Anyone have anything they'd like to rant about?

[XXX-er]

I asked Shop bro about them bikes made out of Chinesium, he told me any E bike with a throttle is illegal in Canada so a real bicycle shop as in a santa cruz/ spesh/ c-dale dealer will probably not be selling them to you

BUT you can order one on amazon and it will be at your door in 2 weeks

Depending on how John Law feels that day, those things are not licensable or insurable so people have been getting > 600$ tickets for no vehical license/ no insurance/ no registration/ no operator's motorcycle license/ no/ improper helmet riding those things in Vancover

[singlesline]

There's a huge subset of Class 3 that have throttles, 1000w motors, and weigh 80-100 lbs that are nothing but electric motorcycles with pedals. Those Scramblers I was ranting about (and their innumerable knockoffs) being the prime example.

See: the class system is extra dumb.

Why should that be in the same class as something like a pedal-only Turbo Creo that's basically a road/commuter machine that can go 28, but only has 240W of pedal assist?

Then you add in the fact that some states (and BLM/park service) cap all classes of ebikes at 750 W so even though those Scramblers may be sold as class 3, the local authority may disagree and say they are just motorcycles.

[zion zig zag]

A local guy gave the city a permanent easement through his property to access the foothill trails. He’s also a long time advocate and trail builder and is getting up in age. He tried to speak to a couple of teenage kids riding throttle e-bikes on the trails recently and they responded by breaking his nose, knocking him out and leaving him lying on the trail. I guess be careful talking to people?

[skaredshtles]

A local guy gave the city a permanent easement through his property to access the foothill trails. He’s also a long time advocate and trail builder and is getting up in age. He tried to speak to a couple of teenage kids riding throttle e-bikes on the trails recently and they responded by breaking his nose, knocking him out and leaving him lying on the trail. I guess be careful talking to people?

[evdog]

A local guy gave the city a permanent easement through his property to access the foothill trails. He’s also a long time advocate and trail builder and is getting up in age. He tried to speak to a couple of teenage kids riding throttle e-bikes on the trails recently and they responded by breaking his nose, knocking him out and leaving him lying on the trail. I guess be careful talking to people?

Seems right in character for e-moto kids. Looking on the positive side this will put them more on the radar of law enforcement. Hopefully the property owner is ok.

[jackstraw]

A local guy gave the city a permanent easement through his property to access the foothill trails. He’s also a long time advocate and trail builder and is getting up in age. He tried to speak to a couple of teenage kids riding throttle e-bikes on the trails recently and they responded by breaking his nose, knocking him out and leaving him lying on the trail. I guess be careful talking to people?

That sucks.

Certainly need to "read the room" and come from a friendly perspective when approaching. Nobody is going to want to hear it, so being as kind as possible is the only way. And some, like these assholes, it probably wouldn't have mattered. Or maybe they were a tough read, meaning they looked and acted kind enough initially.

Years ago an old friends dad...big dude and owned an auto body repairshop...was up in age and approached kids vandalizing street construction stuff, just being idiots, but he ended up in hospital. That was a long time ago and it really hit home. Sometimes just call the cops.

[XXX-er]

This is America god dammit why wasnt somebody shot ?

[Tailwind]

I’m pretty strongly in the “annoyed by e-bikes camp” but I do think they’re an immature product that needs someone to actually try to make them safe with logical categories.

What they need is to adapt some of the same technology that drones have. $300 drones have very strict parameters for where they can fly (ie won’t fly into an airport).

We just need e-bikes that have a similar technology. Try to go into a trail system they’re not allowed in? Cool but the motor won’t work.

You could also program them so in certain areas trail systems could set limits. IE mixed use multidirectional trail? Pedal assist up to 8mph but beyond that nothing. Directional MTB specific trail? 20mph.

This would let trail systems start honestly opening up for e-bikes in ways that make sense… and it honestly wouldn’t add much expense to the bike. IE “bikes with this super special tech can ride here”. This would let e-bikes help with accessibility while also not ruining things.

Then you make it legal to bear spray people on non-compliant e-bikes and everything is fixed.

Fact. Class ii and iii ebikes have zero business in any mountain bike trails. If you wanna ride full Moto, then go where the motos go.

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[toast2266]

At the end of the day, the problem with ebikes is just that they allow assholes to display their assholeness more easily.

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[sfotex]

I bet the whole e-bike thing is going to bite us in the ass in the long-term access wise...

[rideit]

How do you guys feel about areas that have welcomed (class 1) e-bikes, some in major urban, front-country areas?
By almost all reports, there really aren’t many conflicts occurring out there. It all seems relatively peaceful in Jefferson County (Denver/Golden), Pocatello, Bentonville, the few legal Moab trails, and a bunch of others?

Sure, an ass is an ass on any conveyance, but I haven’t seen any altercations with class 1 riders anywhere.

[Spats]

There's a huge subset of Class 3 that have throttles, 1000w motors, and weigh 80-100 lbs that are nothing but electric motorcycles with pedals. Those Scramblers I was ranting about (and their innumerable knockoffs) being the prime example.

RANT

Anything with power assist over 20MPH AND a throttle is not "Class 3" in any US jurisdiction, and is legally a motorcycle in almost every US state.
Some unscrupulous sellers call these motorcycles a "Class 4 ebike,"
This does not exist.
Anything with power assist over 20MPH and a throttle is legally a motorcycle.
Anything with power assist over 28MPH is legally a motorcycle.
Anything with power assist >750W is legally a motorcycle. (Except in Oregon, where the limit is 1000W.)

Unscrupulous sellers will call anything an "ebike," but the legal definitions are well-codified and very clear in almost every US state...and the ones that don't follow the standard Class 1/2/3 system don't differ substantially (the only exceptions being NM and AK).
https://www.aventon.com/blogs/avento...ultimate-guide

Yes, there are several Internet retailers who specialize in selling electric motorcycles while calling them "ebikes". (Yes, this means any "ebike" with a Bafang BBSHD or M620 is legally a motorcycle, not an ebike.) You'll note that no reputable bicycle company or bike shop sells these electric motorcycles while claiming them to be "ebikes": all the major bicycle manufacturers have always maintained full compliance with Class 1/2/3. These motors and bikes are all Chinese, assembled and sold by Internet retailers.

[Spats]

How do you guys feel about areas that have welcomed (class 1) e-bikes, some in major urban, front-country areas?
By almost all reports, there really aren’t many conflicts occurring out there. It all seems relatively peaceful in Jefferson County (Denver/Golden), Pocatello, Bentonville, the few legal Moab trails, and a bunch of others?

Sure, an ass is an ass on any conveyance, but I haven’t seen any altercations with class 1 riders anywhere.

In my area over 30% of riders on singletrack are on Class 1 ebikes, and the percentage rises every year. I haven't yet seen a throttle bike or Surron anywhere that isn't motorcycle-legal (Corral, Stinger). I have had exactly two people in five years take notice of my ebike on the trail. One was a wildland firefighter who thought it was cool and wanted to know more. The other was on a different kind of ebike and wanted to know about mine.

Out of the hundreds of ebikes I've seen on the trail over those years, I have seen zero trail conflicts. (Speed difference is what causes trail conflicts. Ebikes don't go downhill any faster.)
I've seen exactly one example of people who obviously couldn't have got where they were on an acoustic bike: the rest looked like any other mountain bike rider. Even then, those people weren't causing the trail or anyone else any harm. (And I've seen hundreds of trucks full of fat, out-of-shape people who couldn't have got their acoustic bikes uphill without shuttling, using gallons of gas vs. a few cents of electricity, so this isn't a valid argument against ebikes anyway.)

In the real physical world, no one cares about Class 1 ebikes. The "backlash" is entirely online, manufactured by a tiny minority of HOHAs (who oppose all bicycle access of any kind) and a few online trolls who deliberately conflate Surrons with ebikes for reasons I won't pretend to understand.

[Dantheman]

RANT

Anything with power assist over 20MPH AND a throttle is not "Class 3" in any US jurisdiction, and is legally a motorcycle in almost every US state.

Class 3 can have a throttle but it's supposed to be capped at 20 mph.

IMVHO, anything with a throttle shouldn't be classified an ebike period. But, it's all moot anyway since no government agency is likely to take any kind of enforcement action ever against these manufacturers.

[MagnificentUnicorn]

I bet the whole e-bike thing is going to bite us in the ass in the long-term access wise...

It’s funny, I said this here a while back and was shouted down by the e-bike bros. It’s not like we couldn’t see this coming.


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[Shredhead]

It’s funny, I said this here a while back and was shouted down by the e-bike bros. It’s not like we couldn’t see this coming.


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People have been chicken littling since the advent of e bikes.
Can you name an example of it in fact, bitting our ass?

[MagnificentUnicorn]

People have been chicken littling since the advent of e bikes.
Can you name an example of it in fact, bitting our ass?

You’re an impatient one, give it more time.

I see people on e-bikes all the time on a local network that has a sign that expressly prohibits motorized use of any kind. Another network, NGO land trust, is watching what happens but is close to dropping the hammer on e bikes. It only takes a few negative interactions with the wrong/right person to get the ball rolling.

Look at the frustration in this thread. I’ll admit class 1 ebikes don’t really seem to be an issue. It’s the folks that will interpret the rules to their liking that will ruin it for the class 1 riders. People are shitty, haven’t you been paying attention?


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[sfotex]

People have been chicken littling since the advent of e bikes.
Can you name an example of it in fact, bitting our ass?

At the start of it all it wasn't much of an issue when it was just pedal assist, but now it's a mess of fucking e-bike classes and Surrons and whatever other e-stuff you can get off Amazon or Cabelas.
The line between e-moto and e-bikes is so blurred now how does a land manager deal with it? Ban them? Come up with a speed limit for everyone on a bike?
I think a lot of people in the mountain biking community are so new to it or used to mountain bike only trails they don't know about all how tedious access has been at times...
Look at climbing, there's plenty of areas that have been shut down because some idiot develops a route over some ancient pictographs and its game over for everyone.

[singlesline]

IMVHO, anything with a throttle shouldn't be classified an ebike period. But, it's all moot anyway since no government agency is likely to take any kind of enforcement action ever against these manufacturers.

There does seem to be an accessibility niche where a bit of throttle assist at low speed is useful (but not really in the MTB world). I know a guy whose wife can ride/balance a moving bike just fine, but has some physical issues that make it very hard for her to start one moving. At least in a safe and orderly manner within the space of a bike lane and timespan that other road users/traffic signals expect (they live in a very hilly city which doesn't help).

A throttle to get the bike moving is a killer feature for her.

But that throttle doesn't really need to go to 20mph. It could cap out at 5mph with pedal assist beyond that and she'd be fine. And she's not mountain biking either.

Otherwise I agree though--throttles to 20mph are not really bikes. That's faster than the speed limit most local governments decided to put on those e-scooters...faster than most average people typically pedal a bike on flat ground.

[nickwm21]

The line between e-moto and e-bikes is so blurred

This is the only issue. E motos in shared trails is a significant safety issue.

The slippery slope argument is valid.

Having a problem with sharing the trail with a Class 1 pedal assist rider is some gatekeeping bullshit.

I’ve come full circle on this.


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[jackstraw]

.

Having a problem with sharing the trail with a Class 1 pedal assist rider is some gatekeeping bullshit.

I’ve come full circle on this.


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I have a commuter/trail build ebike now. The only time I was slightly pissy at a group of class 1 ebikers was on a dbl track climb (which I avoid whenever possible!) went blowing by me and created a huge dust storm as I'm sucking wind climbing. That actually really pissed me off. Acoustic bikes would never do that on a climb to that degree.

[XXX-er]

We havent seen any Surons yet but they don't have pedals and would qualify as a electric motor bike, the local area has no motor cycle/ no horses / no class 2 or 3 signs I don't think they will com

The only time I was slightly pissy at a group of class 1 ebikers was on a dbl track climb (which I avoid whenever possible!) went blowing by me and created a huge dust storm as I'm sucking wind climbing. That actually really pissed me off. Acoustic bikes would never do that on a climb to that degree.

IME even on single track people move over a bit to let the E-bike by so you would prefer they sit on your ass all the way to the top with those motors whining away ?

[toast2266]

Having a problem with sharing the trail with a Class 1 pedal assist rider is some gatekeeping bullshit.

Depends on the trail. For most trails, I agree. But I can think of a few local trails that get a ton of use - bikes, hikers, trail runners, dog walkers, etc. And the trail networks are poorly designed, so everyone is going in both directions on the same trails, and there's plenty of semi-blind corners. Regular bikes are already bordering on being a problem because they move faster. Ebikes (including Class 1) just increase the speed a bit more, and they also invite a whole new user group that's entirely capable of going pretty fast on an ebike but aren't particularly proficient riders.

For trails that aren't so crowded or are in better laid out networks, then sure. Class 1 is fine.

[zion zig zag]

Depends on the trail. For most trails, I agree. But I can think of a few local trails that get a ton of use - bikes, hikers, trail runners, dog walkers, etc. And the trail networks are poorly designed, so everyone is going in both directions on the same trails, and there's plenty of semi-blind corners. Regular bikes are already bordering on being a problem because they move faster. Ebikes (including Class 1) just increase the speed a bit more, and they also invite a whole new user group that's entirely capable of going pretty fast on an ebike but aren't particularly proficient riders.

For trails that aren't so crowded or are in better laid out networks, then sure. Class 1 is fine.

Exactly. This is the exact situation we are facing around here, trails are way too crowded and the e-bikes have added a noticeable amount of users. Illegally (with no enforcement) I should add.

[nickwm21]

Sounds like bicycles in general shouldn’t be on those trails…


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