Turbo Creo 2 Comp E5 (aluminum) is out, is a Vado SL 2 next?

[Rás Cnoic]

I may be wrong here - it happens - but I believe any Revolt e+ bikes are a couple of years old. They have not been available in the US for maybe two years, and searching their website yields nothing. My LBS, Giant dealer, agrees.

With that said though, in I believe in or around 2022 it seemed like they really didn’t know what they were doing. The Revolt e+ web page itself referred to BOTH the Shimano and the Yamaha motors as the power source in different sections of the page. It seemed like they intended to switch, but ended up walking away from the whole thing. Either way, it was referred to as Syncdrive.

I did see and test an actual Revolt e+ in the shop in Lake Placid on one of our frequent visits up there, and liked it quite a lot as the replacement for the excellent Toughroad ebike. Almost bought one, but ended up going a different direction to the Creo.

Funnily enough I was idly checking other brands to see what rivals there are to the Creo 2 when I saw the Revolt e+ had a Shimano motor. Here's the UK website page but it might auto click through to the North America site when you try and open it!

Revolt E+ 1 (2024) | Gravel bike | Giant Bicycles UK

www.giant-bicycles.com

 

[Saratoga Dave]

yeah, that’s a new one alright… cassette on the last ones here was 11-42.

 

[jabberwocky]

Was just looking up the Giant e gravel bike and to my surprise It's powered by the Shimano EP6:

Giant Revolt E+ 1 £4,499 Shimano EP6 Battery 500wh weight 40lbs

That surprised me as I thought they were all Yamaha PW Series. Maybe it's only in the UK. To further confuse it Giant still calls it a SyncDrive motor.

Interesting... I know they switched the canadian Revolts to Shimano a few years ago. So maybe they are using Shimano more globally? I've not seen a US spec bike using anything but Yamaha (and now whatever brand hub motor system they are using for the new drop bar bikes). I don't think Shimano makes a class 3 motor, they are class 1 only which makes them less attractive for the US market where drop bar ebike buyers do generally want that class 3 assist speed.

That's what surprised me about them still using the Syncdrive name I thought (assumed) this was a special custom version of the Yamaha motors. If it's just a Giant branding exercise like a cover to slap on any motor brand, why bother?

i don’t think giant has done as much customization or co-engineering though, they’re pretty much all off the shelf motors?

They've always rebranded their motors. Calling Yamaha, Shimano and [insert hub motor brand] all Syncdrive is unsurprising. I agree its very confusing and silly.

They are, as far as I know, off the shelf motors with Giant controllers. The screens and controllers don't match anything standard Yamaha on my bike, though I think its reasonable to assume Yamaha makes the damn things for them. Or maybe they have in house people making the batteries and controllers but don't want to mess around with motors? Kinda wondering if they actually use the same batteries on Yamaha and Shimano motor systems.

 

[PedalUma]

Someone mentioned the new Vado SL Al. I built my first today. It is nice with the future shock. This one has the brushed finish. On the B to B site the price was mis-listed. My boss got it for that price and will ride it until it needs new tires then he will go with tubeless gravel 42's.