rope_byrne
New Member
I purchased the BABE online in January and have had a few months of riding on this bike. I've clocked somewhere around 2000 miles so far if that tells you anything about my riding. My typical ride area is in Colorado along the front range and includes some hilly areas as well as plenty of flat ground.
The Good
This bike looks good. I'm new to fat bikes and so I may not have a proper context to judge this particular bike against, but it rides comfortably, looks attractive, and generally gives you a feeling of a solid build. The components, in general, seem like good quality components. The front shock is definitely adequate for soaking up bumps without needing to reduce the tire pressure. It definitely surprised me how much bump can be soaked up by just letting a little air out of the tire.
Riding this bike makes you feel like you're capable of rolling over anything in the way. Riding trails on a traditional mountain bike is not tough, but it definitely requires more attention and skill than does the BABE.
The brakes are definitely adequate and are capable of stopping the heavy bike without any great strain. Similarly, I feel like the belt and motor combination are sized appropriately. I don't want the motor to be doing all of the work and I enjoy being able to provide a decent amount of pedal power while having the option to work quite a bit less if I wish. I ride in assist level 1 or 2 mostly, but I also have a replace IGH on the back (more about that in the bad).
The Bad
This bike comes stock with a terrible internal hub. Specifically, it is a new(ish) Sturmey Archer RX-RK5 5 speed hub. This hub is supposed to be designed for fat tire bikes and supposedly capable of handling the torque that can be delivered to it from a 750 watt mid-drive motor. The reality is that this hub is not able to handle higher levels of torque (search Luna Cycle's forum for other reports from BABE owners complaining about this hub) and it fell apart on me within about 3 months. I bought this bike new, expecting to be able to put some pretty serious miles on it and so even though the hub was clunking, slipping out of gear, shifting randomly, and generally making riding less joyous than it should be, I continued riding because, well, I bought a new bike to ride it not work on it. This hub has some history on endless-sphere that seems to have been missed when Luna chose to go with this option on the BABE and that is rather disappointing. I just replaced the SA hub with a Rohloff speedhub and I'm thrilled to be riding again, but Luna gave me zero support on replacing the (obviously inadequate) hub with something more appropriate and also ignored others when they suggested that the hub was insufficient for the bike. I also have had some minor complaints about noise and the bafang motor, but these are minor niggles. The Gates belt needs to be lubricated (silicon spray or paraffin wax) to keep it from squeaking. Mind you, that I wasn't sure what was squeaking and thought that it was the motor and so I bought a tool to open the case of the motor and replaced all the grease inside with the recommended grease only to have the squeak persist. That was when I discovered that the belt was the issue (sigh).
The other bad about this bike is that the crank arms are too long and can occasionally hit the ground or rocks while turning and pedaling. This is not a huge issue, but kind of annoying.
Lastly, depending upon your desired usage, the lack of any light, fenders, or rack as original equipment and the lack of any readily available options for purchase post delivery is also a bad thing.
My take on my bike at this point is that it failed miserably on delivering trouble free riding, but the sense of freedom and enjoyment that you get from riding it when it is working properly is worth working for (YMMV). Were I given the opportunity to reconsider my original purchase knowing what I know now, I would not buy this bike. Luna Cycle has not demonstrated decent concern for the early purchasers of this bike and knowing that their warranty is 30 days only leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth. Do yourself a favor and look at the FLX bikes or check out what other manufacturers have to offer. Honestly, this experience has taught me the value of purchasing a bike from a local shop.
The Good
This bike looks good. I'm new to fat bikes and so I may not have a proper context to judge this particular bike against, but it rides comfortably, looks attractive, and generally gives you a feeling of a solid build. The components, in general, seem like good quality components. The front shock is definitely adequate for soaking up bumps without needing to reduce the tire pressure. It definitely surprised me how much bump can be soaked up by just letting a little air out of the tire.
Riding this bike makes you feel like you're capable of rolling over anything in the way. Riding trails on a traditional mountain bike is not tough, but it definitely requires more attention and skill than does the BABE.
The brakes are definitely adequate and are capable of stopping the heavy bike without any great strain. Similarly, I feel like the belt and motor combination are sized appropriately. I don't want the motor to be doing all of the work and I enjoy being able to provide a decent amount of pedal power while having the option to work quite a bit less if I wish. I ride in assist level 1 or 2 mostly, but I also have a replace IGH on the back (more about that in the bad).
The Bad
This bike comes stock with a terrible internal hub. Specifically, it is a new(ish) Sturmey Archer RX-RK5 5 speed hub. This hub is supposed to be designed for fat tire bikes and supposedly capable of handling the torque that can be delivered to it from a 750 watt mid-drive motor. The reality is that this hub is not able to handle higher levels of torque (search Luna Cycle's forum for other reports from BABE owners complaining about this hub) and it fell apart on me within about 3 months. I bought this bike new, expecting to be able to put some pretty serious miles on it and so even though the hub was clunking, slipping out of gear, shifting randomly, and generally making riding less joyous than it should be, I continued riding because, well, I bought a new bike to ride it not work on it. This hub has some history on endless-sphere that seems to have been missed when Luna chose to go with this option on the BABE and that is rather disappointing. I just replaced the SA hub with a Rohloff speedhub and I'm thrilled to be riding again, but Luna gave me zero support on replacing the (obviously inadequate) hub with something more appropriate and also ignored others when they suggested that the hub was insufficient for the bike. I also have had some minor complaints about noise and the bafang motor, but these are minor niggles. The Gates belt needs to be lubricated (silicon spray or paraffin wax) to keep it from squeaking. Mind you, that I wasn't sure what was squeaking and thought that it was the motor and so I bought a tool to open the case of the motor and replaced all the grease inside with the recommended grease only to have the squeak persist. That was when I discovered that the belt was the issue (sigh).
The other bad about this bike is that the crank arms are too long and can occasionally hit the ground or rocks while turning and pedaling. This is not a huge issue, but kind of annoying.
Lastly, depending upon your desired usage, the lack of any light, fenders, or rack as original equipment and the lack of any readily available options for purchase post delivery is also a bad thing.
My take on my bike at this point is that it failed miserably on delivering trouble free riding, but the sense of freedom and enjoyment that you get from riding it when it is working properly is worth working for (YMMV). Were I given the opportunity to reconsider my original purchase knowing what I know now, I would not buy this bike. Luna Cycle has not demonstrated decent concern for the early purchasers of this bike and knowing that their warranty is 30 days only leaves me with a bad taste in my mouth. Do yourself a favor and look at the FLX bikes or check out what other manufacturers have to offer. Honestly, this experience has taught me the value of purchasing a bike from a local shop.
