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Jenkins
Legendary Member
- Location
- Felixstowe
At this rate I'll have finished paying off the Cycle to Work before the bike is delivered - the latest date is now the end of August.
Ribble Hybrid AL-e (Fully loaded version)
- Thread starter Jenkins
- Start date
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wiggydiggy
Guru
I like the bike, the earlier poster who described how the app can set power levels is interesting
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Jenkins
Legendary Member
- Location
- Felixstowe
Finally, after almost 9 1/2 months from the order date and just a couple of days away from the 8th cycle 2 work payment, a call from Ribble this afternoon regarding the bike build. For some reason it had come with (or they could only get hold of) a black bar, stem & pannier rack instead of the copper colour of the rest of the bike - would that be OK with me? As this would have been my preferred original option I had no hesitating in agreeing to this.
What this means is that my bike was scheduled to be built this afternoon (more likely tomorrow I expect) so I hope to be in posession soon. Bring on the easier commute giving me a bit more energy for human powered rides on my days off.
What this means is that my bike was scheduled to be built this afternoon (more likely tomorrow I expect) so I hope to be in posession soon. Bring on the easier commute giving me a bit more energy for human powered rides on my days off.
ColinJ
Puzzle game procrastinator!
- Location
- Todmorden - Yorks/Lancs border
@Littgull has been whizzing about on his new AL-e for the past month or so and is very happy with the bike. Perhaps he will call in here and give you a mini-review?
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Jenkins
Legendary Member
- Location
- Felixstowe
Good news - it finally arrived this morning. At 07:55 having just got to work and changed there was a text from Parcelforce saying the delivery was scheduled between 08:00 an 09:00 
Another 50 minutes later and I had a call from the Parcelforce driver asking what to do and I agreed for it to be left round the back of the house out of sight and texted confirmation to hiim.
Having knocked off work a couple of hours early, I then spent the afternoon getting everything set up how I like it and a couple of short trips round the close to make sure everything works and a brief check of the motor. I've set it up in 'Urban' mode, charged the battery and will try it out on the commute on Thursday
Depending on how it goes, I may get some Ergon (or Wiggle own brand version) grips as I like bar ends on my flat bar bikes plus a saddle bag for the spare tube, etc so I can run without the pannier which is where they are at the moment.
Naked
In full commute mode
Another 50 minutes later and I had a call from the Parcelforce driver asking what to do and I agreed for it to be left round the back of the house out of sight and texted confirmation to hiim.Having knocked off work a couple of hours early, I then spent the afternoon getting everything set up how I like it and a couple of short trips round the close to make sure everything works and a brief check of the motor. I've set it up in 'Urban' mode, charged the battery and will try it out on the commute on Thursday
Depending on how it goes, I may get some Ergon (or Wiggle own brand version) grips as I like bar ends on my flat bar bikes plus a saddle bag for the spare tube, etc so I can run without the pannier which is where they are at the moment.
Naked
In full commute mode
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Jenkins
Legendary Member
- Location
- Felixstowe
First thoughts afetr today's commute - the riding position still needed minor tweeking by raising the saddle, moving it forward a fraction and putting the nose up a few degrees. The slightly swept back riser bars don't make for the most comfortable hand position and a 50mm stem make the bars seem a bit close, so I've ordered the Lifeline lookalikes of the Ergon grips as I kept automatically moving my hand to non-existant bar ends and may consider getting a properly flat bar such as the Planet X one I have on another bike.
Still need to get used to riding with panniers as and they don't half add a bit of weight to the back end of the bike (which isn't bad without them) and I kept going over the speed humps on a couple of roads as if I was riding all my other bikes which don't have racks. One Ortlieb easily carried the tool bottle, spare tube, laptop & accessories (in a neoprene sleve), uniform clothing to be washed and a couple of other small bits on the homewards leg, so I could just use one pannier to take stuff in to work at the start of the week, leave it in a locker and then bring it home at the end of the week if I get a saddle bag for the tube, etc.
In use: Surprisingly fast and comforable, partly due to being ordered with upgraded tyres and a carbon seat post added to a Charge Spoon saddle ordered from elsewhere. It may be my more push-on style of riding, but quite a lot of the ride time was spent over the 15.5mph motor cut-off, to the extent that I averaged 15mph over a 29 mile round trip commute (normally 16-17mph on a road bike). In general I wasn't aware of a major assist from the motor, but that may be due to my settings (see below) however the much easier pedaling in traffic and pulling away from a stop was noticable.
Battery usage: To be on the safe side I set it up in 'Urban' mode (the middle of the 3 pre-sets) and only used the minimal assistance level (again of 3). From fully charged last night, I checked the stats on the 'My Smartbike' app the system links to when I got home to find there was still 93% left in the battery with a theoretical 310 miles range
It's safe to say that I could up the assistance level if needed to complete a week's commuting (3 days) without needing to charge the battery.
The idea is that this will be my main commuter bike and certainly will be in anything other than good weather, but I can still see the Van Nicholas being used quite a lot when the weather's good and there's no load carrying needed.
Still need to get used to riding with panniers as and they don't half add a bit of weight to the back end of the bike (which isn't bad without them) and I kept going over the speed humps on a couple of roads as if I was riding all my other bikes which don't have racks. One Ortlieb easily carried the tool bottle, spare tube, laptop & accessories (in a neoprene sleve), uniform clothing to be washed and a couple of other small bits on the homewards leg, so I could just use one pannier to take stuff in to work at the start of the week, leave it in a locker and then bring it home at the end of the week if I get a saddle bag for the tube, etc.
In use: Surprisingly fast and comforable, partly due to being ordered with upgraded tyres and a carbon seat post added to a Charge Spoon saddle ordered from elsewhere. It may be my more push-on style of riding, but quite a lot of the ride time was spent over the 15.5mph motor cut-off, to the extent that I averaged 15mph over a 29 mile round trip commute (normally 16-17mph on a road bike). In general I wasn't aware of a major assist from the motor, but that may be due to my settings (see below) however the much easier pedaling in traffic and pulling away from a stop was noticable.
Battery usage: To be on the safe side I set it up in 'Urban' mode (the middle of the 3 pre-sets) and only used the minimal assistance level (again of 3). From fully charged last night, I checked the stats on the 'My Smartbike' app the system links to when I got home to find there was still 93% left in the battery with a theoretical 310 miles range
It's safe to say that I could up the assistance level if needed to complete a week's commuting (3 days) without needing to charge the battery.The idea is that this will be my main commuter bike and certainly will be in anything other than good weather, but I can still see the Van Nicholas being used quite a lot when the weather's good and there's no load carrying needed.
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youngoldbloke
The older I get, the faster I used to be ...
It would be interesting to see just how much assistance you actually used. If you look at the details of the ride recorded in the app (in 'Activities') it will show details - under the 'bike' symbol - of % time assistance used at each level, and without any assist. I suspect you actually used very little assistance at all, given the % battery charge remaining and theoretical range remaining.
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Jenkins
Legendary Member
- Location
- Felixstowe
Unfortunately I recorded the ride on my Garmin as usual, so I don't have any stats to look at. The app was only used to set the mode and to have a look at the battery level when I got home, but I may try it next week. You would probably be right about using little assistance as I do tend to push a bit hard on the commute and most of the times I looked at the Garmin display it was showing over 16mph.
Interestingly something is recording the mileage independantly as, in the app under Settings - eBike information, there's a display for 'Controller data' which shows a bit over 30 miles which would be the commute and the short trips used to set up the riding position and to bed the brakes in.
