Superdelite Bosch Battery Rental/Purchase

[John Vincent 2]

My wife and I live in Canada and own two Superdelite bikes. We plan to tour Europe in 2022 on them. We are well aware of the difficulty of shipping e-bikes with batteries, which is problematic if not impossible. Therefore we are looking for a place to either buy them in Europe, which shouldn’t be too difficult to achieve, or rent them if possible. Can anyone give us any guidance on this? We presume taking our bikes as excess baggage without the batteries on the plane would be no different than a regular bike, which is quite common. Does anyone know otherwise?

 

[RMK!]

I have no experience with this, but couldn't you ship your batteries to your first destination and then ship them back at the end of the trip (you can find some info on packaging here)? They would need to be properly packaged/labeled as I have had ebike batteries air freighted from the factory in China to the US with no issues. I know you can include your ebikes on your flight as oversized baggage and shipping batteries would seem cheaper than renting if that's even possible. Buying batteries in Europe would have the same issue when returning ... no?

 

[John Vincent 2]

I have no experience with this, but couldn't you ship your batteries to your first destination and then ship them back at the end of the trip (you can find some info on packaging here)? They would need to be properly packaged/labeled as I have had ebike batteries air freighted from the factory in China to the US with no issues. I know you can include your ebikes on your flight as oversized baggage and shipping batteries would seem cheaper than renting if that's even possible. Buying batteries in Europe would have the same issue when returning ... no?

I have looked into shipping my batteries from Canada to the U.S. via FedEx. It requires packaging by a hazardous goods specialist in a special hazardous goods package. Cost in C$275. Then shipping via FedEx from Vancouver to Munich is $C500. Then you have to clear the package into Germany separately as personal goods and hopefully avoid any duty charges. Do that several times back and forth and you can see how it would add up to the purchase price of new batteries in Europe. As we intend to make this trip every year for several years, it is why we are planning to buy them in Europe and leave them with relatives between trips. But we would be interested in renting them if possible and more economical. Personally I think this will become a new business opportunity for someone as more people will want to ship their e-bikes around the world.

 

[Dallant]

Good luck finding

My wife and I live in Canada and own two Superdelite bikes. We plan to tour Europe in 2022 on them. We are well aware of the difficulty of shipping e-bikes with batteries, which is problematic if not impossible. Therefore we are looking for a place to either buy them in Europe, which shouldn’t be too difficult to achieve, or rent them if possible. Can anyone give us any guidance on this? We presume taking our bikes as excess baggage without the batteries on the plane would be no different than a regular bike, which is quite common. Does anyone know otherwise?

This is why ebike battery research needs to advance into a less flammable form that can be easily shipped!
Good luck finding batteries to buy for some time into the future. I’ve had a Bosch 625wh battery on order almost 8 months now. Let us know how it goes.