I've been waiting for an affordable full suspension electric mountain bike to come to the market for some time, I had my eye on the Biketec Swiss Flyer X series with the Panasonic system which I am sure are great bikes (not actually tested one), but they have been too expensive and dealer service a bit convoluted.
So when Haibike teamed with the new Bosch system to produce the Xduro full suspension at a much lower price point, then the decision to spend became much easier. Also, ever since I introduced my wife to my Cytronex road bikes, she has secretly been hoping I would splash out on something for her birthday (and provided me with the perfect excuse to buy), so on Wednesday last week I called James at LEV Justebikes.co.uk and purchased two bikes and the bikes were delivered yesterday (Sunday) by James, who is a very nice chap.
Wow! This is the same fun to be had on a FS mountain bike, but with an extra dollop of fun! If you ever pick-up a mountain bike magazine (I do rarely) then you'll notice a growing market of bike parks that have an 'uplift' system that will transport your bike to the top of the hill/mountain so that you can enjoy the downhill bits without the strain of having to ride up the hill again and again (and some people call electric bikes cheating, ha!). Well with the Xduro, there is no need for such an uplift system as it is included for free with the bike!
We went for a 30km test ride (20+Km off-road), setting off late afternoon, the route was in the North Hampshire Downs, a beautiful area of rolling hills, steep valleys, woods, ridgelines, roman roads, archealogical sites, no traffic, no people, chocolate box villages, tons of wildlife, idyllic and right on my doorstep. The aim was to visit Fosbury Ring Fosbury Camp Hillfort : The Megalithic Portal and Megalith Map: I have done this route before on my unpowered Marin Attack Trail FS and arrived home wasted, my wife has attempted this route before and only managed half the route because of the steepness and difficulty of some of the hills.
On the Xduro we both completed the route, having taken in the scenery, stopped for a sandwich and a pint, pedalled up some steep (20% in places) hills non-stop and raced (in my case) down the same hills, bikes and people made it back safely.
As we are still relatively young (30's and 40's) and want to increase our fitness levels, we didn't want the bikes to do all the work, so found a natural rythym on setting 2 Tour, with occasional forays into the other settings. Even on the steep uphills it was easy to maintain 10-12Km/hour whilst still putting in some legwork, higher settings meant less legwork, but we were happy with this as we wanted to feel like we were going for a mountain bike ride. We arrived home tired and pleased with the energy we had put into the ride, today (Monday) I can feel my legs and body aching from the exertion so I know we did enough but not too much to be too tired to get out of bed for work
The bike and electric drive system itself is solid, only rattles are from the front forks, which clatter like all suspension forks do when being bounced hard down rocky, rooty, ribbed, stony, bumpy hills, the bike feels like a quality mountain bike and is solid and sure footed, brakes are good. Suspension is very good, however mine does need some more air in the shock and forks which I'll pump in when I get the chance. As with all bikes of this type, personal tweaks to the setup are needed before a full impression can be gained. Front and rear suspension are fully adjustable for air, rebound and damping with a lockout for the forks (not sure about rear lockout yet).
Before riding this bike, I had only ridden the Panasonic crank drive on a short test ride, but I can say that the Bosch assistance is as smooth as silk at the lower power settings and takes off like a rocket at the highest. The ramp down at cutoff (25Km) appears to be smooth also. The drive matches leg input in a way that is very controllable, just what you need when offroad on a steep hill on loose rocks.
The bike arrived with 5 bars showing on the battery and had 2 remaining on mine and 3 on my wife's when we had finished the ride, so with similar riding I guess we could get around 50-60km range, which would be good for a 4-5 hour, cross-country, off-road, hilly day out. The computer tracked the usual bike related things and showed we had averaged 14km/hour. There is some electric motor whine present when underway which increases under load, but certainly nothing that annoyed me and wasn't unexpected. One aspect of the ride I found was that I felt actually forgot that I was riding an electric bike a couple of times and was just enjoying the ride, it was such a natural cycling experience, I think that is a good indicator of how this bike feels. The freewheel is excellent with no noticable drag from the motor, the weight of the bike is 2 or 3 kilos heavier than my Marin, so pedalling freewheel is just as much work, setting 1 eco (the lowest setting available) takes the sting out of pedalling the bike at low, easy cruising speed when on a slight incline.
As is typical with all electric bikes, the assistance encourages you to get out and ride more and I can see that our Xduro's will not be getting an easy ride this Summer! If you are in the market for an electrified full suspension moutain bike, then I don't think you will be disappointed with the Haibike/Bosch system.
No pics of the ride out, but here is the best one I can find of the bike....
http://wurstkoffer.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/haibike.jpg
PS if anyone wants to cycle in this wonderful part of the UK I can provide some pointers for routes (on or off road).
Tim.
So when Haibike teamed with the new Bosch system to produce the Xduro full suspension at a much lower price point, then the decision to spend became much easier. Also, ever since I introduced my wife to my Cytronex road bikes, she has secretly been hoping I would splash out on something for her birthday (and provided me with the perfect excuse to buy), so on Wednesday last week I called James at LEV Justebikes.co.uk and purchased two bikes and the bikes were delivered yesterday (Sunday) by James, who is a very nice chap.
Wow! This is the same fun to be had on a FS mountain bike, but with an extra dollop of fun! If you ever pick-up a mountain bike magazine (I do rarely) then you'll notice a growing market of bike parks that have an 'uplift' system that will transport your bike to the top of the hill/mountain so that you can enjoy the downhill bits without the strain of having to ride up the hill again and again (and some people call electric bikes cheating, ha!). Well with the Xduro, there is no need for such an uplift system as it is included for free with the bike!
We went for a 30km test ride (20+Km off-road), setting off late afternoon, the route was in the North Hampshire Downs, a beautiful area of rolling hills, steep valleys, woods, ridgelines, roman roads, archealogical sites, no traffic, no people, chocolate box villages, tons of wildlife, idyllic and right on my doorstep. The aim was to visit Fosbury Ring Fosbury Camp Hillfort : The Megalithic Portal and Megalith Map: I have done this route before on my unpowered Marin Attack Trail FS and arrived home wasted, my wife has attempted this route before and only managed half the route because of the steepness and difficulty of some of the hills.
On the Xduro we both completed the route, having taken in the scenery, stopped for a sandwich and a pint, pedalled up some steep (20% in places) hills non-stop and raced (in my case) down the same hills, bikes and people made it back safely.
As we are still relatively young (30's and 40's) and want to increase our fitness levels, we didn't want the bikes to do all the work, so found a natural rythym on setting 2 Tour, with occasional forays into the other settings. Even on the steep uphills it was easy to maintain 10-12Km/hour whilst still putting in some legwork, higher settings meant less legwork, but we were happy with this as we wanted to feel like we were going for a mountain bike ride. We arrived home tired and pleased with the energy we had put into the ride, today (Monday) I can feel my legs and body aching from the exertion so I know we did enough but not too much to be too tired to get out of bed for work
The bike and electric drive system itself is solid, only rattles are from the front forks, which clatter like all suspension forks do when being bounced hard down rocky, rooty, ribbed, stony, bumpy hills, the bike feels like a quality mountain bike and is solid and sure footed, brakes are good. Suspension is very good, however mine does need some more air in the shock and forks which I'll pump in when I get the chance. As with all bikes of this type, personal tweaks to the setup are needed before a full impression can be gained. Front and rear suspension are fully adjustable for air, rebound and damping with a lockout for the forks (not sure about rear lockout yet).
Before riding this bike, I had only ridden the Panasonic crank drive on a short test ride, but I can say that the Bosch assistance is as smooth as silk at the lower power settings and takes off like a rocket at the highest. The ramp down at cutoff (25Km) appears to be smooth also. The drive matches leg input in a way that is very controllable, just what you need when offroad on a steep hill on loose rocks.
The bike arrived with 5 bars showing on the battery and had 2 remaining on mine and 3 on my wife's when we had finished the ride, so with similar riding I guess we could get around 50-60km range, which would be good for a 4-5 hour, cross-country, off-road, hilly day out. The computer tracked the usual bike related things and showed we had averaged 14km/hour. There is some electric motor whine present when underway which increases under load, but certainly nothing that annoyed me and wasn't unexpected. One aspect of the ride I found was that I felt actually forgot that I was riding an electric bike a couple of times and was just enjoying the ride, it was such a natural cycling experience, I think that is a good indicator of how this bike feels. The freewheel is excellent with no noticable drag from the motor, the weight of the bike is 2 or 3 kilos heavier than my Marin, so pedalling freewheel is just as much work, setting 1 eco (the lowest setting available) takes the sting out of pedalling the bike at low, easy cruising speed when on a slight incline.
As is typical with all electric bikes, the assistance encourages you to get out and ride more and I can see that our Xduro's will not be getting an easy ride this Summer! If you are in the market for an electrified full suspension moutain bike, then I don't think you will be disappointed with the Haibike/Bosch system.
No pics of the ride out, but here is the best one I can find of the bike....
http://wurstkoffer.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/haibike.jpg
PS if anyone wants to cycle in this wonderful part of the UK I can provide some pointers for routes (on or off road).
Tim.
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