robgul wrote:willcee wrote:Interesting.. the thing that i find a bit confusing is and I speak from an extensive background in high ticket business, within the UK imv Orbea seem backed up by the consensus of contributors & owners hereabouts who have expounded their views on E assistance their market aim is for those who were cyclists and are no longer as fit or as young to enable continued 2 wheeled leisure.. perhaps I am totally wrong but why therefore tie all the mods that can be achieved through exclusive use of a 'smart' phone, I don't have one, indeed as a user of cell technology since the mid 80's I was glad to be rid..I still use a small cellphone, but have no truck with apps and someone who I don't Know being able to track my location, after a lifetime of looking under my vehicles each time I used them..Admittedly Orbea have a very smooth motor action, emphasised to me last week when my chum on his 2nd Gain, had his up at the dealer for that add on battery, the guys, who as far as I was concerned knew the app but couldn't really sort other than say its all good running fine look here flashing the screen at me.. old guys and smart phones are worse than old guys and a readable dashboard... like Giants...will..
Indeed - I fit the profile of the "older person wanting to keep cycling" - and not a "Strava bunny" obsessed by performance, or the the minutiae of the stats from the app and the brain on the bike.
To me a couple of improvements to the Gain would be to make the very neat top-tube indicator/switch two "discs" - one with up/down buttons to toggle the power selection rather than scrolling through them in one direction; and the other as a separate simple battery indicator (same visual as the current (sorry!!) way that the button changes colour)
For all that it's a great machine - it's horses for courses with my use, riding both unpowered machines and the Gain
Rob
To achieve your wants you might consider an e-bike with a Fazua Evation motor and the associated controllers. Although reviewers tut about the simplicity and lack of swish in the bar-mounted controller, it's functionally very good. One may control the motor output and see the battery level very clearly. What more is needed?
It does allow some sort of software connection via a smartphone, with a simple "rider" as well as a complicate "dealer-only" option. Unless one is obsessed with riding data or wanting to change the power profiles for the various levels of assistance (which only the dealer software is allowed to do) it's really not needed.
Mind, I can never understand some lad's (and lass's) obsession with datafication of their rides. Personally I prefer no artificial construct between me and the riding pleasures. No bike computer, which is basically a slave-driving galley drummer. I suppose a case can be made for software to set up an e-bike motor to behave exactly as one wishes in terms of degree of assistance in various riding conditions for various rider types...... But the ladywife has no interest in such things, being too busy enjoying the ability to go up hills faster than me and buzz along at a reasonable speed when not climbing.
It's still a bike, not just an exercise machine.
Marketing men will try and sell us spurious accessories as this is the modern mode. We should always ask ourselves, "Do I want this for my reasons or for their reasons which I have been programmed to host".
CUgel
“Practical men who believe themselves to be quite exempt from any intellectual influence are usually the slaves of some defunct economist”.
John Maynard Keynes