The new VALLKREE is in stock. The Scrambler is their 500W model that comes with a bit more punch than usual. At first we were a bit dubious about ordering the smokey blue colour from online pictures but we’re extremely impressed to see it in the flesh. This latest up-spec model comes with a 5 speed pedal assist function as well as open throttle. It’s a beautiful and classic electric bike if you’re a classy type of ebike enthusiast!
WA is coming alive tomorrow night with the West Coast Eagles taking on the Western Bulldogs in the 1st AFL final for the season starting at 6.10pm. We’re giving away either a men’s or ladies’ electric YUN bike or else any of the SOLAR BIKE conversion kits if you can correctly guess the exact score at the final siren!
An additional bonus is 10 free coffees from the great Barber & coffee shop up the road – Cut Throat Coffee.
Conditions:
This is a Bakfiets box bike that came into the shop for electric conversion this week. We put the Bafang mid-drive kit on it and it works a treat. The Solar Bike rear rack battery replaced the existing rack. It’s well equipped now to take two kids strapped in up any hill. Bafang make great mid-drive motors, you take the existing crank out and replace it with the mid-drive motor system. They’re a little bit more expensive than hub motors but have their own advantages. The bike came from a group called “Dutch Cargo Bike“, they have an importer based in Claremont and stock a bunch of fancy cargo bikes. Some of the better known cargo bikes they import are the Douze, Nihola, Bakfiets, Biomega and Bullitt models. Well worth having a look through their site if you’re interested in this type of cycling. Bring it over here if you want to make it electric!
Please come in and take a free test ride on one of the cool little YUN electric bicycles. They’re 50% off until stock lasts! Usually $1450, they’re now selling briefly for just $725. These ebikes have a single speed rear hub motor, 3 levels of pedal assist and a bunch of colour options. They’re fun little electric bikes that are great for getting around the neighborhood!
Over the last few months we’ve been working to find the best e-bike setup for a folding bicycle and we may have found it! Folding bikes are an excellent choice for those who need to use public transport as a leg of their commute or who have limited space in which to store a bike either in the home or at work.
The bike in question is an XDS City Pro. It’s a well equipped and well priced folding bike that’s absolutely ideal for shorter commute distances. When in action, its generously sized wheelbase is comfortable enough for a larger framed rider yet it is still able to fold down to a manageable size for stowage on peak hour public transit services. Furthermore, the smaller 20″ wheels make this bike extremely agile around town which is likely where this bike will see most of its action.
The City Pro’s componentry is of excellent spec for this price point with a SRAM X4 8 Speed rear dearilleur and a pair of Tektro V Brakes for reliable stopping. Pair that with a lightweight alloy frame and XDS’s comfortable finishing kit and you’ve got a seriously capable bike at an excellent price point of $550.
To make this already great bike an even more versatile e-bike, we’ve fitted it with a Solarbike 20″ rear-drive swift kit. It features a street-legal 250 Watt rear hub motor and a Panasonic 36v 9Ah ‘Frog’ Battery specifically designed for use on folding bikes. The rear-drive configuration affords the high torque motor extra traction which is sure to make the steering performance more predictable. Furthermore, the seatpost mounted battery retains the functionality of the City Pro’s folding mechanism.
The e-bike conversion kit from Solarbike provides the XDS City Pro with great all round performance. The 250 Watt motor should give a top speed of between 25 and 30 km/h with the smaller 20″ wheels allowing for great acceleration and hill-climbing ability. Meanwhile, the 9Ah battery should give ranges of up to 35 km/h with light to moderate pedaling making this e-bike ideal for inner city commuting. Perhaps most importantly, with its snappy handling and great acceleration, the electric City Pro is great fun to ride!
Currently we’ve got one electric XDS City Pro setup and ready for a test ride in our store down in Fremantle. Alternatively, the bikes can be ordered in and setup within 7 working days.
The Electric City Pro is competitively priced at $1750.
Finally, if you’ve got an existing folding bike that you wish to have converted, Solarbike conversions start at $1150 Installed.
When you’ve converted as many bikes as we have, you grow accustomed to seeing a multitude of hybrid, flatbar road, comfort and mountain bikes coming in for electric fitouts. As a result, it’s always a real treat to work on something completely different. By this standard, we really got lucky when Luke brought his Specialized Fatboy in to us a few weeks ago.
Fatbikes have become popular in Australia over the last few years. They’re now used for everything from recreational cruising, to high performance off-road use on surfaces that conventional mountain bikes just can’t handle. That said, a great many fat bikes have been chosen simply because they’re so radically different to conventional models. It was this appeal that made the Specialized a bike that Luke wanted to ride everyday.
The Specialized Fatboy is one of the better entry level fatbikes available today, with a lightweight alloy frame furnished with a dependable wheelset and rugged componentry that makes it more than suitable for the rigors of off-road use. It also sports a very comfortable riding position that affords good all round vision and predictable handling. These features gave it great potential as a high powered e-bike.
Quite possibly the ultimate E-bike!
The main challenge with converting any fatbike is finding a suitable hub motor and wheel combination. Up until recently, a custom wheel build was required. However, fortunately we’re now able to offer a Solarbike 1000 Watt rear wheel kit made specifically for use on fatbikes which greatly simplifies the process.
Battery placement was the next consideration. The 48V Tiger Shark style battery can be mounted centrally within the main triangle of the frame to allow for optimum weight distribution, however Luke preferred to have a rack style battery fitted given that he planned on using the rear carrier to mount pannier bags. This choice also allowed a larger capacity 48V 17Ah Panasonic Lithium Ion battery to be fitted to give this high-powered machine a range of around 35 kms on a charge with a cruising speed of between 40 and 45km/h. Pretty blistering performance we think you’ll agree!
We’ve electrically converted a handful of fatbikes in our store over the past couple of years but few have been quite as exciting as this one! It goes to show that there are a great many possibilities when you choose to custom build an electric bike. So if you’ve got a specialist e-bike build in mind why not drop in and see us at our Fremantle store to discuss our great range of conversion options.
This is probably the most underrated bike on the shop floor at the moment- But the clean, discreet styling is all part of the appeal!
The Lekker Amsterdam is a steel framed urban bike more than rugged enough for the rigours of daily commuting. Its elegant frame is equipped with simple and reliable componentry making it both practical and refreshingly straightforward to ride.
Lekker Amsterdam
The Ride
As any bike enthusiast will tell you, “nothing rides quite like a steel frame” and this is certainly true of the Amsterdam. Steel is well regarded for its vibration damping and eminent durability making it ideally suited for an urban bike. The Amsterdam felt smooth and fast with a slightly more relaxed riding position than is common on these bicycles. This affords a more upright position on the bike whilst also slackening the steering somewhat- both characteristics are likely to accommodate the more occasional cyclist who may not be comfortable with the more aggressive geometries out there.
The component selection is oriented towards simplicity, making the bike easy to ride and maintain. Riders familiar with older styles of bike are sure to enjoy the inclusion of a kick-back rear brake in addition to the dual pivot caliper at the front. Furthermore, the addition of a SRAM Automatix rear hub allows two gear options that automatically adapt to your level of pedaling effort. It’s a novel system that is sure to catch on in the world of urban bikes and makes the Amsterdam more versatile than you might think. As a bike to suit Perth’s terrain and riding conditions, it’s hard to go past the Amsterdam.
Conversion Options
We’ve seen a wide range of Lekker bikes since first getting them in at the start of the year and can confirm that their quality construction is sure to make them well suited to electric conversion. The Sportief and Jordaan range make fantastic comfort e-bikes and the Amsterdam is sure to make a very capable commuter.
Its traditional frame design can accommodate any Solarbike tube or Black Diamond battery. This allows the additional weight to be kept low and central preserving the Lekker’s excellent handling performance. As for motor options, the Amsterdam is compatible with any front wheel hub motor kit or even a BAFANG middrive system to really make use of the 2 speed automatic hub. There are power options to suit any performance requirements but our recommendation would be to keep things clean and simple with the street legal 250 Watt mini motor which is sure to provide great range.
Prices for the Lekker Amsterdam start at $650 for the bike or $1800 for one sporting a Solarbike conversion kit.
Call in at our Fremantle store to test ride one. You’ll be glad you did!
Here are a couple of custom e-bike builds we’ve recently put together in our Fremantle store. Both came to us as bikes that weren’t getting enough use. However, thanks to electrical conversion, they’re now sure to get a new lease on life.
Electra 8 Ball with BAFANG Mid-Drive
Don’t let the retro styling fool you, the Electra 8 Ball has truly modern performance and quality. This cruiser sports an incredibly comfortable riding position particularly good for people who want something upright. We fitted it with a BAFANG 48V mid-drive system that transforms this reasonably sedate cruiser into an absolute blast to ride. Truly one hell of an e-bike!
An immensely comfortable leisure cruiser with performance to match its styling.
Apollo Cross Roads with Solarbike Swift Kit
This Apollo Cross-roads also came to us as a well kept but underused bike and it’s potential as an e-bike was immediately apparent. It’s quality steel frame means this bike is more than rugged enough to handle the rigors of daily commuting as well as the additional power of a conversion kit. Furthermore, its efficient riding position and dependable running components means that this bike is sure to be a dependable rig. We fitted it with our 250 Watt Mini motor kit and 36v 9Ah tube battery to provide electric assistance without too much intrusion on the riding experience. Many bike enthusiasts maintain that ‘steel is real’ and we couldn’t agree more!
A practical Steel framed tourer/commuter ideal for everyday use.
This is the Elliptigo It’s a strange contraption that gets along by doing a type of skiing motion. Toby asked us to convert it to electric about 8 months ago. Here is his review:
“I ride a weird bike because I had a spinal fusion and cannot ride a normal bike. Its less like riding and more like running. Combine the running, the smaller wheels, a 36 km daily commute and you have a recipe for exhaustion and overlong days.
Enter the electric conversion. I can use my bike every day now, the commute time is manageable and I’m not exercising into an early grave. The best part is I still get to exercise. Riding with an electric motor is a bit unusual. The extra power doesn’t stop me pedalling, but there’s a steep drop-off in return past the max speed generated by the motor. I had the conversion done around November 2015. Eight months later, the battery and motor are still running smoothly.
The Fremantle crew were great. Converting the Elliptigo required some creative thinking and a wheel rebuild but they got the job done and were cheery and enthusiastic throughout the process. I wholeheartedly endorse electric conversion kits for commuter cyclists. Anything that keeps you riding every day pays for itself very quickly with lower transport costs and better health. Give it a go and if you do try the Fremantle people, they seem nice.”
We have made a quick video to show the range of electric bicycles in our shop. They include a lot of conversions as well as some factory produced models using the BOSCH and SHIMANO crank driven motors, the sleek BH ebikes and the stylish Valkree ebikes.