Hi everyone! So I've been looking into getting an ebike kit for some time now and finally decided to get serious about purchasing. After reading through the forums and asking questions about anything that I could see being a potential problem, I figured that the 1000W 48V kit would be good for me and fit my bike. It would substitute the need for a car and allow me to get quick short rides to where I need to go as well as assist in longer rides.
Being a student with tuition and rent to pay (4 years of school, 3 semesters a year = year round school, yay), I needed to confirm with my parents before spending around $1k for the 1000W kit. Not to mention that my credit limit is also just slightly below what I needed to purchase
So after talking with my dad about it, he was pretty fine with it as long as I could first see the product in real life.
I emailed Gary from GM Canada and after asking a few quesitons, including can I see the product, he agreed to show me his own bike. So off to Mississauga I went and not only did Gary bring one bike, he brought two! Correct me if I'm wrong here Gary, but if I recall correctly, the one bike had a 500W 36 volt rear hub wheel and the other had a 1000W 48V front. We took the bikes to some trails and I started off with the 500W bike.
The 500W was quite powerful. It smoothly accelerated up to its controller-limited speed of around 32kph I think and was able to maintain that on even slightly uphill paths. Going over a whole bunch of bumps with the bike also created no problems. On flat surfaces it took roughly 10 seconds I think before I could no longer feel acceleration coming out of the wheel. Gary was easily able to outrun me on the 1000W bike however, as it was not speed limited. The 500W had a twist throttle, which made it kind of awkward to hold in the full-throttle position without readjusting my grip.
After riding the 500W for a little while, Gary and I switched up and I tried out his 1000W bike. This bike had the thumb-throttle installed and I found it much easier to use. I could instantly feel the greater acceleration of this bike right from the start. Travelling down a flat road, the bike would accelerate quite quickly and then start to accelerate less and less as it went faster. With the 500W motor I could tell that the acceleration stopped once I reached a certain speed (32km/h) but with the 1000W, it kept accelerating until the force of the wind balanced the force from the wheel. I tried making myself more aerodynamic and could feel the speed creep up a little then, which also showed that the motor was not speed limited. At the speed that the 1000W brought me to I felt like it was plenty fast but not at a speed where I would consider a wipeout to be dangerous (ie. more than road rash or a broken arm).
The regenerative braking on both bikes was very good. Most of the time I did not even need to pull the brakes harder to activate the regular brakes. What I like most about the regen braking is not so much that it recharges the battery, but that it saves wear on the regular brakes.
As we rode our bikes along we got a few looks of interest. I like how inconspicuous the entire setup is. People probably didn't realize for a few moments that the bikes were propeled by a motor. If it weren't for the battery hanging off the back then it would be really hard to tell.
All in all the entire kit seems to have a good reputation and the product prooved itself to me today. When I got back home I purchased the 1000W 48V hub motor from goldenmotor.ca with a 12ah 48V battery and a couple other accessories such as the seat-post rack and the gear removal tool. I plan on putting it on my bike that I bought from Costco a few years ago (I’ll include a picture). I’ll update when I get the kit and have it installed. I can’t wait to give it a try and thanks for the demo and all the help Gary!
The picture with the front hub motor is me on Gary’s 1000W bike.
PS: For some reason the pictures aren't showing up when I log out of my account, which means no one else can see them either. As a temporary fix I've uploaded them elsewhere and provided links.
http://picasaweb.google.ca/mike662/Bike#5477158118112277682http://picasaweb.google.ca/mike662/Bike#5474263357066330930
