A bike which I'm sure is on most people's list along with Levo's, Decoy's, Mig-R's, Powerplays ... E-ST500 ..
Shortly after heading back into the world of cycling with a cheapo MTB, I found there was no way I could keep up with the Other Half on horse back going up the hills, so took the next step - "Cheap" emtb ...
€1200, which in my mind seemed like a crazy amount of money for a €400 bike with a €30 motor stuffed in the back wheel.
Ordered on line and collected it from the local Decathlon. Was slightly disappointed that it already had some dinks and scratches from delivery and the tyres looked like the shop had given it a fairly thorough test ride, but heck, I'm sure it will have more scratches soon with my inability...
First impressions : it was amazing. Felt so much better than my cheap mtb and with the motor I could at least stay near the horse, as long as they didn't go too fast.
It's described as having a torque sensor in the crank. It's actually a pedal movement sensor that just reads when the left pedal passes the top point (TDC?). So you don't get varied assistance, you get either no assistance or full assistance. This can catch you out a lot at the start if you're in a higher assistance mode as you set off, or if you're trying to squeeze through a gap as the motor keeps pushing until it realises you haven't made another turn of the cranks. As a newby, it's easy to flip over backwards on steep inclines with instant full power and a lot of the weight stuck in the middle of the back wheel.
Two days later it stopped working on the way home, (only dry rides and not washed at this point) so I experienced my first of many "Heavy workout" trips home.... Tried all sorts of resets, battery removals etc .. nothing.
The next morning I cleaned it to take it back.. bounced it up and down to shake off some drips and then gave it one last try .. it worked ..
A few days later it stopped again .. The return to store to fix option seems to involve it being left for a day or two and which point moisture in the crank sensor area drys out and it fixes itself.
Eventually, I got fed up and they said they'd have to send it away to fix it properly, which involves packing grease in the crank to stop water getting to the sensor. This would take 2-4 weeks ....
So after a couple of weeks I was hoping to get my bike back or at least get a time scale. Another week went by with no information. Eventually I had an e-mail explaining what they would do to fix it, it would be done as a priority and it would be back on Friday - guaranteed...
End of Friday, went to the shop .. no bike. The guy in the shop checked their system and confirmed it wasn't back, wouldn't be back and hadn't been looked at yet.
By now I was fed up from 4 months of intermittent bike, no bike for 4 weeks and a lack of information. I'd lost confidence in the bike and the service, so the next day I went back and asked for a refund.
To their credit they stuck to their "12 months not satisfied and you can have a refund" and I got my money back.
A couple of weeks later I was back in there buying something else and saw my bike was back. It was for sale as a new bike. I knew it was mine instantly as I'd worn some paint off the seat stay with my heel, so there was an oval white area. After seeing that, I suspect that my bike was already used when I bought it and had been returned by a previous dissatisfied customer suffering from the moisture problem. It would explain the scratches, dinks, dirty tyres and stopping from the moisture issue when it had never been wet.
So all in all .. as a "cheap" bike for use in the dry on fire roads and tow paths, it's actually not bad, but I think there are other better offerings out there for similar money (Focus?). From what I know of geometry (not much) it's a bit of a contradiction. It seems both twitchy and difficult/slow to turn. Compared to it's replacement, it wasn't overly confidence inspiring and the standard tyres seem to release a special teflon compound in the wet. It's got a comfortable saddle and I think anyone buying one now would have the fixes in place as standard so shouldn't have the moisture/sensor problems.
The customer service in the shop was always excellent, but behind the scenes was lacking. It seems a bit dodgy selling used bikes as new bikes in my mind, but maybe that's normal ?
I then test rode a mid drive Shimano E8000 bike - this felt like 20 years of evolution in every way compared to the decathlon. Unfortunately, it had also suffered from 20 years financial inflation compared to the decathlon which required 20 years of promised slavery to the OH for agreement to purchase.
Decathlon have a mid drive brose E-ST900 (also a hardtail) out soon with hydraulic brakes (for some reason the e-st500 has cable disks which feel horrible) and better forks for about €2000. That shouldn't have the same issues in theory.
Shortly after heading back into the world of cycling with a cheapo MTB, I found there was no way I could keep up with the Other Half on horse back going up the hills, so took the next step - "Cheap" emtb ...
€1200, which in my mind seemed like a crazy amount of money for a €400 bike with a €30 motor stuffed in the back wheel.
Ordered on line and collected it from the local Decathlon. Was slightly disappointed that it already had some dinks and scratches from delivery and the tyres looked like the shop had given it a fairly thorough test ride, but heck, I'm sure it will have more scratches soon with my inability...
First impressions : it was amazing. Felt so much better than my cheap mtb and with the motor I could at least stay near the horse, as long as they didn't go too fast.
It's described as having a torque sensor in the crank. It's actually a pedal movement sensor that just reads when the left pedal passes the top point (TDC?). So you don't get varied assistance, you get either no assistance or full assistance. This can catch you out a lot at the start if you're in a higher assistance mode as you set off, or if you're trying to squeeze through a gap as the motor keeps pushing until it realises you haven't made another turn of the cranks. As a newby, it's easy to flip over backwards on steep inclines with instant full power and a lot of the weight stuck in the middle of the back wheel.
Two days later it stopped working on the way home, (only dry rides and not washed at this point) so I experienced my first of many "Heavy workout" trips home.... Tried all sorts of resets, battery removals etc .. nothing.
The next morning I cleaned it to take it back.. bounced it up and down to shake off some drips and then gave it one last try .. it worked ..
A few days later it stopped again .. The return to store to fix option seems to involve it being left for a day or two and which point moisture in the crank sensor area drys out and it fixes itself.
Eventually, I got fed up and they said they'd have to send it away to fix it properly, which involves packing grease in the crank to stop water getting to the sensor. This would take 2-4 weeks ....
So after a couple of weeks I was hoping to get my bike back or at least get a time scale. Another week went by with no information. Eventually I had an e-mail explaining what they would do to fix it, it would be done as a priority and it would be back on Friday - guaranteed...
End of Friday, went to the shop .. no bike. The guy in the shop checked their system and confirmed it wasn't back, wouldn't be back and hadn't been looked at yet.
By now I was fed up from 4 months of intermittent bike, no bike for 4 weeks and a lack of information. I'd lost confidence in the bike and the service, so the next day I went back and asked for a refund.
To their credit they stuck to their "12 months not satisfied and you can have a refund" and I got my money back.
A couple of weeks later I was back in there buying something else and saw my bike was back. It was for sale as a new bike. I knew it was mine instantly as I'd worn some paint off the seat stay with my heel, so there was an oval white area. After seeing that, I suspect that my bike was already used when I bought it and had been returned by a previous dissatisfied customer suffering from the moisture problem. It would explain the scratches, dinks, dirty tyres and stopping from the moisture issue when it had never been wet.
So all in all .. as a "cheap" bike for use in the dry on fire roads and tow paths, it's actually not bad, but I think there are other better offerings out there for similar money (Focus?). From what I know of geometry (not much) it's a bit of a contradiction. It seems both twitchy and difficult/slow to turn. Compared to it's replacement, it wasn't overly confidence inspiring and the standard tyres seem to release a special teflon compound in the wet. It's got a comfortable saddle and I think anyone buying one now would have the fixes in place as standard so shouldn't have the moisture/sensor problems.
The customer service in the shop was always excellent, but behind the scenes was lacking. It seems a bit dodgy selling used bikes as new bikes in my mind, but maybe that's normal ?
I then test rode a mid drive Shimano E8000 bike - this felt like 20 years of evolution in every way compared to the decathlon. Unfortunately, it had also suffered from 20 years financial inflation compared to the decathlon which required 20 years of promised slavery to the OH for agreement to purchase.
Decathlon have a mid drive brose E-ST900 (also a hardtail) out soon with hydraulic brakes (for some reason the e-st500 has cable disks which feel horrible) and better forks for about €2000. That shouldn't have the same issues in theory.
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