Get an E-bike for hills or get a different gear/casette?

TheGardenGnome

I cycle to work pretty much every day- a 26 mile round trip that involves going uphill 1/3 the way. I weigh 110kg and lug around 5kg of buggage with me. I struggle a lot with going uphill, crawling at 4mph when on average I would do three times that on flat surface. Being only 5 ft 5, I understand that I weigh a LOT more than I should.

I am thinking about getting an e-bike but I am limited to £80 per month in spending for something like interest free financing. As I would like to get my missus to cycle with me on ocassion, such a bike would not be just for me either.

Would getting a different cassette i.e. 10/11 gearing with new chain be a better or cheaper alternative?

If it helps to know my fitness level: it takes me 90 mins to cover the 13 mile trip, so i am moving pretty slow and would like to reduce my journey time. I have been doing this for a month and my legs are not quite recovering as I stumble going up the stairs everyday.

slowbike

First off - bluddy well done .. not meant in a patronising manner at all - 26 mile round trip is a decent amount - when I was riding every day to work I'd really feel it towards the end of the week - it took me quite a while to get up to that level too.

As to whether you should buy an e-bike or not - I can see the attraction - faster for less effort - and no doubt you'd be able to make full use of it.... but ...

what do you want to achieve? Why are you cycling to work? Are you cycling to get fitter and lose weight or are you doing it because there's no better alternative?

I'll assume you're doing it to get fitter - because otherwise any suggestions would purely be based on cost.

Unless you have a medical condition that prevents you from working hard(er) - Don't get an e-bike. It will make your journey quicker for sure - but as you're currently doing the journey without you've proved you can do it.

What bike do you ride? What sort of tyres have you got on it? If it's a mountain bike with knobblies it's going to be a lot harder going than a lightweight road bike with 25mm slicks.
What gearing do you currently have on it? Gears aren't going to make you go quicker up hill - but they will provide you with slightly easier pedaling at a slower speed.

TheGardenGnome

Hi SB,

My primary aim is to lose the excess weight I have in a way that doesn't involve me making the "effort" to go to the gym. I own a car but I don't see a point using it if using a bike my journey time increases by 50% while allowing me to lose weight and becoming fitter. The savings from not using fuel is just a bonus really. I am using a hybrid bike for the majority of my journeys though occasionally I use a Brompton- hills seem equally as bad on both of them. The gradient on these hills are mere 2-4% and I'm struggling in a way that makes no sense to me.

The gearing on the hybrid:
Chainset 28-48
Cassette 11-32

The tyres:
Front 700c x 35
Rear 700c x 25

The difference between the front and rear tyre sizes: I recently changed my rear to 700c x 25 from 700c x 35 as I wanted puncture resistance from a new Marathon Plus tyre but didn't see a difference in speed or ease of peddling. I didn't see the point getting the front replaced with a narrower tyre because of this, but I'm willing to be corrected on this one if it causes a significant issue.

The rear cassette on the hybrid is an 8 speed which limits me to finding cassettes with not significantly different cogs, I found one with 34T, I'm not sure how much of a difference I can expect from 2 teeth difference.

wongataa

Again, well done on the cycling to work.

A couple of thoughts. As you are currently finding the cycle commute tough and are doing every day have you thought about having a few days off from cycling to let your body have a good rest and recover? Sometimes that can help a lot.

Cycling will help with the fitness and help a bit with weight loss. However, as weightloss occurs by consuming less calories than are expended that is mostly due to changing what you eat and drink. Weightloss happens primarily in the kitchen. Make sure you are eating/drinking healthily and not snacking too much on energy dense foods. Also, it is not a fast process so you will have to be patient and hopefully you will slowly lose the excess weight and get faster on the bike.

As weightloss is quite slow you may not notice the improved cycling easily but looking back over time you will notice the improvements.

Good luck!

cougie

I'd swap the tyres round when you get a chance. Wider at the back.

I don't think lower gears would speed the ride up massively but there would be a small difference on the hill.

The best thing to get faster and healthier is to cut down on your food slightly. You'll be lighter and ride faster.

An e bike would speed your trip to work but you'll be burning less calories. And they're expensive.

I'd try to keep up the riding as you are. Maybe drive in on a Wednesday to reduce the fatigue until you're used to it but well done on doing so well already.

slowbike

yup - I'd swap the tyres around ...

A hybrid isn't the fastest either - due to the nice upright position you tend to sit in, and the wide handlebars - so if you were looking for a change in bike I'd suggest trying a drop bar one. I can't see that you can do much for gearing - 2-4% gradients are not steep - but if theyre long enough they do sap the energy - if you're going into the hill "as fast as possible" then perhaps try dropping that back a bit and just accepting the hill will take some time - you should find you've got more energy later on the hill to maintain the slower speed and may just do a PB - think tortoise vs hare ...

I think Cougie has a good suggestion - break the workouts on a wednesday - and drive - give your body a chance to recover - you're punishing it pretty hard.

Last up (and it's a little bugbear of mine) - Weight loss isn't ALL about cutting calories in - if you cut too much you go into starvation mode where the body does as much as possible to maintain it's energy store - you need to boost your metablosim - and look at WHAT calories you're consuming (cut down them beers a little!) Cycling/excersice does boost the metablosim - but you have to be careful not to overcompensate - cos it does make you hungry.


Anyway - it looks like you're mostly doing the right thing - another suggestion - if you haven't already - record your rides on something like Strava or MapmyRide or even just Garmin Connect - it'll let you see your ride stats and compare them to historic achievements - don't think it's all going to be faster right now though - we're heading into the cold - everything is slower when it's cold ....

roger_merriman

26 miles is a fair old distance with hills, I do 22 and it’s pan flat being London!

Would a E bike be easier yes clearly, at that price it might not be a great bike, but it depends on what you want, really.

In terms of fitness it sounds like possibly your pushing too hard, if your struggling with stairs! At that distance fitness will come but maybe either take rest days or take it slower some days?

In terms of gears are you running out of gears on the hills? Ie if you had lower gears would you use them? 8 speed cassettes don’t get much lower, but you could lower the chainrings.

My hunch would be give it time and don’t worry about the speed. It will come.

jamesco

Respect to you for your riding - it would take more guts than I've got to stick with it!

Echoing everyone else, listen to your body and take rest days as you need them. It's better to miss a few rides by choice than a lot by injury. As you lose weight (and diet is the main factor, as wongataa says) it'll get easier.

25mm tyres offer no real world speed advantage, and as you've probably found out, the high pressure means they're not very comfortable. I ride on Kojak 35c tyres which are comfy, light and rarely puncture. They're also fairly cheap and occasionally dirt cheap (~£12.50).

Finally, keep the hybrid for now if you like it. The aero advantage of a drop-barred bike is not a factor unless you're cycling into hurricane winds.

wolfsbane2k

Welcome to the forum TGG.
Like everyone else has said before - Well done, 26 miles round trip is a slog, especially if it's not flat ( and 2-4% isn't flat if its a long climb).
and as everyone else has also said - what are you doing it for? If weight loss, don't go for E-Bike, unless you want to use that for your rest days just to keep moving, but staying in zone 1.

Someone else has mentioned clothing - it's really important you get that right, it's amazing how stifling being even slightly overdressed can be - in my experience, it's like adding an extra 4-5% on the gradient. At this time of year, arm warmers & thin layering of wicking, breathable clothing are your friends here. Somewhere I saw "dress for 20-30 mins into the ride, not the start or finish", and have removable layers/adjust zippers etc to increase warmth at the start.
Do you have a heart rate monitor or similar? I found the tell tale sign of overheating by clothing was lowish heart rate but absolutely no energy, when normally my HR would be 20-30bpm higher.

PS - I'm circa 125kg, and carry a few extra kg of stuff with me everyday - I've only lost about 5kg in the 2 years I've been commuting by bike to work - but I'm a heck of a lot fitter & only a little bit faster - I've got a steep hill half way along too, that some days I just pootle up.

Good luck with it all, and stick with it!

The Rookie

The simple fix to me is a swap to MTB chainrings, 22/32/42 or 44, it will give you better cadance going uphill at slow speed on the smallest ring equivalent to about 3 extra low end gears. Learn to spin and use leg speed not torque to create the power, burns calories faster as well.

You can get a wider ration 8 speed cassette (CSM680 is the part number 11-40t) courtesy of Suntour but its a bit wide spaced for road use.

The Rookie

Just to add, you are getting int the lowest gear? If not then changing gearing is pointless if you aren't using what you already have!

6wheels

Reasons for going leccy...

Three hours a day commuting is a lot of your waking life, when with an ebike you would certainly knock an hour or more off your total commute.

£1000 would get you a cheap Halfords (black friday) bike, or you could buy a 250w kit for £500-£600 and put that on your hybrid , not difficult to do.

Your wife would probably appreciate and enjoy the assistance, even blowing you off going uphill.

Don't think using an ebike is 'giving in', plenty of fit cyclists use them for commuting, so they arrive at work/home fresher.

While you've been given plenty of encouragement by other posters, you should have a look at Pedelecs forum for a bit of balance.

roger_merriman

6wheels wrote:

Reasons for going leccy...

Three hours a day commuting is a lot of your waking life, when with an ebike you would certainly knock an hour or more off your total commute.

£1000 would get you a cheap Halfords (black friday) bike, or you could buy a 250w kit for £500-£600 and put that on your hybrid , not difficult to do.

Your wife would probably appreciate and enjoy the assistance, even blowing you off going uphill.

Don't think using an ebike is 'giving in', plenty of fit cyclists use them for commuting, so they arrive at work/home fresher.

While you've been given plenty of encouragement by other posters, you should have a look at Pedelecs forum for a bit of balance.

More than a hour gained is unlikely unless its a route with no junctions, no lights no traffic etc. At the legal maximum a Electric bike would do the commute just under a hr each way. Once you add in traffic lights, junctions and what not, ie it would need to be a perfect foot up type run, for those sort of time gains to be likely.

I would also castion against add on kits which are cheaper than a full bike, and of variable quality, which when your dealing with transport and big batteries is fundamentally a poor idea.

kingstongraham

6wheels wrote:

Your wife would probably appreciate and enjoy the assistance, even blowing you off going uphill.

I can't believe this has been on the site for 5 hours without comment.

N0bodyOfTheGoat

Going uphill will be a lot kinder on your body long term if you have a gear where you can spin at 80+rpm, in my opinion and experience, having become a hill climbing addict on both my bikes this year. If you can already choose a gear to spin at 80+rpm for all the hills you encounter, there won't be much benefit in replacing the chainrings or cassette, unless they and the chain is worn.

I've never ridden an e-bike, so can't comment much on them, but legal ones would enable you to get motor assistance to ~15.5mph.

Especially if you already have a "smart" gadget like an Android mobile that can do it, I'd encourage anyone to use an app such as Ghostracer (pro only costs £3, one-off fee, enables unlimited number of "ghost" segments, http://getghostracer.com/ and can be easily linked to a Strava account) or the Strava app itself https://www.strava.com/mobile (Sony Smartwatch 3 owners have been waiting on a fix for weeks, as the app no longer launches).
It doesn't have to be about competing with others and can be a great way to see your own progress and get extra motivation.

TheGardenGnome

Front wheel is now 700c x 23 (rear is 700c x 25), and the buggage weight has been reduced from 5kg to ~1kg. I seem to do a bit better on the hills even on the Brompton. I'm able to maintain 60RPM cadence with the gears that I have but I have "severe" lactic burn going up hill or maintaining any speed above 10mph- maybe I'm just being a whimp and need to continue working

The hybrid bike is 4 years old and has at least 5,000 miles on it.
A small inspection:
-The front wheel has curvature on the rim where the brake pads rub
-The chain is VERY worn.

Recently my wife got a go on an electric bike from Halfords. She was scared witless because of the power delivered even on low-power mode was even a bit much for her, she was VERY impressed about it taking her uphill and is now the one trying to convince me getting an ebike. Excuse enough for a new bike? Yup

The struggle now is making the choice in finding the right bike with a budget within ~£1200 that can:
1) Lug around a 110kg guy for at least ~14 miles on a somewhat hilly path (I can charge it at work).
2) Has a step-through frame (or at least partially step-through).
3) Is foldable.

This will primarily be a bike for my wife so she can accompany me on rides and on days she isn't riding, I can use it for my "easy days" at work.

Halfords has 5 choices, Evans has only ONE and it's available NEXT YEAR. This leaves me with Halfords. Looking at some of the prices, it seems too good to be true (electric foldable bike at half the price of my Brommie?), surely something must be up?

I'm not in any way familiar with the electric bike world or the companies involved and need something that's reliable, a bike that would at least last 2 years with very few hiccups would be nice. What options have I got at this point?

roger_merriman

Does it have to be folding bike? You will get better bikes for the same money with non folding, plus the weight of a Ebike even if smaller will be getting on for double the Brompton/hybrid. So will be fair lump to lift, even if it would fold down smaller.

I don’t think you need to worry about weight that much, personally i would use wider tyres than 23/25mm, for comfort/grip etc.

Looking at Halfords electric folders the cheaper ones use fairly cheap gears and brakes. Not sure how much punishment they would take, if your going to clock up 5k per year that will be fairly high mileage, which would kill some of the cheaper shifters, etc.

Personally as a heavy guy my self I couldn’t go back to V brakes but people have different wants.

N0bodyOfTheGoat

There was a nice deal on the Raleigh site yesterday, that I posted in the bargains thread, the Di2 Alfine Strada was 50% off at £1250