The Pro’s and cons of lightweight, lower powered e-mountain bikes
With the ever increasing models entering this category, it’s a common question we get in store. So we’ll run through a few of the differences to help you decide what would might be best for you.
Typically a full-fat e-MTB provides approximately 90Nm of assistance, whereas lightweight options can be from 35 to 60. The trade off, is that a lightweight system adds approximately 4.5kg over an acoustic bike, whereas a full-power is 9+kg more, resulting in quite a different ride experience.
First and foremost – What do your mates ride? It’s a speed thing and you don’t want to be having a near death experience at the back of the group, or dropped, while your mates all power up the hill in full turbo mode. To keep up with full-fatters on a lightweight you have to be working harder and/or using a higher level of assistance than the others. This will impact your range, but you can always add a range extender battery and give yourself 50% more capacity.
If the group tends to be mostly acoustic bikes, but your fitness isn’t quite there and you need a helping hand, an SL ( term used for lightweight by Specialized ) could be perfect for you. It’ll give you the extra push to keep up, add to your natural range and give you the confidence that may have been knocked if you’re always at the back. In situations like this, full fat is often overkill and you can enjoy the fruits of a lighter, easier to manoeuvre bike.
Confidence – A heavy bike can make up for a multitude of sins. For those of us that aren’t queueing for the world cup podium, letting the weight of the bike steam roll its way through the terrain can make up for any shortfall of athletic talent.
Range – With battery options limited on SL models, the larger batteries on full power bikes mean that if going the distance is high on your list, then go for all the juice. Running a higher power machine in Eco mode can result in some truly incredible distances to be covered.
Ride experience – For the more experienced riders, who have the skills to pay the bills, but sometimes just don’t feel like doing all the hard work, then lightweight ebikes really are the best of both worlds. 4.5kg is barely noticeable and give a bike that allows you all the direction changing ability of your honest bike, and little disadvantage. All the fun and playfulness, without the uphill effort.
At Certini we have a great range of demo e-bikes, allowing you to test both levels of assistance on your usual trails and make your own mind up. Specialized have SL models of both the Levo and Kenevo and we have access to demo bikes of the Levo SL and Kenevo SL. Give our stores a call now to try them out.