Reviewer: Mike W
Purchased From: Alien Bikes
Purchase Price: £999 (incl. delivery)
Time Owned: 1 week
Local Terrain: Moderate Hills
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Strengths: Range, (off-road!) speed, torque/hill climbing ability (in power-assist and throttle), launch, price, solid build, controls fall to hands nicely, sized for taller rider, comfy.
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Weaknesses: Weight, the law, gearing could be set higher.
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Summary: Wanted a bike that enabled me to do the 17 mile round-trip, back-road commute between home and office without getting sweaty/tired every day (previously used Brompton + train most days). Country roads: bendy, hilly, but not mountainous, and very few cars. Bought this, never having seen/tried one in the flesh, largely on the strength of comments on this forum (and having tried a GoCycle, an Oxygen E-Mate and a Kalkhoff). One week in and it’s great. Using the pedal-assist more than I thought I would as it really goes up hill well in this mode and isn’t hard work. Will do it OK in throttle-only, but high-power mode + pedals is more satisfying, and faster. Going at what I considered a non-strenuous, typical pace, using a mixture of modes, revealed an average speed of 17.9 mph over the 8.5-mile trip with all its ups and downs, according to the cycle computer, which is 60% faster than I used to manage on a non-ebike, and a lot more pleasant. In high-power mode it will touch 20 mph on the flat, fully laden, in throttle only. Medium power is comparable to the strictly road-legal bikes I’ve tried. Low power seems largely pointless. It is very heavy and doesn’t coast well when you crest a hill, resulting in a tendency to engage the throttle on the downslope until the speed picks up (which is a guilty pleasure at this stage).
The battery charger weighs next to nothing so I have been taking it in the panniers to the office. The panniers supplied, which hide a lot of the workings, are spacious. I removed the bottle holder as a) the bottle supplied didn’t fit it, and b) it was stopping me attaching a D-Lock bracket. I don’t find it too noisy (neither in the widely-reported battery rattle nor the whine of the motor). I’m 6’1” with 33” i/l and it fits, with neither the seat post nor the handlebars at close to their maximum height. My 6’6” all-legs friend does still find the frame a little small for him (though better than many others on the market), but that was without any adjustment to my riding position, and he still liked it.
It is heavy, particularly at the back end. The upside is it feels very sturdy and is comfortable to ride, but, like me, it probably could benefit from shedding a few pounds. The only other downside I can see in the first week is that the gearing could be set higher - I can leave it in top gear pretty much all the time (the assist really kicks in when you set off).
So, in summary, with the caveat that it’s still early in the relationship, I’m loving the alien.
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Overall Rating (out of 10) : 8
Purchased From: Alien Bikes
Purchase Price: £999 (incl. delivery)
Time Owned: 1 week
Local Terrain: Moderate Hills
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Strengths: Range, (off-road!) speed, torque/hill climbing ability (in power-assist and throttle), launch, price, solid build, controls fall to hands nicely, sized for taller rider, comfy.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Weaknesses: Weight, the law, gearing could be set higher.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
Summary: Wanted a bike that enabled me to do the 17 mile round-trip, back-road commute between home and office without getting sweaty/tired every day (previously used Brompton + train most days). Country roads: bendy, hilly, but not mountainous, and very few cars. Bought this, never having seen/tried one in the flesh, largely on the strength of comments on this forum (and having tried a GoCycle, an Oxygen E-Mate and a Kalkhoff). One week in and it’s great. Using the pedal-assist more than I thought I would as it really goes up hill well in this mode and isn’t hard work. Will do it OK in throttle-only, but high-power mode + pedals is more satisfying, and faster. Going at what I considered a non-strenuous, typical pace, using a mixture of modes, revealed an average speed of 17.9 mph over the 8.5-mile trip with all its ups and downs, according to the cycle computer, which is 60% faster than I used to manage on a non-ebike, and a lot more pleasant. In high-power mode it will touch 20 mph on the flat, fully laden, in throttle only. Medium power is comparable to the strictly road-legal bikes I’ve tried. Low power seems largely pointless. It is very heavy and doesn’t coast well when you crest a hill, resulting in a tendency to engage the throttle on the downslope until the speed picks up (which is a guilty pleasure at this stage).
The battery charger weighs next to nothing so I have been taking it in the panniers to the office. The panniers supplied, which hide a lot of the workings, are spacious. I removed the bottle holder as a) the bottle supplied didn’t fit it, and b) it was stopping me attaching a D-Lock bracket. I don’t find it too noisy (neither in the widely-reported battery rattle nor the whine of the motor). I’m 6’1” with 33” i/l and it fits, with neither the seat post nor the handlebars at close to their maximum height. My 6’6” all-legs friend does still find the frame a little small for him (though better than many others on the market), but that was without any adjustment to my riding position, and he still liked it.
It is heavy, particularly at the back end. The upside is it feels very sturdy and is comfortable to ride, but, like me, it probably could benefit from shedding a few pounds. The only other downside I can see in the first week is that the gearing could be set higher - I can leave it in top gear pretty much all the time (the assist really kicks in when you set off).
So, in summary, with the caveat that it’s still early in the relationship, I’m loving the alien.
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Overall Rating (out of 10) : 8
