Maintaining e bikes

[Tom]

After scrolling through the e bikes coloum I would like to know how you overcome repairing/ removing a rear wheel.due to weight and punctures.
I have a cube hybred pro 500 w/h
Thanks Tom

[stodd]

Things that help with punctures.:
Marathon Plus tyres (yes, I admit they do have downsides as well)
Gaadi spare inner tubes.
Learn how to reliably mend a puncture on the road without taking out the wheel. (I've never managed that one)

Some would say slime or similar gunk. My experience is that they don't stop punctures and make them almost impossible to repair when they do happen.

[peterb]

I sympathise - I find removing the rear wheel of my Orbea Gain (16kg) hard work - and the Cube Hybrid Pro appears to be 10 kg heavier at around 26kg. Bike weight was one of the major considerations for me when buying an ebike as I also need to load the bike into a car. Good advice on your other thread re raising the bike to work on the back wheel, difficulty arises when needing to remove the wheel out on the road. Hooking saddle over a handy fence or gate can work. Could the kickstand be used to help somehow - supported on a kerb or brick maybe?

[UpWrong]

This is a concern. Whilst I can invert my eBike with the battery removed, that's not the end of it. There's also:

1. rotating the display on the bars so it's not damaged. Because space is tight this also means rotating the thumb throttle. Note, 3 different size allen keys are required.
2. undoing the main motor lead. I can't do this with my hands, I need two pairs of pliers to grip the lead ends.
3. unding the axle nuts. Need to carry a large enough spanner.
4. Get the 140mm OLD rear hub out of and back into the 133mm spaced dropouts. This requires usuing thumbs on oily bits to gradually work the hub in/out of the dropouts.

Hence I carry a gaadi tube and a pair of scissors.

[Jdsk]

This requires usuing thumbs on oily bits to gradually work the hub in/out of the dropouts.

My current favourite workshop gloves:

Tornado Contour Avenger
https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/121299680674

Jonathan

[UpWrong]

Things that help with punctures.:
Marathon Plus tyres (yes, I admit they do have downsides as well)
Gaadi spare inner tubes.
Learn how to reliably mend a puncture on the road without taking out the wheel. (I've never managed that one)

I'm hoping I can lay the eBike on its drive side and replace the punctured tube with a Gaadi tube. Which is why I'm not using a Marathon Plus tyre. I find Marathon Greenguard a lot easier to mount/dismount, and interesting in 1.75" form the tread thickness is almost the same. (Data from https://www.bicyclerollingresistance.com/

[axel_knutt]

Learn how to reliably mend a puncture on the road without taking out the wheel. (I've never managed that one)

I used to repair virtually all my rear punctures that way, up until my eyesight and hearing had deteriorated to the point where I could no longer find the punctures.

[axel_knutt]

I don't have an e-bike, but the way I deal with oily bits is usually by hooking the chain with a twig plucked from the roadside. Failing that, I can invariably restrict the mess to two patches on the tips of my thumb and index finger, and the most effective and convenient way of removing those is by using the nearest masonry as a pumice. I carry a pair of gloves, but in 20-odd years I've never used them because dealing with oily tools and implements is as much hassle as oily fingers. Twigs and tarmac get left behind, and don't need cleaning to stow them back in the toolkit. I also carry a rag for cleaning tools, but again, if you can avoid using it you don't have to stow an oily rag.

At home I use Rozalex, there's no way I could manage fine assembly work with gloves on.

[yakdiver]

Things that help with punctures.:
Marathon Plus tyres (yes, I admit they do have downsides as well)
Gaadi spare inner tubes.
Learn how to reliably mend a puncture on the road without taking out the wheel. (I've never managed that one)

Some would say slime or similar gunk. My experience is that they don't stop punctures and make them almost impossible to repair when they do happen.

Just ordered two for my etrike thank you

[peterb]

To avoid oily finger tips use nature's wet wipes - dock leaves.

[peterb]

Another thought - could a ratchet strap over a convenient fence-rail or branch and looped under the top tube or saddle be used to help lift and hold the rear end of the bike while you remove the wheel?

[Bonzo Banana]

You have a powerful ebike so I feel a little extra weight wouldn't matter. I'd go with tyre liners between the tubes and tyres and use the extra thick downhill inner tubes that can take a lot more abuse as well as using good inner tube sealant. If you are the type of rider who mainly gets punctures on the rear then you could just do the rear wheel, that is typically heavier riders. I realise if you run your tyres tubeless then you don't have to replace tubes so don't have to remove the wheels sometimes thats another option but you need to get yourself up to speed on how to deal with tubeless issues and have the right repair bits in case of a puncture.

[richtea99]

After scrolling through the e bikes coloum I would like to know how you overcome repairing/ removing a rear wheel.due to weight and punctures.
I have a cube hybred pro 500 w/h

I can only answer for an Orbea Gain with a rear hub motor, but there are only two extra steps to rear wheel removal compared to a normal bike - about 20s of effort if that:

1. Having loosened the rear wheel, you'll have anti-rotation 'washer nuts' on either side of the axle to remove / refit. You have to make sure the 'key' part of the washer lines up correctly in the frame on refitting.
2. You need to disconnect / reconnect the motor cable. In the dark and wet, it can be tricky to reconnect (black plastic with two black arrows to line up. Doh! Painting them white beforehand might be a good idea.)

In terms of weight I find it's easier to work with the bike upside down, balanced on the handlebars. Getting it upside down isn't hard unless you insist on flipping it in the air. Just lie it down on grass and then up onto the bars - easy. The rear wheel + motor does weight maybe 1.5Kg more than the average rear wheel, but it's not much compared to the overall bike weight, and you should be able to remove it fairly easily

And the obvious general tips:
- Practice at home! Take the wheel out and put it back in in the comfort of your room / garden / garage, and it will be so much easier when you have to do it in the wild.
- Have a piece of rag/kitchen towel for handling the chain, otherwise you'll have oil everywhere including the bars/grips.
- Do some pre-planning to be able to avoid damaging anything attached to the handlebars. You may need to either remove or loosen handlbar bits, so carry tools to do that. For that reason I only have one thing attached to my bars - a low profile bell, which doesn't touch the ground when the bike is flipped upside down. It took me a while to find that:

[peterb]

Good tip re painting arrows white! In addition to the points you listed I find locating the Gain's rear wheel tricky sometimes as you also need to make sure the flats on the axle are aligned probably so as to allow it to slip into the dropouts and that the axle is in the correct position for connection of the power cable. Not as simple as replacing a standard Q/R rear wheel, especially if you are trying to hold the frame up with one hand and replace the wheel and fit the chain with the other. I find it easier to remove the nuts and the anti-rotation washers completely. Just make sure you know where you've put them - especially if you are working on an overgrown roadside. The Gain is 10kg lighter than the OP's Cube of course, even so I find it very heavy to turnover and prefer to keep the rubber side down. The best solution is to ride with a stronger companion, and let them do the heavy lifting!