
2019 RadRover – an honest review by Bolton Ebikes – Electric Bike Videos & Price Comparison
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Wow. For a ebike delivered straight to the customer, that is one whopping big piece of poor quality control. Very few people have the skills you do for trouble-shooting, and to identify a cord INSIDE the frame, that was disconnected would be impossible for MOST consumers. Rad’s support for troubleshooting would not catch that either. I have dealt with them. They are at best mediocre. For consumer direct, you have to be better THAN EVERYONE else on the market, or you die, especially without dealerships to see and trouble shoot first hand. The size is absolutely a poor fit for anyone below 5’11” and above 6’2″. Its a really short in length ebike, and the short wheelbase is ridiculous for fat tires. It looks very crowded. Even at $1200, this could be over priced. You wont get over 30 miles on this ebike. Trust me, with that motor. I disagree on your opinion. You should range test it like Pete Preibus. Its NOT a 750 watt ebike. Its barely a 500 watt ebike. I would not for one minute believe their torque rating at 80 NM. Put it up against a Magnum Metro+ or Metro, which has a true 80 nm torque rating, and you’lll notice a HUGE difference on hilll climbing acceleration through the range, and acceleration off the line. The Rad will be way behind. I’ve done it. Also try the Aventon Pace 500 against the Rad. It would blow this ebike away on power, acceleration, and range too. That would be a REAL review, comparing two ebikes with supposed same ‘ratings’ and specs, to show people the real truth in marketing. Also, mechanical disc brakes on an ebike, should rate no more than a 5 dude. Thats very entry level stuff. You’re review here sort of reminds of of those like Court Rye’s who can’t give anything lower than an 8, even when an ebike absolutely sucks. Aventon pace 500 has HYDRAULIC BRAKES. It deserves a 7 or 8, but based on your scale, should actually be at 11 – again based on you giving the rad an 8. That Rad display is plastic mediocrity, very low level $20 stuff max, and you know it. $200 entire Chinese aftermarket ebike kit level quality display. Its like Rad took an $80 frame, and had the chinese put a $200 aftermarket kit on it. Maybe a 4 rating for the display and wiring. Those thumb shifters do not hold up, and gears will skip easily after a year or two. They should at least use a quality rapid/trigger shifter, especially on an ebike. If you give overall components on this a 7, then Aventon is a 12. Magnum would be a 15 by comparison. No way does Rad deserve a 9 on support. Here’s why. They will drag out the troubleshooting process with anyone who does not identify the root cause, and start by sending you the cheapest part first, which may lead to 6 ‘solutions’ of various parts, days or weeks in between shipping, before they get it right. Meanwhile, you bought all these parts, that did not solve the problems until the last one sent. They sent me 5 parts before they sent the controller, (which I told them from day 1 it was the controller, but they disagreed.) Which according to them was ‘appropriate’ process since it was the most expensive. Wow, a naive customer would have wasted $150 on parts that didn’t need to be replaced before they got the right one that did solve the problem. Also, that controller box is mounted right by the wheel where it will get covered with MUD and water. Its not hermetically sealed, or even Nema rated. The controller connections inside that are NOT Waterproof. Again, aftermarket type chinese kit like very cheap stuff. Personally this comes across as biased toward them, since you do sell uprated parts and power increases for it. Folks, sorry but this is not an objective review. It may be HIS ‘honest’ opinion, but its hardly an objective one. For the price, and the potential risks of it not working when you get it, and then not having any shop nearby that can trouble shoot it, or fix it, for the average consumer, this ebike should rate no more than a 4 or maybe 5 on a scale of 1 to 10. I would suggest this ebike ONLY for those who are VERY handy, and cannot only handle all bike maintenance and repairs, but also savvy with electronics. By it cheap, and use it as a base ebike that will be later on ‘upgraded’ with components, like many DIY’ers do with the Sondors. JMHO, but Reviewers out there on these ebikes need to start outlining all the risks of buying on line. I get more ebikes and consumers into my shop who bought their’s on line (not from me), than I do from my own customers, and I have been selling ebikes for 4 years now. They really regret their decision to do so, especially when they find its a poor fit, or weak power, and generally they only figure that out, after they ride someone else’s and see how great another ebike fits them, and how much more power another ebike has, that only has a 350 watt or 500 watt motor, versus the Rad’s so called ‘750 watt’. They feel frustrated, but they sunk all that money, and now feel stuck with the Rad. Rad honestly is doing the entire market a huge dis-service, by over marketing the motor as being ‘750’ when they know damn well that is a ‘peak power draw’ which many 500 watt motors can achieve. They are misleading people into acting like they are giving ‘more’, when the reality is its much less. A bunch of VC money is coming into this company, and they are shooting for sales of $100 million. With VC’s their gross margins will have to be a minimum of 60%. Thats why they are avoiding dealers. SO this is an ebike, where they can spend no more than $500 to $600 landed cost. Look for them to ‘value engineer’ this even further to maintain those levels of gross margin, absorb the 25% china tariff, and the overhead of $200,000 in google adwords per month, and over 100 employees.