Velotric Breeze 1 — a powerful lightweight cruiser

Jeremy McCreary

Bought it anyway
Region
USA
City
Carlsbad, CA
Picked up the wife's new Velotric Breeze 1 yesterday.

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She has about 25 miles on it now. I have about 5. Great color, nice lines.

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As a 50 lb, 750W, 65 Nm, 8-speed, hub-drive step-thru with cruiser geometry, the Breeze has little in common with my high-step 38 lb, 240W, 35 Nm, 12-speed mid-drive Vado SL. But it's a great bike for her riding needs, she's delighted, and I found it a lot of fun to ride.

Unlike her previous 65 lb, 500W, 65 Nm hub-drive, she's eager to ride the Breeze. She feels in control with this bike. And in a turn of the worm she clearly relishes, she can now leave me in the dust.

Better yet, all of that plays right into my evil scheme: To ride with her a lot more often.

Best features in no particular order:
1. At 50 lb, agile and easy to handle but stable.
2. Comfy ride despite lack of suspension.
3. Upright pedals-forward geometry allowing both adequate knee extension while pedaling and both feet firmly on the ground while stopped.
4. Powerful motor and brakes more than adequate for local hills.
5. Very flexible power delivery: Dual torque-sensing and cadence-sensing assist switchable on the fly plus a progressive throttle. She's already putting this brilliant SensorSwap feature to good use.
6. Richly featured display and phone app.

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On the downside,
1. Neither of us is entirely happy with the throttle implementation: Weaker than expected, and the throttle turns off pedal assist rather than just adding to it.
2. The chain sometimes drops off the chainring to the outside when she shifts into top (8th) gear. Hoping a derailleur adjustment will take of this. Chainline looks OK.

More at the 100 mile mark. Thorough EBR review here.
 
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happy trails!

No fenders? and the rear reflector is covered by the bag, is the bag equipped with a light?

For dropping the chain. give the L screw (the one where the derailleur parallelogram rest on on the smallest cog) a 1/4 turn, that might help or mount a chain guide on on the lower bottle cage mount (where the lock is on) to prevent it from skipping of.
 
Thanks for the derailleur adjustment tip. Lock has to stay.

Yes, no fenders to save weight in this warm, dry SoCal climate. I'll check rear reflector visibility. Rear lights are on the lower seat stays.
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Nice bike! So far I'm impressed with the Velotric bikes. They are selling very well in SW Florida near our beach town that has an established dealer. The new Velotric my wife has with the throttle gets her back on the bike. She had been hesitant to ride since a mishap on her Townie Go about seven years ago. Before she started the test ride on the Velotric I reminded her of how well she rode my Honda 350 when we were dating about a hundred years ago.

I agree with your assessment of the throttle and will discuss that with the dealer.
 
Velotric prices will be increasing TOMORROW (April 15)! Here's a 10% discount link:
rwrd.io/ref_ZD5TTHA?c
 
Picked up the wife's new Velotric Breeze 1 yesterday.

View attachment 191932
She has about 25 miles on it now. I have about 5. Great color, nice lines.

View attachment 191935
As a 50 lb, 750W, 65 Nm, 8-speed, hub-drive step-thru with cruiser geometry, the Breeze has little in common with my high-step 38 lb, 240W, 35 Nm, 12-speed mid-drive Vado SL. But it's a great bike for her riding needs, she's delighted, and I found it a lot of fun to ride.

Unlike her previous 65 lb, 500W, 65 Nm hub-drive, she's eager to ride the Breeze. She feels in control with this bike. And in a turn of the worm she clearly relishes, she can now leave me in the dust.

Better yet, all of that plays right into my evil scheme: To ride with her a lot more often.

Best features in no particular order:
1. At 50 lb, agile and easy to handle but stable.
2. Comfy ride despite lack of suspension.
3. Upright pedals-forward geometry allowing both adequate knee extension while pedaling and both feet firmly on the ground while stopped.
4. Powerful motor and brakes more than adequate for local hills.
5. Very flexible power delivery: Dual torque-sensing and cadence-sensing assist switchable on the fly plus a progressive throttle. She's already putting this brilliant SensorSwap feature to good use.
6. Richly featured display and phone app.

View attachment 191933View attachment 191934
On the downside,
1. Neither of us is entirely happy with the throttle implementation: Weaker than expected, and the throttle turns off pedal assist rather than just adding to it.
2. The chain sometimes drops off the chainring to the outside when she shifts into top (8th) gear. Hoping a derailleur adjustment will take of this. Chainline looks OK.

More at the 100 mile mark. Thorough EBR review here.
Jeremy, check that the chainring itself is not bent or somewhat misshapen. It’s probably just a slight derailleur adjustment, but thought I’d mention it.

Nice bike. Hope she really enjoys it!

p.s./ sorry I missed this when you first posted it. Congrats.
 
Jeremy, check that the chainring itself is not bent or somewhat misshapen. It’s probably just a slight derailleur adjustment, but thought I’d mention it.

Nice bike. Hope she really enjoys it!

p.s./ sorry I missed this when you first posted it. Congrats.
Turned out to be a chainring defect. Mechanic told me it was warped. Replacement seems to have fixed the problem, but I'll feel more confident in another 100 mi.

Wife's loving her new bike. Success!
 
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Rode the Breeze again today. Have to say, it's a well-engineered ebike and a pleasure to ride.

Much more oomph than I'm used to on my mid-drive Vado SL 1. Power delivery is very natural but not as refined as the SL's. Not as nimble or responsive either, but very good on these fronts.

The Breeze does fine on the moderate climbs tried so far. Wife also rode it up a 1-block grade of 16% without a hitch. How it handles sustained steep climbs remains to be seen.
 
Turned out to be a chainring defect. Mechanic told me it was warped. Replacement seems to have fixed the problem, but I'll feel more confident in another 100 mi.

Wife's loving her new bike. Success!
Great! How’s it doing, range-wise?

I recently rode over something in the back woods that somehow got into the guard and really bent my chainring out of shape but I didn’t see it at the time. The chain derailed and flopped into the groove between the chainring and outer guard. About 15 miles after that happened, I was finding that when I shifted into 1st gear, the chain was coming off frequently and I realized something was wrong. I used my hex tool and some elbow grease to wedge/bend the chainring back into mostly proper (planar) shape and all’s been well since. Of course, since your wife’s bike is new, it was probably bent from the start.
 
Great! How’s it doing, range-wise?

I recently rode over something in the back woods that somehow got into the guard and really bent my chainring out of shape but I didn’t see it at the time. The chain derailed and flopped into the groove between the chainring and outer guard. About 15 miles after that happened, I was finding that when I shifted into 1st gear, the chain was coming off frequently and I realized something was wrong. I used my hex tool and some elbow grease to wedge/bend the chainring back into mostly proper (planar) shape and all’s been well since. Of course, since your wife’s bike is new, it was probably bent from the start.
No meaningful range data yet, but battery use seems reasonable for the rolling 5-15 mi coast rides she's tackled so far.

Pretty sure the chainring was bad on delivery.
 
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