Cycling UK Forum

am liking the look of this ...

https://ebiketips.road.cc/content/news/ ... YthdJZpFno

I was going to say...

... but you can't fit mudguards
... but you can't fit a rack
... the battery will be tiny

looks like I'm wrong on all counts. It is rather nice. Pity that the handlebars are so low, wouldn't work with my neck!

Rather heavy, and looking dated with that big stuck on battery. Surprised they haven't followed the lead of other makes and concealed the battery in the down tube.

When people who don't ride E machines or even if they have tried one and now feel experienced enough after a couple of miles to wax lyrical about the weight and visual aspects of said machine, I wonder at their comments..
Having built 7 midmotored bikes now and having first got the bug back in 2013, using mine since April last year, I can from user experience say that weight doesn't come into the ride, it does if you are hawking it up and down stairs or steps or in and out of estate cars, when aboard it actually works in your favour ,more stable in side winds, and faster downhill coasting nor does it skip about on bumpy tarmac.
The comments previously about Yamaha not placing their power pack up enclosed in the downtube comes from listening to engineers who are more concerned about function over form.. ask anyone who has had to trail a pack out of a Gain.. and the useful aspect of being able to remove the pack from the cold shed or garage in winter weather to keep it in more moderate temperatures..what I would say is I wouldn't be a fan of the coffee and cream colorway, however looking as it does... its more subtle than the Giant Road E, which for all its fuglyness rides bloody well..suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder, just try the machine before you run it down, Yamaha are good engineers and have a sound background in 2 wheeled powered machinery..will

willcee wrote: its more subtle than the Giant Road E, which for all its fuglyness rides bloody well..suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder,

I like the look of the Giants and this Yamaha, I don't get the idea of trying to hide what it is, why do people like that? Are they trying to fool someone? Are they embarrassed by it? When I get an E-Bike, it'll look like what it is.

PH wrote:

willcee wrote: its more subtle than the Giant Road E, which for all its fuglyness rides bloody well..suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder,

I like the look of the Giants and this Yamaha, I don't get the idea of trying to hide what it is, why do people like that? Are they trying to fool someone? Are they embarrassed by it? When I get an E-Bike, it'll look like what it is.

Because people like sleek and aesthetically pleasing.

PH wrote:

willcee wrote: its more subtle than the Giant Road E, which for all its fuglyness rides bloody well..suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder,

I like the look of the Giants and this Yamaha, I don't get the idea of trying to hide what it is, why do people like that? Are they trying to fool someone? Are they embarrassed by it? When I get an E-Bike, it'll look like what it is.

+1
I've no reason to conceal an e-bike for what it is in the vain hope some other cyclist may think I'm fitter than actually am,e-bikes are e-bikes and bikes are bikes why pretend otherwise?

Bonefishblues wrote:

PH wrote:

willcee wrote: its more subtle than the Giant Road E, which for all its fuglyness rides bloody well..suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder,

I like the look of the Giants and this Yamaha, I don't get the idea of trying to hide what it is, why do people like that? Are they trying to fool someone? Are they embarrassed by it? When I get an E-Bike, it'll look like what it is.

Because people like sleek and aesthetically pleasing.

I never look at the bike when I'm riding it.

Neither do I, perhaps us old school guys have it backwards,everything today has to look cool, whatever the hell that really means in a real world, maybe thats why a plain jane Rotrax Shirley was a much better riding machine than the vaunted Baines, Bates or Curly Hetchins, those which would have been called cool if they had known to do so, but that in those days it was a weather term..!!!!!! will

willcee wrote:Neither do I, perhaps us old school guys have it backwards,everything today has to look cool, whatever the hell that really means in a real world, maybe thats why a plain jane Rotrax Shirley was a much better riding machine than the vaunted Baines, Bates or Curly Hetchins, those which would have been called cool if they had known to do so, but that in those days it was a weather term..!!!!!! will

I think those you cite are deeply uncool, having ornamentation for its own sake (or perhaps to show you had a 'Gate, for instance) , in the name, at the time, of technical innovation.

You misunderstand the point I am making. There is little 'cooler' than a well-designed, simple traditional diamond frame. If through good design, then something can look sleek and unornamented, then that follows Morris's much quoted advice. Judging by the number of 'bike in front of a ...' photos, plenty of people consider the aesthetics of their cycles. Now we can debate what that might actually look like (or perhaps agree!), but IMHO, having plastic boxes hung off the downtube like some pseudo-motorcycle, no matter how easy that might be to work on doesn't fulfil that criterion.

I'm not even sure it looks cool compared to some of the recent, better integrated offerings from some quarters. Still, it ain't ugly. I'd be far more interested in what it rode like. I have a couple of existing Yamaha 2 wheeled products, and they ride pretty well, so one would hope they could pull the same trick with this.

Fortunately, the only 'cool' thing that ever interested me was Robert Plant strutting the stage bare chested with Led Zeppelin. Now that was cool.

Lance Dopestrong wrote:I'm not even sure it looks cool compared to some of the recent, better integrated offerings from some quarters.

Fugly for the want of better design

reohn2 wrote:

PH wrote:

willcee wrote: its more subtle than the Giant Road E, which for all its fuglyness rides bloody well..suppose beauty is in the eye of the beholder,

I like the look of the Giants and this Yamaha, I don't get the idea of trying to hide what it is, why do people like that? Are they trying to fool someone? Are they embarrassed by it? When I get an E-Bike, it'll look like what it is.

+1
I've no reason to conceal an e-bike for what it is in the vain hope some other cyclist may think I'm fitter than actually am,e-bikes are e-bikes and bikes are bikes why pretend otherwise?

I like my bike looking like a bike because:
1. I liked my old bike so got a retro conversion,
2. It can revert to a bike in about half an hour should I so wish.
3. It has nothing to do with vain hope of fooling anyone. Reality is that I am hugely fitter and have lost quite a bit of weight since getting an ebike. No need to fool anyone. I am evangelical about my ebike.

Oldjohnw wrote:

reohn2 wrote:

PH wrote:I like the look of the Giants and this Yamaha, I don't get the idea of trying to hide what it is, why do people like that? Are they trying to fool someone? Are they embarrassed by it? When I get an E-Bike, it'll look like what it is.

+1
I've no reason to conceal an e-bike for what it is in the vain hope some other cyclist may think I'm fitter than actually am,e-bikes are e-bikes and bikes are bikes why pretend otherwise?

I like my bike looking like a bike because:
1. I liked my old bike so got a retro conversion,
2. It can revert to a bike in about half an hour should I so wish.
3. It has nothing to do with vain hope of fooling anyone. Reality is that I am hugely fitter and have lost quite a bit of weight since getting an ebike. No need to fool anyone. I am evangelical about my ebike.

Modern cyclists seem to think that a bike is a frock. They don't so much ride one as wear it, hoping for admiring glances. Thus image becomes more important than substance to the frockers.

Personally I don't mind a very functional-but-ugly thing. Eventually, one recognises a form that follows function then begins to see a different kind of beauty in that. A large steam engine is a very lumpy dirty stinking thing but many can see the beauty within one nevertheless.

But there is a case for an e-bike that looks like an ordinary bike. The case is a functional case, in that the geometry and other configurations of a standard racing-style road bike, for example, are often very functional, since it's a result of a long evolution of a functional form. The ladywife has such an e-bike (a Focus Parlane2).

This e-bike looks like a road bike and achieves a very good road bike ride quality (slightly improved, even, by the lowered centre of gravity due to the motor, battery and gearbox located in the downtube & BB). It rides like the best road bike you ever rode, in fact. You can even drop the motor and battery out of it in one second to give a non-assisted road bike that also rides just like any other good road bike.

But a fugly utilitarian e-bike might eventually appear in our hoose, when I get too decrepid to ride the ex-cyclocross shopping bike up the many hills to obtain the 20llbs of frutti-veg. If it's form suits that function, it can be as lumpy as it likes.

Cugel

Why not make that big lumpy excrescence a structural member, bolt-in, bolt-out? That would be form following function, and elegant engineering, for instance.

Oh and BTW, every era of cyclists has considered the aesthetics of their bikes, it's certainly not a modern phenomenon. My Dad was telling me he used to ride a Holdsworth with chrome forks in the late 40s & 50s, and how it drew admiring glances from the Parisian cyclists when he toured there.