Balance is essential when riding on sand or snow. Too much weight in front or on the rear makes the bike unstable in loose terrain. Frame bags have become a popular accessory with Fat Bikes. Electric Fat bikes – Fat eBikes as we call them also benefit from frame bags. The bike shown has a 20- 30 mile range, perfect weight balance and extra storage for personal items, making beach and city riding convenient and pleasurable.
A Fat eBike is simply a Fatbike (also know as Sandbike) that has been converted to electric drive. Currently no ready made Electric Fatbikes are on the market. To get an Electric Fatbike you must buy a Fatbike from Surley, Salsa or other manufacturer of Fatbikes and install an electric drive system. The two bikes pictures are equipped to ride on beach sand, snow or deep mud without pedaling. The extra wide tires give good traction on wet sand and allow you to ride unassisted at roughly 20 mph along the beach. The two bikes tested were built with direct drive motors hub motors. Sensorless direct drive motors are a good choice for an ebike that will be exposed to moisture.
The Orange bike with 900 watts of power was able to cruise on sand with some pedal assist while the black bike with 1800 watts of power was capable of unassisted 20 mph sand cruising. The sealed sensorless motors are very resistant to water damage, in fact they will run under (fresh) water. A longer term test will show how the motors last after repeated exposer to salt water.
People spend the extra money to buy a Titanium frame because it lighter than a standard steel or aluminum frame. At two – three times the cost of an aluminum or steel frame you are paying dearly for the weight savings. Weight savings are less important when you are building an electric bike. The battery alone could weight more than an entire standard bicycle. So why spend the extra money for aTitanium Fat eBike frame?
Rust.
When you ride on the beach every part of your bike is exposed to salt spray and components start to rust immediately. Titanium is impervious to rust while Aluminum and Steel both disintegrate quickly when exposed to salt water. Washing your Fat eBike with fresh water after each ride is recommended. Fat eBike owners who ride on the beach frequently may find Titanium to be worth the extra expense.
If you were at the San Francisco Green Fest this year you may have seen some of the cool custom bikes on display at our booth. San Francisco Bay Area customers that have used our custom build service were happy to allow their custom Ebikes to be displayed at the Green Fest
Anyone who has ridden a lead acid powered ebike will tell you the range sucks and the bike is heavy as a brick. Lead batteries have given electric bikes and other electric vehicles a bad name. A Lithium battery pack transforms an electric bike from recreation to a means of transportation.
These pictures show a modern fully managed Lipo battery pack. Another option is an unmanaged pack built from Radio controlled aircraft batteries. Click more for Detailed information
