Just ordered my Rover....

[Lost]

I pulled my hair out trying to choose either a new bike, putting a BBSHD on my 20 year old road bike, or maybe a Luna bike. In the end, the finished look of the rover, the warranty, and the $1450 delivered price won out.
Can't wait!
In all the reviews, one consistant truth seems to be the headlight is not worth a 22 round to put it out of its misery. A large portion of my riding will be night time. There are plenty of lights that have three or four cree led's that will draw 15 or 20 watts. I would like to switch out to one. Anyone know if that is congruent with the output (the lights are rated over a large voltage range up to 70 volts) load ability of the controller?

I also would have preferred hydraulic brakes, maybe switch those out down the road.

 

[mrgold35]

Congrats on the Radrover purchase!

I've put around 1000 miles between the 2 Radrovers I purchased back in Sept/16 for the wife and I. I mostly do commuter duties of 45-60 miles a week and switch off bikes to keep the mileage and wear/tear the same.

The shipping box isn't the greatest and one of the RR boxes was dirty, beat all to hell, and had a large basketball size hole on one side. I've had issues with:
- bent rear derailleur causing the chain to rub against the rear tires, bent back into place
- damaged left pedal crank arm that kept falling off, replaced under warranty
- sightly bent front brake disk that kept rubbing against pads, bending true with adjustable wrench fixed 90% of the rub and switching front tires between the two bikes worked the rest of the way
- re-torqued the spokes, about 15%-20% were a little loose

Others had cosmetic damage during shipment; but, nothing more you wouldn't do after a few hard trail rides. I also had to replace my controller and battery on the RR that was beat up during shipment a few months later. Don't know if it was a bad luck with the controller/battery or they were damage during shipment (both replaced under warranty).

 

[Lost]

Congrats on the Radrover purchase!

I've put around 1000 miles between the 2 Radrovers I purchased back in Sept/16 for the wife and I. I mostly do commuter duties of 45-60 miles a week and switch off bikes to keep the mileage and wear/tear the same.

The shipping box isn't the greatest and one of the RR boxes was dirty, beat all to hell, and had a large basketball size hole on one side. I've had issues with:
- bent rear derailleur causing the chain to rub against the rear tires, bent back into place
- damaged left pedal crank arm that kept falling off, replaced under warranty
- sightly bent front brake disk that kept rubbing against pads, bending true with adjustable wrench fixed 90% of the rub and switching front tires between the two bikes worked the rest of the way
- re-torqued the spokes, about 15%-20% were a little loose

Others had cosmetic damage during shipment; but, nothing more you wouldn't do after a few hard trail rides. I also had to replace my controller and battery on the RR that was beat up during shipment a few months later. Don't know if it was a bad luck with the controller/battery or they were damage during shipment (both replaced under warranty).

Good to hear. So they took care of you gripes without a lot of heartbreak?

Ordering up a bunch of stuff for mine, I literally LOLd when I saw a GREAT review (in ultra hd on youtube) where the dude installed a bottle opener up front. That's me to a "T". I got to get me one like that!

Waiting for full fenders and rack to get in stock, I'll get those too.

RE: Torquing spokes. Is that tough to do without knocking the wheel out of true? Never done that.....

 

[mrgold35]

Any issues with the RR, just email tech support about the problem. They will give some trouble-shooting steps to take, maybe take a picture or video of the problem, and they are pretty quick about resolving warranty issues.

I just had on of those round spoke torque wrenches and just made sure each spoke had about the same amount of tension all the way around. It didn't seem to effect the wheel and it pretty much stayed torque when I double-check about a month later.

I did the Topeak fat tire rack for both of my RR. Some of the rack bolts started to work themselves out after about a month of riding. I used some blue Loc-tite and they seem to be staying put for now.

One thing that surprised me was how easy it is to get a flat tire if you have a lot of goat heads in your area. There really isn't a lot of rubber to stop the average size goat head from puncturing the inter tube. The thin rubber on the tires are probably to keep the weight down. I ended up using Mr Tuffy tire liners and 2 2-oz bottles of Stans tire sealant per tire. Usually every weekend, I'm picking out 10-20 goat head thorns broken off in the tread and some of them punch through Mr. Tuffy also. I just rotate the tire until the sealant squirts out, wait a few seconds until it stops, and double check the PSI for a few days afterwards. I imagine my inter tube looks like swiss cheese after +4 months of doing this every weekend.

 

[BVC]

The wires to the factory light are 50v. The reducer inside the headlight housing is going from 50v to 3v. Hence why the factory light is pure crap.


However... you want some major light - we are currently testing out some prototypes of some plug-n-play headlights for Rad Power Bikes or any electric bicycle with the same style mount and at least 12v to the wires. This way everything is all integrated into the bicycle.

This photo shows the factory light and the teaser light output of our prototype. Needless to say our LED chip is only running at 3.7% of capacity That's right - not even 1/8th of the potential showing in this pic! We are not exactly sure yet where the numbers will rest with the final product but I can assure you that it will be wide and bright! A practical bright - not a landing airplane bright. Tho we may add a mode for that in case you find yourself doing some awesome jumps at night

..oh, And at a VERY affordable price point.

We expect to have this product to market very soon...

 

[Lost]

Kewl. I bought a ebay high voltage capable led in the meantime, but will be looking forward to your light. I copied just about everything you did to your bike via the shopping list on your video anyways. Down to the bottle opener!

I would disagree that having the voltage converter integrated into the headlamp makes it crap. It's crap because it's crap. The higher voltage can be nice for higher loads over distance due to smaller wires. That's the reason for high voltage transmission lines, even DC ones. Airport lighting runs on 5000 volts IIRC.

 

[BVC]

Oh awesome! Glad my videos helped!! The bottle opener is a must.. and even more so....... the prototype on the other side of the bottle opener

If you want - and are on Facebook - follow our page for the latest updates, videos, photos and live streams of our what we're up to!

www.facebook.com/1859NW

And what I meant was the voltage regulator in there was crap - not the idea. It's hard to get anything useful out of that little chip (we took it apart, tinkered with it and got some readings off it). I think you'll be pleasantly surprised with what we have brewing on our end! We will be doing more testing this weekend as more inventory rolls in. I have a hobby background in automotive lighting so..its kind of my thing

 

[Lost]

 

[BVC]

Ahhhhhhhhh shiiiiiiiiiiiizzzzz Now you're ready!!

I wish I could show my prototype that is mounted on the other size. But you're on the right track!

 

[Ncgo4]

Can an aftermarket headlamp wired into the bike’s electrical system create a major drain on the battery! Could it even do damage to the controller? Would such a change effect the warranty! I’m not an electrical engineer, clearly.

 

[larry-new]

Can an aftermarket headlamp wired into the bike’s electrical system create a major drain on the battery! Could it even do damage to the controller? Would such a change effect the warranty! I’m not an electrical engineer, clearly.

If l.e.d., most likely not.

 

[eguy]

The Spanninga Axendo 60s on the 2018 bikes are dramatically better than the Kendo that came with the 2016 bikes. I find it to be almost enough for most night riding. I have a Fly12CE on the front that adds plenty more light that makes me feel like I am driving a car. Spanninga also makes the Axendo 80, not sure if that is plug and play with the 2018 Rad bikes.