My Raleigh Motus Grand tour after 3 years and 10,000 miles

[stevenatleven]

I have had my Cube with a Bosch Gen 4 85nm motor for 3 years and 7100 miles.
The 625w battery seems to me to perform the same as day one, by that i mean i still get the same 40 ish mile run done with a couple of bars left. It was tested after 1 year as part of the the deal and recorded 93%. obviously it will have diminished further but for my typical use it still feels the same.

 

[georgehenry]

Taking the thread a bit off topic by talking about battery longevity, but it is an interesting topic.

As I said above I rode to my friends house on Thursday, a 15 and half mile ride, probably about 70% off road and 30% on road. A climbing route from Godalming rising 774 feet to its high point at the top of The Devils Punch bowl at Gibbet Hill before descending 626 feet into Lindford.

I reached the top of the climb and had used 31% of my battery. When I reached my friends house I still had close to 60% remaining, though I did not write it down.

I could charge at my friends house.

On the ride home I reached the top of the 626 foot climb and had used 26% of my battery. I used a higher assist level to climb the last steep hill home and had 58% of my battery left at the end of the ride.

31 miles ridden. 1629 feet of climbing.

My original 400Wh battery is approaching 8 years and 2 months old.

With quite a lot of guess work it could have been charged at least 2,100 times.

Using the Yamaha workshop manual guide in December 2022 it was recording a capacity between 75% and 100% of when it was new.

I do try to look after this battery as carefully as I can due to the expense of replacing it, but this is basically following the routine I described in my post #18 above.

It seems to be lasting a lot better than the silver fish batteries I use on my two old rear hub drive bikes.

I do ride my Haibike with battery economy in mind, using mostly but not exclusively the lowest assist and no assist where the gradient allows.

 

[tuniwes]

OK, I agree that Saneagle has picked me up on a statement that I made that as an engineer by profession, I understand cannot be true, the battery will obviously be less efficient per 100 charge cycles and it cannot possibly be as good as new, the question is by how much?.....I'm 18 St, so I accept I'm a bit of a challenge for an ebike battery....the new battery I've ordered will provide the definitive answer.
The stats coming back from the Nyon have been fascinating, my starting April calories/mile were 34, since then I have got stuck in, worked a bit harder and am now generating 43 calories/mile, the Nyon teaches you so much about how you ride.....It's measuring your actual power output off the motor which is a game changer...take a high end Garmin watch doing the same task....It doesn't know the wind speed....everything becomes a guess....the Nyon on the other hand knows everything, topography, cadence, power output....for anybody wavering on should I do the upgrade?....no brainer and it is compatible with most Bosch bikes since 104

 

[tuniwes]

OK, I agree that Saneagle has picked me up on a statement that I made that as an engineer by profession, I understand cannot be true, the battery will obviously be less efficient per 100 charge cycles and it cannot possibly be as good as new, the question is by how much?.....I'm 18 St, so I accept I'm a bit of a challenge for an ebike battery....the new battery I've ordered will provide the definitive answer.
The stats coming back from the Nyon have been fascinating, my starting April calories/mile were 34, since then I have got stuck in, worked a bit harder and am now generating 43 calories/mile, the Nyon teaches you so much about how you ride.....It's measuring your actual power output off the motor which is a game changer...take a high end Garmin watch doing the same task....It doesn't know the wind speed....everything becomes a guess....the Nyon on the other hand knows everything, topography, cadence, power output....for anybody wavering on should I do the upgrade?....no brainer and it is compatible with most Bosch bikes since 104

2014

 

[tuniwes]

2014

BTW if anybody is looking for an upgrade from Purion to Intuivia PM me, everything included, mount cables etc £45

 

[saneagle]

Taking the thread a bit off topic by talking about battery longevity, but it is an interesting topic.

As I said above I rode to my friends house on Thursday, a 15 and half mile ride, probably about 70% off road and 30% on road. A climbing route from Godalming rising 774 feet to its high point at the top of The Devils Punch bowl at Gibbet Hill before descending 626 feet into Lindford.

I reached the top of the climb and had used 31% of my battery. When I reached my friends house I still had close to 60% remaining, though I did not write it down.

I could charge at my friends house.

On the ride home I reached the top of the 626 foot climb and had used 26% of my battery. I used a higher assist level to climb the last steep hill home and had 58% of my battery left at the end of the ride.

31 miles ridden. 1629 feet of climbing.

My original 400Wh battery is approaching 8 years and 2 months old.

With quite a lot of guess work it could have been charged at least 2,100 times.

Using the Yamaha workshop manual guide in December 2022 it was recording a capacity between 75% and 100% of when it was new.

I do try to look after this battery as carefully as I can due to the expense of replacing it, but this is basically following the routine I described in my post #18 above.

It seems to be lasting a lot better than the silver fish batteries I use on my two old rear hub drive bikes.

I do ride my Haibike with battery economy in mind, using mostly but not exclusively the lowest assist and no assist where the gradient allows.

My first bike was a cheap Chinese one. It had one level of assist, which was maximum until the motor started to max out. It had an 8.8 ah 36v battery. I bought it for ny 14.4 mile each way commute. On the first couple of days, the battery cut out on the last hill 1/4 mile from home. By the end of the week, I could just get the bike home without it cutting out. After 3000 miles of commuting and pleausure riding, and fitting a wattmeter so that I could see how much battery I was using and an "economy" switch, I could do the return journey using only 12% of the battery (1Ah), so the range increased from 29 miles to 253 miles. Four years later, it could still do the same. What does that tell you?

 

[georgehenry]

So in essence saneagle as my battery has weakened I have hopefully become fitter and also very experienced at managing how I ride my bike in relation to my battery consumption to essentially mask its decline.

I still think its holding up very well.

 

[soundwave]

So in essence saneagle as my battery has weakened I have hopefully become fitter and also very experienced at managing how I ride my bike in relation to my battery consumption to essentially mask its decline.

I still think its holding up very well.

if you get a new batt you will feel the difference it took me 200 miles just to brake in the new bearings in my bosch cx from peter.

but there is way more kick from my new batt and after nearly 10 years on this thing i can pump out 500w from my legs and why i can hit over 35mph and nuke every road bike to date.

you got the motor done so treat your self and get a new batt cos everything is going down the $hit hole

 

[saneagle]

I still think its holding up very well.

I'm sure it is. I'm just making the point that how far you can pedal has little to do with the health of your battery. I could put a motor, battery and other stuff in a rucksack and pedal it for 1000 miles without the battery going flat. and I'd be able to go even further if I cut half the cells out of that battery and chucked them.

The only meaningful test of a battery's condition is a battery tester or wattmeter.

 

[soundwave]

m8s bbs hd with a batt 24 months old can do 17 miles new it was 24 and 20 ah frame batt.

but he uses a throttle and can afford new batts as got 4 of them now

 

[tuniwes]

It's now a very different bike to the one that was delivered. I have taken advantage of the CTW scheme over the last 2 years to upgrade it into my "Perfect bike"

Changes that I have made:

Nexus 7 speed-> Rohloff speedhub (Gamechanger)
Stock seat post-> Thudbuster ST (Very comfortable)
Tektra brakes-> Mugura MT5 4 Pot (So powerful, now feel safe on the steepest descents I'm 18St, the stock Tektra's were terrible)
Stock Saddle-> Brooks B17 Special (There's nothing more comfortable, I've had it for 14 years)
Intuiva display-> Nyon 2 ( Just done this, the conversion is fairly easy but you do need to replace the motor cable through the frame)...Wow! best display there is and is the icing on the cake
Tyres-> Schwalbe Marathon E plus (Disappointed with the punctures I've had running these
Tyre Inserts-> Tannus Armour (We'll see how well they work)
Pedals -> SHIMANO PD-GR500L didn't like these at first, the grip pinds were lethal on your shins, I turned them over so that the cap heads provided the grip)

All in all, It owes me around £4,500 but similarly specified bikes out of R&M with a Rohloff drive now start at £7,500.

Generally, It's quite difficult to buy a new bike with a Rohloff drive, the E14 electronic change option is now available as an upgrade but wouLd cost around £1,000 fitted, I'll stick with the twist grip

R&M's have the CX motor, I'm quite happy with the performance line + motor, I wouldn't change it for a CX if I could, don't like how noisy they are.

So, very happy with how the bike has evolved, the only other thing I may add is a spare battery for touring when i retire

Update, 11,00 miles, after having 3 punctures since fitting the Tannus armour I could not recommend this as a solution, the only benefit for me is that you can get home SLOWLY on them but you can also do this with a can of foam for a fiver.
The only upgrade left for me were the front forks, since upping my mileage to 25 a day sometimes on forestry trails, the impact on my shoulder muscles was noticeable...the original fork on the motus was a spring loaded Suntour with 60mm compression, I realised this was not even coming in to play except for 4 inch kerbs.
I swapped that out for a Rockshoxs recon air shocks....what a difference!, like riding on a pillow.
There were no mounting points for mudguards, something essential to me so fitted SKS Speedrocker mudguards that don't need any bolt holes.

Nothing left to to do now, highlights of the upgrade:
Rohloff, yes expensive but I have the best gearing solution there is and it will outlive me
Magura 4 piston brakes, feel much safer on downhills compared to the old Tektra 2 piston
Brookes saddle...simply the best seating solution for ebikes there is.
Rockshox...just wonderful
Bosch Nyon display....Perfect ebike display with built in satnav and every conceivable piece of info you could want to know about your ride.

I've learned a lot about routine maintenance on the way:
New chain every 2,500 flip the rear cog or replace it at the same time
New brake pads every 1,500
New wheel bearings every 5,000
New tyres every 2,500
Rohloff oil change every 3,000

 

[Bullet]

It's now a very different bike to the one that was delivered. I have taken advantage of the CTW scheme over the last 2 years to upgrade it into my "Perfect bike"

Changes that I have made:

Nexus 7 speed-> Rohloff speedhub (Gamechanger)
Stock seat post-> Thudbuster ST (Very comfortable)
Tektra brakes-> Mugura MT5 4 Pot (So powerful, now feel safe on the steepest descents I'm 18St, the stock Tektra's were terrible)
Stock Saddle-> Brooks B17 Special (There's nothing more comfortable, I've had it for 14 years)
Intuiva display-> Nyon 2 ( Just done this, the conversion is fairly easy but you do need to replace the motor cable through the frame)...Wow! best display there is and is the icing on the cake
Tyres-> Schwalbe Marathon E plus (Disappointed with the punctures I've had running these
Tyre Inserts-> Tannus Armour (We'll see how well they work)
Pedals -> SHIMANO PD-GR500L didn't like these at first, the grip pinds were lethal on your shins, I turned them over so that the cap heads provided the grip)

All in all, It owes me around £4,500 but similarly specified bikes out of R&M with a Rohloff drive now start at £7,500.

Generally, It's quite difficult to buy a new bike with a Rohloff drive, the E14 electronic change option is now available as an upgrade but wouLd cost around £1,000 fitted, I'll stick with the twist grip

R&M's have the CX motor, I'm quite happy with the performance line + motor, I wouldn't change it for a CX if I could, don't like how noisy they are.

So, very happy with how the bike has evolved, the only other thing I may add is a spare battery for touring when i retire

I've had a Raleigh captus 8 years now and it's still doing 3 hours on a charge and the original cassette, excellent bike

 

[tuniwes]

Update 13,0000 miles
Just completed the second oil change on the Rohloff, installed @ 6,800 miles. Every day I marvel at the experience of riding with Rohloff......fit and forget apart from the oil change.
The addition of the Loam seat post(mentioned on the seat post thread) and lupine slx front light brings my upgrade journey to and end.
I'm finally satisfied that I have the perfect bile for me.
This is the Lupine slx in my local park...extraordinarily good....expensive like the Rohloff but worth every penny if your bike is your only means of transport both from a safety and an overall enjoyment perspective.

 

[guerney]

This is the Lupine slx in my local park...extraordinarily good....expensive like the Rohloff but worth every penny if your bike is your only means of transport both from a safety and an overall enjoyment perspective.

2100 lumens sounds good! €429.00 less so. It's difficult to judge brightness from photos, because cameras expose differently for their different sensors with their different lenses and algorithms. By way of example, Lupine's own photos look dimmer than yours.

Lupine Lighting Systems - E-Bike lights • SL X • SL X (25km / h)

The SL X is safety, safety during the day and safety at night. With up to 2800 lumens of high beam, the SL X is our brightest StVZO-approved e-bike lighting and gives you the feeling of absolute safety even off the road.

www.lupine.de

 

[AntonyC]

Looks good and the upgrades seem a sound investment over 13k miles, although round here I'd have to upgrade the locks to match.

I don't quite get the Loam dropper(?) post, I was going to suggest a SP12NCX as it's plusher than a Thudbuster. A frame bag is dead handy with 3 to "7" litres and large openings:

https://www.amazon.co.uk/BLACKBURN-OUTPOST-MEDIUM-EXPANDABLE-FRAME/dp/B013VQ1E9K?th=1

 

[tuniwes]

Anthony, here's my thinking on the Loam dropper post from another thread, really works well for me:

Shock absorber seat post

Hi would appreciate the benefit of others experience here. I have reached an age where comfort is creeping up my priorities list. I would like to add a shock absorber seat post to my new bike but the range is wide from £15 ebay ones to £80 + ones, so it may be easy to waste money at either end...

www.pedelecs.co.uk

I previously used a Thudbuster ST which I've moved onto my Specialized Tricross.

I have just invested in an upgraded ABUS lock and Vaude frame bag to store it. It's a nice bag with two waterproof compartments....just the right size

 

[guerney]

I don't trust "waterpoofing" claims made about any bag with a zip. It took ages to carefully dry out one of my DSLRs and lenses etc. for a week, using silica beads, after a 43 mile bike ride in the rain. So I bought a bunch of roll top dry bags of various sizes in a sale, for everything from my phone to something of rolled sleeping bag domension, to stash inside bags with zips claiming to be waterproof but never are when exposed to several hours of sustained heavy rain. That won't happen to my camera and gear again.