Hello.. Looking for help and advice converting an off road ebike

[larkbox]

Hi Im Phil, fairly new to ebikes though they have been on my radar for years. I have recently converted my sit up n beg town cycle with a rear hub motor, and lurve it..

I now want to build an off rd bike.. Years ago i used to muck about off rd with mopeds and later bigger bikes. All it took was a little taste of e-bike power and i want to play !!

Ideally I want something that can handle moderately rough terrain not just gravel tracks without bruising my backside.

The Plan as it stands ..

Source a bargain local donor/base bike via ebay, Ideally with good suspension, front disk brake, a 8-10speed rear gear cassette, and suitable frame for mid motor and battery mount. at close to starting bid price .. This may take some time..

Buy and fit a 250w mid drive motor kit bafang or tsdz? eventually with a large capacity 20ah battery rack mounted. Though to start with i can share the battery from my town bike as i can only ride 1 bike at a time

Thing is i know nothing about mountain bikes, Im the old bloke who plods along on a boneshaker at 8-10 mph that everyone has passed..

Hope i dont ask too many idiot questions and will be grateful for any help and advice offered.

budget upto £1000 circa 7-800 will be the motor kit and rack mounted battery leaving 2-300 for the bike and extras like tires brake shoes chain etc

 

[Paulquattro]

Welcome to the forum

 

[TommyC]

For what it’s worth, my advice would be to find a decent second hand emtb.

I just built a hard tail with a bbshd kit. The kit with a 52v 19.2ah battery cost me £925 from alibaba. Bike was a nearly new trek Marlin 7 for £400 and I spent another £150 on bits and pieces. The bike didn’t feel anyway near as planted as my Cube. Invariably you’ll end up needing to change other components as they’re not built for emtb’s. I thought about putting the motor on a full sus bike but I didn’t like the idea of going off road with that motor hanging off the bottom bracket like it does. The lack of torque sensing on most bolt on mid drives is a problem off road too in my opinion.

Maybe if you put a low power torque sensing motor on a full suspension that allows you to tuck it right up out of the way you may end up with a capable bike. But a proper factory built emtb, with a bosch motor, is going to be soo much better.

Maybe someone who’s actually riding a converted bike off road will tell you otherwise. That’s just my two cents.

 

[larkbox]

Thanks @Paulquattro ..

Cheers @TommyC, I kinda expected that would be the case, but i had to ask

Seems like my time would be better spent reading up on the motors employed in emtbs and the long term serviceability than diy builds then. the utubes better be as good..

And on a lucky day a reasonable proportion my budget wouldn't insult someone selling an ebay bargain.

Shame, but i might be ok blowing £50 on a project that goes nowhere or results in something i could have bought for £40 3 months later. emtb money is in a different league..

While I may have started my 'trial moped' ridding unsupervised, and am pretty adept at falling down without injury. I am also an old man so think i will be scoping out a local club or 2 too which im kinda dreading..

And you fitted the BBSHD motor option into a frame you selected for the job too? that things got to be a speed demon nonetheless

I gotta ask is the extra torque from a bbshd of any real benefit over the smaller bbs01 when used with gears?
my experience is with a single 250w hub motor with speed limited pedal assist. and that delivers enough power to move me up inclines im normally in bottom gear and standing using my full shifted weight on each laboriously slow down stroke climbing.

Again thanks for the straight talk.
.

 

[TommyC]

The bbshd is crazy fast. The bike would do 35mph+. But it was twitchy and the bike felt unstable. All that extra weight, 12-13kg, bolted to a standard bike just amplified all the lumps and bumps. At the very least it needed better forks which could have taken me close to £2k spent. I sold it to a guy who wanted it to cycle 3 miles to work every day with minimal effort. It was perfect for that!

 

[larkbox]

I found the thread discussing your gear changing issues, had a similar moment when i fitted my hub and took the opportunity to fit an 8 speed cassette took me too long to realise i had been turning the wrong tuning screw,

That bike sure looks way too sweet for the likes of me Hope the buyer appreciates it and paid accordingly. tho i gotta admit i thought about being cheeky and asking if you fancied popping it on ebay for a £200 starting bid no pics needed....

My bike above sure isnt built for speed since adding the speedo with the hub motor kit ive discovered its old top speed was just about 15mph, with the newly added extra 11t cog at the rear i can go a bit faster but wouldnt want to on that bike unless up out of the saddle. alert, and ready to be braced its a real bone shaker.. 8-10 mph is a comfortable speed on the streets round here (residential/urban) 35 mph wouldnt be fun..

A bike that can handle 35mph on the other hand would be quite a lot of fun.