Ben J
Well-Known Member
- Region
- USA
I’m saying you shouldn’t buy it!
There are lots of reviews and long-term ownership reports on the Aventure and they are mostly positive. Those reviews are all true! But there are negatives to the bike. That’s all I’m listing here. If you want a balanced view of the bike, you need to go look at all the positives, too.
You may read these items and think, “eh, that doesn’t matter to me.” Great! If you aren’t bothered by the negatives, then this might be the right bike for you. No bike is perfect.
If you already own the bike, maybe don’t read this?
Post-purchase rationalization is a real thing. We feel happier if we see positive news or reviews about something we already own. I don’t want to make you feel bad about your purchase. It was a great purchase! This is for people who are trying to make a decision.
Why you shouldn’t buy an Aventure.2:
It’s Big
It’s a fat tire bike that is not geared for no-assist riding
Maintenance
The brakes are only just good enough
There’s not enough variation in the assist modes
Noise Issues
Ergonomic Issues
Very limited firmware/software
There are lots of reviews and long-term ownership reports on the Aventure and they are mostly positive. Those reviews are all true! But there are negatives to the bike. That’s all I’m listing here. If you want a balanced view of the bike, you need to go look at all the positives, too.
You may read these items and think, “eh, that doesn’t matter to me.” Great! If you aren’t bothered by the negatives, then this might be the right bike for you. No bike is perfect.
If you already own the bike, maybe don’t read this?
Post-purchase rationalization is a real thing. We feel happier if we see positive news or reviews about something we already own. I don’t want to make you feel bad about your purchase. It was a great purchase! This is for people who are trying to make a decision.
Why you shouldn’t buy an Aventure.2:
It’s Big
- Doesn’t fit in normal bike racks because it’s too heavy and/or the tires are too wide
- On cars
- On public transit
- In public parking areas (with “slots” for front tires)
- Where hanging hooks are used
- Where it does fit, it still weighs 75lbs and you have to wrestle it up there.
- The front wheel does not come with a quick release so it can’t go in spots where you have to remove the wheel.
- You can’t just manhandle it around because it’s heavy. Depending on your fitness level, you might not be able to lift it at all. But even if you can, you’ll find yourself doing a 3 point turn to turn around instead of just picking it up.
- Assist power only cancels out “big” when you’re riding. The rest of the time it’s just big.
- It’s conspicuous.
It’s a fat tire bike that is not geared for no-assist riding
- It’s like you took a regular fat tire bike, filled the frame with cement, and deleted all but the 3 highest gears.
- Because of that, it’s more dependent on assist than other bikes.
- Actually I did the math, cement is not heavy enough. You’d need to fill the frame with something like depleted uranium. Seriously. Berm Peak Express, are you listening?
Maintenance
- As soon as you buy it (and at intervals thereafter) you will need service. If you didn’t get the bike from LBS, you may have trouble finding anyone to work on it. Both “ebike” and "DTC” are trigger words for bike shops. Are you ready to buy some tools, watch some YouTube videos, and get your hands dirty?
- To give you an idea: I’ve had mine for 2 months/350 miles. I’ve adjusted the calipers to avoid rubbing (the front multiple times), the derailleur to fix clicking in high gears (from the factory), cleaned and lubed the chain, replaced the brake rotors (harmonic noise), replaced the pedals (failing bearings), and I’m about to true the front wheel (it has picked up about 5mm of wobble, and I’m getting what I think are spoke noises at certain speeds). This is in addition to ordinary stuff (organizing the cockpit, changing grips, seat, seatpost)
- Aventon support is responsive, but they are limited to replacing parts and telling you what the manual says. I know they’re active on social media, but they are not addressing common concerns (some of which I mention here).
The brakes are only just good enough
- It’s a 75lb bike with a 400lb payload capacity with brakes meant for something about half that size.
- You can panic stop on the flat from 20mph, can you do it downhill at 28mph?
- It probably needs a 4 piston caliper on the front at the very least.
There’s not enough variation in the assist modes
- You think it’s 4 assist curves stacked, but really they have the same origin and are only really different at higher speeds (note I didn’t say “higher torques” because you can tell that current bike speed is also an input to the algorithm).
- At low speeds this means there’s a big gap between “OFF” and “ECO” so it’s hard to manage your exertion level if you are in a speed limited environment like a mixed-use path. In most flat situations, ECO is nearly effortless to 15+mph in a situation where unassisted pedaling in gear 1 or 2 would hit 7mph with twice the effort.
- On hills at low speed there’s also not much variation. You would think TURBO would result in “all the assist” but often I see the bike has more to give (according to the power bar, and based on what happens if I mash the throttle)
- Because the current speed influences the assist response, the bike can feel “steppy” where you can be putting out constant effort, then a burst of power that takes you a few mph faster, and when you ease off you are now maintaining that speed at the original effort. This also makes it tricky to manage exertion level by slightly changing speed.
- Assist is greatly influenced by battery level, even in low modes like ECO where it should be possible to smooth them out electronically. There’s a hill near me that I’ve done at 9% battery remaining and 90% battery remaining. In ECO mode, it’s the difference between about 9mph and 13mph. No point in testing in other modes because you would not get more assist in that situation.
Noise Issues
- The front brake caliper is hard to adjust, and hard to keep in adjustment. It moves as you tighten it (making every adjustment a series of tap-tap-tap, tighten, repeat). It will move if you panic stop. It’s slightly easier if you get brake rotors that are flatter than stock. As a result, even if you leave the house with the brake not rubbing, there’s a decent chance it will be rubbing before you return.
- That irritating rotor harmonic vibration at certain speeds (which happen to be the bike’s favorite speeds).
- There’s another noise from the front that some people have which I think is a spoke tension issue.
Ergonomic Issues
- It’s prone to pedal strikes. It’s fine on the flat, and in turns with ordinary caution. But if you go over anything bumpy (and why did you get a fat tire bike if you didn’t want some bumps?) you have to use a lot of care. The bearings in the original pedals were showing play in less than 150mi, possibly due to the hits I took learning not to pedal over roots.
- It needs a suspension seatpost. If you aren’t riding it somewhere bumpy, you probably don’t need the fat tires anyway. At least this can be fixed with money, but they’re not cheap. 10% of the bike’s price?
- The fork isn’t great. It doesn’t smooth out small bumps, but it might save the bike (and you) if you hit a big bump at speed. The only instruction to adjust it are “until it feels good”. Some say he is still adjusting the fork to this day…
- There’s no geometry change between the frame sizes, just more seatpost, so your riding posture will be dictated mainly by your height. Taller riders = more upright, shorter riders = more aggressive.
Very limited firmware/software
- The mode will flip to OFF spontaneously but I haven’t found a pattern (it might be hitting bumps, but it’s not immediate). I’d say once every 50 miles or so, but if it happens once on a ride it’s more likely to happen again. It goes back into ECO without any trouble when you click the button.
- Many features are missing
- No ability to tune the assist modes (if you own one and you really want to be sad, watch a video on the Specialized Mission Control app)
- Can’t send or receive data to other devices (e.g. receiving heartrate, or send cadence to a GPS)
- Range calculation
- Screen layout customization
- Broken/Useless features
- CO2 emissions saved (random number)
- Trees saved (ditto)
- Calorie counter
- Subpar Features
- Trip odometer can only be accessed when stationary
- There are two trip odometers but it’s not clear how stats accumulate between them if you try to switch.
- Trip odometer is too many button presses to reset (and they both reset together)
- Battery percent remaining is not very linear
- USB A port for powering another device does not signal any charge capabilities, so many modern phones will not try to charge from it (though they may drain less of their own battery)
- Usability
- Everything is small except the speed (not great for old eyes)
- Useless stats like “total riding time” are front and center
- Polarized LCD screen orientation makes it impossible to read the display with polarized sunglasses
- Controller is a big reach. Hard to accurately hit left/right turnsignals (almost impossible with gloves). I’m saying this even after swapping it closer (moving the brakes to more of a 2-finger position) and you can’t really move it much closer without giving up the throttle. As a result, I rarely use the turn signals, and almost exclusively the left one because I can hit it semi-reliably.
