This is the perfect combination we've been waiting for: safety of a 1980s Honda 3 wheeler ATC, design language of a Rascal Scooter
RadTrike Electric Tricycle
31–40 of 167 posts
Re: RadTrike Electric Tricycle
#32I recently learned about The Villages, FL, which is a sprawling retirement community, and was the fastest growing metro area in the US over the past decade [0]. This feels like the perfect bike for an aging demographic living in that sort of community. This sort of e-bike will be less intimidating to use for older people, and ultimately it feels like a good move for the company. It's hard to argue with getting more p…
Smaller than The Villages, is Peachtree City outside of Atlanta, which is notable for making off-street micromobility pathways a priority in city planning: (relative to the rest of the suburban US)
https://www.peachtree-city.org/DocumentCenter/View/17110/Pat...
(If the map looks a little weird, it's because there's a zillion unofficial paths to connect the dots)
They've rallied around golf carts historically but it's a great place to bike. I use an E-bike and see a lot of recumbent bicycles using the pathways.
Re: RadTrike Electric Tricycle
#33This is in response to the troll who you can see with showdead. The average electric bike owner gets more exercise than the average cyclist or the average driver: https://electrek.co/2019/08/11/electric-bike-riders-more-exe... In retrospect it's not that surprising since the average cyclist doesn't use their bike...
Yea but you don't become a cyclist until you start pedaling.
Re: RadTrike Electric Tricycle
#34This is in response to the troll who you can see with showdead. The average electric bike owner gets more exercise than the average cyclist or the average driver: https://electrek.co/2019/08/11/electric-bike-riders-more-exe... In retrospect it's not that surprising since the average cyclist doesn't use their bike...
Ageist comments always make me laugh. I'm old and let me tell you it's a horror movie to have your body slowly decay and stop working with no hope of repair. If they only knew the shock of a doctor telling you that it's "not worth repairing that" in reference to some important body part, such as a knee or hip. I wished electric bikes fixed this but no, they only make the inevitable easier to take.
Re: RadTrike Electric Tricycle
#35My 2021 radrunner plus has some serious defects. The charging port is prone to weather corrosion. Charging is a risky action that may or may not blow some very sensitive fuses. The mechanical disc brakes suck and are very hard to balance. The discs were supplied warped. I pretty much had to suck that up because of the misery of returning a faulty machine to an online bike company. The seat is a notorious bum numbing…
I usually recommend electric bikes from actual bike companies, like Specialized, because there won't be any weird surprises, you won't have to assemble it yourself, and it will last forever. But everyone I know, other than myself, has gone with a newer electric-only company like Rad or VanMoof. I assume price is the reason.
I've a friend with an electric Specialized, and while his bike looks cooler my Rad is faster, half the price, with much better millage, and I can still hang it from the wall in my apt.
One thing I've noticed is that pretty much every established bike company is placing the motor on the pedal crank, whereas Rad uses a much bigger (750w in my case) in-wheel hub motor. The acceleration with a hub motor is so much better and doesn't depend on what gear I'm in.
Re: RadTrike Electric Tricycle
#36I've got a recumbent bike that I added electric to. I had to redo the setup though because I initially built it with a hub motor which made hill climbing still be a bit of a bitch so I rebuilt it with a middrive motor.
I ride a LongBikes SlipStream and have been considering getting a mid-drive myself. Are you on a LWB or a SWB bike?
Any tips/suggestions?
As a nice bonus, the wheelbase of my bike gives me a TONNE of space under the frame and within the frame for battery packs. So it's a whole project that I'm going to get started on after I move.
Re: RadTrike Electric Tricycle
#37Earlier quoted context omitted.
I usually recommend electric bikes from actual bike companies, like Specialized, because there won't be any weird surprises, you won't have to assemble it yourself, and it will last forever. But everyone I know, other than myself, has gone with a newer electric-only company like Rad or VanMoof. I assume price is the reason.
I've a friend with an electric Specialized, and while his bike looks cooler my Rad is faster, half the price, with much better millage, and I can still hang it from the wall in my apt. One thing I've noticed is that pretty much every established bike company is placing the motor on the pedal crank, whereas Rad uses a much bigger (750w in my case) in-wheel hub motor. The acceleration with a hub motor is so much better…
What do you mean about hanging on the wall? One of the things you are getting for your $5k from Specialized is light weight. They have ebikes down to 34 pounds, about half what a radrunner weighs.
Re: RadTrike Electric Tricycle
#38This is in response to the troll who you can see with showdead. The average electric bike owner gets more exercise than the average cyclist or the average driver: https://electrek.co/2019/08/11/electric-bike-riders-more-exe... In retrospect it's not that surprising since the average cyclist doesn't use their bike...
Yea but you don't become a cyclist until you start pedaling.
My best friend was just hit by a car on a 40mph road and had to be hospitalized with a traumatic brain injury and seizures that he's still not recovered from (and maybe never will).
I'm not cycling again in my city until we start protecting cyclists here. The roads where I live are absurdly unsafe for cyclists to be on. It's a fucking joke to put a bike lane without a physical divider a few inches next to cars on a 40mph road.
Re: RadTrike Electric Tricycle
#39Electric bikes are an order of magnitude more efficient than cars and several times more efficient than bikes. (Measured as calories/electrical power).
People who ride electric bikes still get the benefits of exercise (elevated heart rate, muscle use) though obviously less than regular biking.
I ride mine year round in Seattle, it's incredible. I deliver cargo, go grocery shopping, visit the library. This should be the default mode.
Re: RadTrike Electric Tricycle
#40My 2021 radrunner plus has some serious defects. The charging port is prone to weather corrosion. Charging is a risky action that may or may not blow some very sensitive fuses. The mechanical disc brakes suck and are very hard to balance. The discs were supplied warped. I pretty much had to suck that up because of the misery of returning a faulty machine to an online bike company. The seat is a notorious bum numbing…
I really like my RadWagon 4, but several weeks ago, I received a recall notice with their recommendation to stop using the bike until replacements/repairs have been made. I'm really happy they will be making the repairs for me, but since they parts won't even be ready until Feb/Mar 2023 it does me no good since the eBike is my primary mode of transportation. I know eBikes popularity went to the moon during the pandem…
Yup, same. I bought my radwagon 4 in august, and then in early september was told I should not ride it. And maybe they will be ready to fix it in Feb/Mar, or maybe it will be later. If it was just me, I would risk it, but I bought it to ferry my kids on so I'm not going to do that. So we got to ride it for 4 weeks, and have had it sitting in our garage for the past 13 weeks, and it will probably be another 13 weeks until it is fixed again if we are lucky. And basically all we get is the bike fixed to the state it should have been in upon delivery, not any kind of compensation for them giving us an unsafe bike and not being able to ride it for 6+ months.
I would not recommend this brand. I guess they decided to do a lot of custom components which is why they have like a 6 month lead time to ship out new non-defective tires (or whatever).
You'll find a lot of love for it online, and I think it is genuine, but I suspect the love for the brand is because it is bought by biking neophytes and makes biking accessible to people who don't want to put a lot of effort into it(nothing wrong with that). So it opens up a lot of possibilities for getting outside and getting fresh air without needing strong thighs or aerobic fitness or getting sweaty, and people associate that with their radwagon, not just generally with an ebike. But there is nothing particularly different about this brand compared to other ebike brands. A lot of ebikes look and function exactly the same as the radwagon, and haven't been part of a longstanding recall.