: groupset Shimano GRX. It's my first 1X drivetrain. It clunks kind of hard into those high gears though.

+ The stock seat is comfortable. If only this weren't so rare!

+ Mounting bosses inside the main triangle are nice & tall, I suspect so they would have adequate threads to not strip too easily

+ Included 4 A battery charger (twice as fast as the norm)

- No built-in lights. I would have happily skipped the dropper seatpost for at least a good built-in tail light. There is even an extra hole in the grommet on the right/top side of the downtube for a headlight cable, as well as a button on the control for lights.

- PAS levels are not user-tunable.

- Ludicrous OEM accessory pricing. A set of fenders with rack on the back one cost $300, if you can find them. A spare battery will cost upwards of $700, and it's not a big pack. (36 V, 500 Wh) They are not serious about selling accessories, it seems. A competing pack for an Aventon costs half this, and has more cells in it.

- Aluminum fork. What is this, 1999? The 45 mm tires will largely offset this. If it had a carbon fork, I would've likely bought their road bike instead. As it stands, I will likely wear out these knobbies and then replace them with 40 mm slicks.

± Not fully safety certified. Charger is UL Listed, battery and bike have no certifications. This is part of the reason for the 60% discount. It wasn't required when they were made, but now NY requires it and it looks like CA is heading that way too. (probably followed by the rest of the country. There is a free battery coming in the next six months; I bet that one will be fully certified. At any rate, I trust Yamaha has done their due diligence on the BMS (Battery Management System) based on some instructions that say how charging works. For example, it will not charge below freezing, and charging may shut down at higher temperatures as well.

± Not great, unpowered. The extra pedaling energy needed to turn the motor & gears is noticeable on this, where it is not on my lower-end hub-driven eBikes. However, a tester has found that it will go 125 miles on a charge in ECO mode, so this is a trade-off for efficiency under power. (which is not even the lowest assistance level) Edit: This has improved since I figured out the brakes were dragging a bit and fixed them.

± Display/control is not integrated very well. I understand, as this bike cost 1/2 as much as an entry-level Class 1 Trek or Specialized with their better integration. This is an acceptable way to save cost.

± Included Wellgo metal pedals. They're not the best, but not the worst either, and better than nothing. They have broken in and turn pretty easily now after the first 21 miles. My main beef with them is that they're not wide enough, so that when I get my foot comfortably on them, my heel sometimes strikes the chainstay. (and I'm only a size 10 shoe) I will likely replace them with something a bit bigger and with sharp screws to grab my shoe sole better for pulling with the hamstrings.

More to come as I get more miles on it. I think a set of quality flat pedals, rack & fenders are in my near future.

By the way, there is a Wabash model (lacking the RT suffix) which is their Class 1 version.

Excellent initial impressions, thanks. I wouldn't worry about the battery too much and would bet the new one, if certified, would be the same as the one you received. The "bigs" haven't seemed to make any bad batteries (the seven year old Yamaha battery on my Haibike hardtail still seems perfect).

FWIW, I looked up the owner of the UL File Number on the charger, and it's Sony. That gives me some confidence that they would have chosen good cells and electronics for the battery pack too. For example, Sony owns the Murata brand of Li-Ion batteries, which are well-regarded, and Sony certainly knows how to build a good basic battery charger.

Very cool -

When i saw some of the online sales, i wanted to bite, but couldnt find a dealership who would ship to me

Most distressing

The first place I tried, Electric Cyclery in Laguna Beach, CA, state on their web site that they will ship Yamaha ebikes.

My Wabash RT is in the shop; been there after I found it just randomly shuts down about 10 miles into a ride, leaving me to pedal the heavy beast home unpowered. Sometimes it will restart and keep going a few minutes, other times it just randomly shuts down.

I'm really disappointed that Yamaha would not have this ironed out after having been making eBikes for 30 years. That and the decision to sell only in Yamaha powersports dealers really tanked their US business.

Now, they still sell eBikes in the form of Giant, who arguably makes better bicycles and Yamaha just provides the electronics. (which they SHOULD be better at)