Avg Battery Range

[mschwett]

My Como is ridable with the power off. I just need to gear down. Sometimes it feels like I got sand-filled tires and I have to huff and puff to get things going.

try turning the boost off when you’re going downhill, have a tailwind, etc. you might lose a mph or two on your average speed but probably increase range a lot. sometimes you need it, sometimes you don’t!

 

[Stefan Mikes]

My Vado can be ridden with power off too. My legs don't agree with that

 

[Art Deco]

My Como is ridable with the power off. I just need to gear down. Sometimes it feels like I got sand-filled tires and I have to huff and puff to get things going.

I rode my Como without boost a lot for the first week or two I owned it , just to get used to it's limits as a bike and my limits as a rider. It was OK.
Today I leave it in medium boost almost all the time. That's what I bought it for, and I know it has more range than I have.

 

[RGVCycling]

I rode my Como without boost a lot for the first week or two I owned it , just to get used to it's limits as a bike and my limits as a rider. It was OK.
Today I leave it in medium boost almost all the time. That's what I bought it for, and I know it has more range than I have.

Use it as intended.

 

[RGVCycling]

try turning the boost off when you’re going downhill, have a tailwind, etc. you might lose a mph or two on your average speed but probably increase range a lot. sometimes you need it, sometimes you don’t!

Ya I usually do that when I’m low on juice and want to stretch it as far as possible.

 

[lloose]

I constantly get 45-50 miles on a charge on stock eco for my long rides. It depends on headwind and if I am taking anything with me. All fairly flat with a couple hills here and there. I weigh 244 lbs and will carry up to 15 pounds with me. This is on a Vado 4.0.

 

[RGVCycling]

I constantly get 45-50 miles on a charge on stock eco for my long rides. It depends on headwind and if I am taking anything with me. All fairly flat with a couple hills here and there. I weigh 244 lbs and will carry up to 15 pounds with me. This is on a Vado 4.0.

I almost got the Vado but they were sold out. You are getting pretty good miles with similar conditions. Awesome!

 

[RGVCycling]

I got 49 miles this week. Up from 42 miles from the previous week so I'm happy. Maybe this will turn out to be one of those Prius challenges, How high can I get the MPG.

 

[john peck]

No matter what you ride, I think the way you ride can greatly increase your range. Being heavy,
ebikes coast pretty well once they´re rolling. I coast whenever possible; it gives to motor & me
a break. I try to maintain that sweet spot when gear, mode, & effort all fall into sync, Often the
bike is using little or no power at all even when slightly uphill. That´s something I love about my
display, The power bar let´s me know just how much juice I´m using. Judicious use of throttle can
even improve range by getting a little jump going into a hill or crossing. Maintain momentum,
minimize effort.

 

[RGVCycling]

No matter what you ride, I think the way you ride can greatly increase your range. Being heavy,
ebikes coast pretty well once they´re rolling. I coast whenever possible; it gives to motor & me
a break. I try to maintain that sweet spot when gear, mode, & effort all fall into sync, Often the
bike is using little or no power at all even when slightly uphill. That´s something I love about my
display, The power bar let´s me know just how much juice I´m using. Judicious use of throttle can
even improve range by getting a little jump going into a hill or crossing. Maintain momentum,
minimize effort.

I agree, this bike can coast! I have power meter on my other bike and I’m used to go by power rather than heart rate and I can manage my ride with it. I also like the back lit display. I was not expecting that. It makes my night rides a lot better.

 

[Stefan Mikes]

We all know the battery range depends on so many factors. I'd like to re-iterate on some facts, followed by several very different examples:

• For cyclists who ride in a hilly area, the battery range is mostly affected by elevation gain and the total weight of the rider, e-bike and cargo. That's because a great deal of the energy stored in the battery is used for gaining the potential energy; great part of which cannot be later recovered on descents (if any braking is applied).
• For any type of riding but especially for riding the flats, the battery energy consumption primarily depends on speed. The power demand to counter air drag depends on the relative speed of the bike and surrounding air in the third power. (We can see it becomes quite complicated because headwind itself contributes to the battery use very much).
• Riding style: Either long, steady riding with very few or no stops on the trip, or frequent stops/starts as the latter is a norm in urban environment. Frequent ride restarts mean we spend a lot of energy to gain kinetic energy first that is irreversibly lost on braking next.
• The rider's own leg power input (very, very important)

Only four factors, and there are so many more (inflated tyres? ambient temperature? surface quality?).

Examples:

1. Vado 5.0 (45 km/h version), 600 Wh battery, flat area, mild wind, average speed of 19 km/h: 102 km ridden, 13% of battery charge left
2. The same Vado and rider, flat area, 30 km/h headwind for half of the trip, mostly side wind on the return, 24.4 km/h average speed: 130 km ridden, 178% of 600 Wh batteries used (meaning two batteries with average consumption of 89% of each). As the 5% of each Vado battery cannot be used for ride assistance, effective useful charge remaining in both batteries was only 12%. Compare that with the Example 1. The culprits here was cruising speed of some 30 km/h combined with strong headwind.
3. Vado 4. SL (25 km/h version), 320 Wh battery, flat terrain. The average speed here was only 17.5 km/h. Estimated range here would be 130 km.

What might be most surprising is the fact the same distance might be covered on a single 320 Wh battery with Vado SL or on two 600 Wh batteries with Vado. The primary difference between both rides was the average ride speed. The ride with two big batteries could be completed in 5 h 21 mins while the Vado SL ride (a single small battery) would have taken at least 7 h 25 mins of the net ride time for the same rider! (These two hours of ride time difference would cost me a lot of battery charge).

Also note that even the heavy full-power Vado ridden on the flat allows pretty far -- single battery -- rides if the rider agrees to ride slowly (so the motor assistance might be greatly reduced).