I went for a bike ride today with a good friend on the Cumberland Valley Rail Trail starting in Newville PA. We managed to ride 18 miles total, but took it slow for his sake, averaging about 9 miles per hour. My battery stayed on 5 bars, except whenever my friend borrowed my e bike and went at top throttle speed to cool off several times. He’s sold on the concept of e bikes after riding mine and will be in the market for one this fall. He definitely had the “e bike grin” every time he borrowed my bike. Regardless I’m pretty confident now of being able to complete a 30 mile group ride on rail trails near Elizabethtown PA on August 16.
Yees, I’ll try to remember to snap a few. I’m not one of those guys who can ride without touching the handlebars though. In fact I almost always keep both hands on the handlebars, so I don’t attempt to take photos while moving. I’m going to be going through Mt. Gretna PA which I’ve heard is a very scenic ride so it should be good for some nice pictures.
Yes. I’m visiting family near Harrisburg so I brought the bike along to ride local rail trails. I’m going to the rail trail between Elizabethtown and Mt. Gretna next weekend. I live in northwest Virginia now and we don’t have much except the C&O Tow Parh and the rail trail on up to Pittsburgh. You can ride that trail literally from Pittsburgh to Washington DC but I won’t be attempting that for a while!
The ride down to Cumberland from Somerset County PA is supposed to be pretty nice too. I hope to ride the whole trail from Pittsburgh to DC eventually, but I’ll have to do it in small segments.
Just finished 20 miles on my e bike on a rail trail near Hershey PA. Averaged 12 mph, even with climbing up the grade from Elizabethtown PA to Mt. Gretna and back. It’s was a bit more of a climb than I expected. Good thing there was a well placed bench at the top of Mt. Gretna. I’m supposed to come back here Sunday and do a group e bike ride for 30 miles. That will be ... interesting. My e bike battery still had 3 bars out of five left when I was done so I think a 30 mile rail trail ride on one battery charge is doable.
You’re getting a Rad River 5? That’s a nice looking bike. I decided on a mid drive because of my size and riding long hills. I would like to ride a geared rear hub motor e bike though, just to see how it performs.
Yes, that's what I decided on after a rather hurried (read excited) mostly YouTube decision. Hopefully I'll get the email for it's delivery date.
Since most of my riding is road or rail trails, I wanted to try a more road oriented, lower rolling resistance tire. In researching 26x4 options, I found the Origin8 Supercells to be one of the best reviewed for this purpose. (Frankly there aren’t a lot of road oriented fat bike tire options, and they ain’t cheap!) The Supercells are not currently available at Amazon or most other sites I’ve checked. Just out of curiosity I searched the local Facebook Marketplace for “fat bike tires.” An ad for two brand new, never mounted 30tpi 26x4 Supercells popped up, 50 miles from me. I misread his ad and thought he wanted $40 each, since they still had the packaging on them. When I got there and asked about the price, he said $20, 10 dollars each. So for a hundred mile drive, I just got two brand new 30tpi Supercells for $20. Can’t wait to mount them and try them out.
Well, at 54 this is the first time I’ve taken the wheels off a bicycle and changed the tires. It’s also the first time I changed a front sprocket for that matter. I went from the original 34tooth sprocket that came on the bike for off road hunting and hauling purposes to 46tooth (which the archery shop changed for me) and now to 52t. This is also the first time I had to “break” and add links to a bicycle chain. It all went back together smoothly so I headed out for a test ride. And I realized I hadn’t been paying attention when I put the crank arm back on; it wasn’t opposite the other crank arm. D’oh! Five minutes later I had that fixed and headed back out for a test ride. The magnetic pick up for the motor controller must have gotten out of whack during the process too, so my screen wasn’t recording speed or distance. But the Origin8 Supercells tires were awesome. I actually pumped them up to 22lbs while breaking them in, and slow turns were still a bit squirrelly. Otherwise the ride is immensely improved, faster and with obviously much lower rolling resistance. And it’s a lot easier to pedal the bike now with the motor off completely, which was my primary goal in all of this. Changing out the front sprocket to 52t was also very beneficial as my pedaling cadence can better keep up with first and second gear, and it’s a better cadence at road speeds with the Sturmey Archer IGH in third gear. Overall I’m really pleased with my first “real” attempt at bicycle mechanics, the new tires, and the bigger front sprocket. It’s never been my goal to have a “cool” looking e bike, and I never would have picked camo, but I have to admit this e bike is growing on me! I might have to name it.
Today's the day! Came FedEx mid day. . Very well packaged. After a little "some assembly required" got applied and the battery put on the charger along with attaching the rack I received near a month ago, I'm ready to check it out. First riding around the yard (giggling like a little girl) I headed up the driveway towards the road, then back to the house to circle it several times (showing off to my wife), stop to grab my "work tunes" and headed down to the river camp for a better ride. It's mostly down hill to flat to get there, most of the way on decent gravel/dirt until the 2 track to the camp. There is a learning curve to it, mostly gear selection, pedal assist level and just flat out getting used to all that after not sitting on a bicycle since about... , heck since I got my drivers license at 16! I need to talk a buddy into an ebike, but I think there's hope talking wifey into at least trying it. She'll not be able to stand over this I don't think. We'll see. It's a mile from the house to camp, It's hard to believe that have 4 miles on the bike already and haven't left the property, yet. Supposed to be wet (figures) tomorrow, so prolly no riding. I'm impressed so far and looking forward to exploring on an old RR bed and possibly some ATV trails that are all over the place.
Awesome, congratulations! I’m driving out to Glacier National Park next week and camping there as well as areas in Idaho, Montana and the Dakotas. I got a combination rear cargo rack with motorcycle carrier so I can take my e bike along. I have a Yeti Goal Zero 1000 lithium battery that I’ll charge with my van 12v outlet while driving, that will then provide the 110v I need to charge up the e bike battery. This will be my first major trip hauling the e bike on the rear carrier. I picked up a cheap motorcycle cover to protect the e bike electronics on the way out and back.
Should be a great trip. On your way north out of Missoula heading to Glacier, you'll go by Flathead lake. Look for the most unique "museum" ever, called history of America at the southern end (west side) of the lake. I'm not usually a museum type but this one is very cool and spread around 5 acres with old buildings moved in there full of old American stuff. Iirc they do have a little website.
