IanSmithCSE
Guru
- Location
- Worcester, Worcestershire
Good morning,
I am at around the 1,700 mile mark so getting very used to the bike and am still using it so it can't be terrible, I also still feel no attachment to it.
Firstly and to be clear Ribble delivered what they advertised, at the price they advertised and within the timescale they advertised, so Ribble can hardly be faulted, well not too much.
There are a couple of issues that I can blame Ribble for; There is very little handlebar height adjustment and the motor cable runs very close the rear wheel, a broken spoke would mean that the tyre will rub against the cable!
And yes it does need a clean, but that is only the ride home's dirt! It does look like a big gap in the photo but it is much smaller in reality.
It is still really hard to come up with an average battery life despite it being the same route every day. One charge seems to do Mon-Wed, or around 120 miles but then every so often I might get through half a charge in one 18 mile leg.
The high battery usage seems to co-coincide with a particularly nice, strong ale, or few, from the local the night before, although semi-joking I am also being serious.
Although the X35 system has always been advertised as a bit of extra power for enthusiasts it can be used as an almost moped. Select a low gear, spin a bit without much effort and the motor will do most of the work, although at a pretty low speed, not much more than 12-13mph draining the battery pretty quickly.
IWOC is still awful and there is not much space on the handlebars as soon as you add a couple of lights, remember that you need to be able to mount and dismount them.
I was hoping that chain life might be longer than the 1,500 miles I used to get with 10 speed on the grounds that some of the load is applied directly from the hub rather than via the chain, but sadly I am not. Went to Halfords last week and got a Clarks chain, they seem to be just as good as Shimano and ProBikeKit have just shipped me three Tiagra chains for £47 inluding delivery, sadly 3 is the limit and it is tempting to be selfish and make a separate order for another 3.
So would I buy another Ribble ALe if this one got stolen tomorrow?
Firstlyl I am not sure if I could, I went for the medium frame and the Ribble web site says out of stock and wont let me order one, so maybe they are not restocking this model. The frame sizes left are all still on offer at £2k which is very good value in comparison with its nearest competitor the Orbea D50 suggesting a very low demand.
The Ribble carbon framed range are in stock but they are all 12 speed and prices are getting silly for a commute bike, partly because apart from a mechanical 105 at £2.5k, they are all Di2 starting at £3.6k.
Having come from a good road bike, the underlying bike feels okay but also a step down, so paying £2.7k for a D50 locally would be out of the question. Perhaps if I had swapped from an £199 Apollo full suspension mountain bike to the Ribble I would like it more but I just can’t see the £2k plus is worth the effort saving.
So I would dally and probably not buy another e bike, certainly I wouldn't be rushing to get something.
This may sound odd because a motor must make the ride easier! The place where the motor is noticable for me is when starting to ride without a warm up, but as soon as I have warmed up it mostly sits either turned off or not in use because of the speed cut off.
If you go for a test ride in the shop car park this probably won’t make much sense as the motor can get you up to 15.5mph really quickly on the flat. Indeed this seems to be where it excels, I sometimes use the mid power setting when joining a busy roundabout as it get me onto it at speed quickly.
Yet on steep hills 12% plus the power just doesn’t appear to be noticeable, is it simply a lack of torque or am I expecting too much? On the flatter hills first thing in the morning I do notice the assistance but if ride the same hills after a warm up it is much less obvious.
As it was bought to make the continuous commute easier is it doing that and the answer is still yes.
But more and more experimentation shows that it mostly down to those first couple of hilly miles when straight out of bed and if I ride with the motor on or off after that it makes no difference.
I have also had two visits from the puncture fairy which surprised me as I haven't had tyres as wide as 28mm since I switched from 27x1 1/4 to tubs in the late 1970s and both where pinch flats despite the tyres being almost stone hard!
The lack of a Q/R isn't a problem as a standard multitool can undo and redo the wheel nuts fine, and the motor cable comes undone easily enough. I do worrry about reconnecting it though, the connector is fine when assembling the bike and perhaps disassembling it once a year in a warm workshop on a bike stand, but it seems quite fragile when it is freezing cold and you don't align the two parts accurately.
Bye
Ian
I am at around the 1,700 mile mark so getting very used to the bike and am still using it so it can't be terrible, I also still feel no attachment to it.
Firstly and to be clear Ribble delivered what they advertised, at the price they advertised and within the timescale they advertised, so Ribble can hardly be faulted, well not too much.
There are a couple of issues that I can blame Ribble for; There is very little handlebar height adjustment and the motor cable runs very close the rear wheel, a broken spoke would mean that the tyre will rub against the cable!
And yes it does need a clean, but that is only the ride home's dirt! It does look like a big gap in the photo but it is much smaller in reality.
It is still really hard to come up with an average battery life despite it being the same route every day. One charge seems to do Mon-Wed, or around 120 miles but then every so often I might get through half a charge in one 18 mile leg.
The high battery usage seems to co-coincide with a particularly nice, strong ale, or few, from the local the night before, although semi-joking I am also being serious.
Although the X35 system has always been advertised as a bit of extra power for enthusiasts it can be used as an almost moped. Select a low gear, spin a bit without much effort and the motor will do most of the work, although at a pretty low speed, not much more than 12-13mph draining the battery pretty quickly.
IWOC is still awful and there is not much space on the handlebars as soon as you add a couple of lights, remember that you need to be able to mount and dismount them.
I was hoping that chain life might be longer than the 1,500 miles I used to get with 10 speed on the grounds that some of the load is applied directly from the hub rather than via the chain, but sadly I am not. Went to Halfords last week and got a Clarks chain, they seem to be just as good as Shimano and ProBikeKit have just shipped me three Tiagra chains for £47 inluding delivery, sadly 3 is the limit and it is tempting to be selfish and make a separate order for another 3.
So would I buy another Ribble ALe if this one got stolen tomorrow?
Firstlyl I am not sure if I could, I went for the medium frame and the Ribble web site says out of stock and wont let me order one, so maybe they are not restocking this model. The frame sizes left are all still on offer at £2k which is very good value in comparison with its nearest competitor the Orbea D50 suggesting a very low demand.
The Ribble carbon framed range are in stock but they are all 12 speed and prices are getting silly for a commute bike, partly because apart from a mechanical 105 at £2.5k, they are all Di2 starting at £3.6k.
Having come from a good road bike, the underlying bike feels okay but also a step down, so paying £2.7k for a D50 locally would be out of the question. Perhaps if I had swapped from an £199 Apollo full suspension mountain bike to the Ribble I would like it more but I just can’t see the £2k plus is worth the effort saving.
So I would dally and probably not buy another e bike, certainly I wouldn't be rushing to get something.
This may sound odd because a motor must make the ride easier! The place where the motor is noticable for me is when starting to ride without a warm up, but as soon as I have warmed up it mostly sits either turned off or not in use because of the speed cut off.
If you go for a test ride in the shop car park this probably won’t make much sense as the motor can get you up to 15.5mph really quickly on the flat. Indeed this seems to be where it excels, I sometimes use the mid power setting when joining a busy roundabout as it get me onto it at speed quickly.
Yet on steep hills 12% plus the power just doesn’t appear to be noticeable, is it simply a lack of torque or am I expecting too much? On the flatter hills first thing in the morning I do notice the assistance but if ride the same hills after a warm up it is much less obvious.
As it was bought to make the continuous commute easier is it doing that and the answer is still yes.
But more and more experimentation shows that it mostly down to those first couple of hilly miles when straight out of bed and if I ride with the motor on or off after that it makes no difference.
I have also had two visits from the puncture fairy which surprised me as I haven't had tyres as wide as 28mm since I switched from 27x1 1/4 to tubs in the late 1970s and both where pinch flats despite the tyres being almost stone hard!
The lack of a Q/R isn't a problem as a standard multitool can undo and redo the wheel nuts fine, and the motor cable comes undone easily enough. I do worrry about reconnecting it though, the connector is fine when assembling the bike and perhaps disassembling it once a year in a warm workshop on a bike stand, but it seems quite fragile when it is freezing cold and you don't align the two parts accurately.
Bye
Ian
Last edited:
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