Turbo Vado 5.0: What tire pressure do you run?

[Camasonian]

Most people I see who are riding ebikes that look like bikes are riding like normal people (or, as you say, slower than road cyclists).

But the ones that get the attention are riding "ebikes" like the Surron and are going way too fast for a mixed-use path. And these days, e-scooters and those e-uniwheel things.

I guess I'm not everyone.

I have a 13 mile commute diagonally across the city of Vancouver WA that is on arterials with bike lanes with one big hill at one end. I bought my Turbo Vado 5.0 as a commuting vehicle and it has been superb for that purpose. I'm a reasonably fit recreational rider but it would take me over an hour to make the commute on my regular road bike and I'd arrive a sweaty mess riding at an average speed of about 12 mph.

On my Vado I can average about 25 mph on the flats without breaking a sweat and my commute is about 33-35 min depending on how I catch the lights. Buying the Vado meant I didn't have to buy a 3rd car since I let my HS age daughter use the Prius to commute to school. Without the Vado I'd have had to buy her a new car for HS.

I just leave the bike on Turbo mode all the time so I can grind to work and back as fast as possible and I have chargers at each end. Often I'm riding in the cold and dark and drizzle during the winters here so don't want to mess around in the cold and wet longer than I need to be.

The only other ebikes I usually see around here are other commuters doing the same thing. Vancouver is a big suburban sprawl but they only have well marked bike lanes on certain arterials and so all the bike commuters tend to get funneled into the same few routes and we see each other every day.

I honestly never use the bike if not for commuting. I'm a teacher and so have summers off and all summer I'm out riding for fitness every day on my regular road bike and the Vado just hangs in the garage all summer.

 

[mschwett]

Rolling resistance is also less of a factor on ebikes than regular bikes due to the higher speeds.

As you go from say riding at 10-15 mph on a conventional bike to riding at 25 mph on an ebike the friction from wind resistance goes up geometically while rolling resistance does not. So basically the faster you ride, the less your total drag is due to rolling resistance and the more it is due to wind resistance.

very true - but the same things which make heavy bicycles heavy (fat tubes, big tires, knobby tires, racks, accessories) also often make very unaerodynamic bicycles. riding position is of course the biggest contributor, and again, the heavier, more casual bikes tend to have a very upright riding position. best case to worst, the variation at 25mph is almost a factor of two between a rider on a light bike with smooth tires in an aggressive position vs. a heavier bike and rider sitting upright with big knobby tires.

 

[Stefan Mikes]

@Jeremy McCreary what about the acceleration? You lose power to accelerate (to gain the kinetic energy), and that is dependent on the mass.
Acceleration power loss is the factor greatly contributing to the battery use for commuters (frequent starts/stops).