Qulbix Raptor ebike + frame kit

[Rix]

Rix, what do you think about the air shocks? Like I could get a cane creek double barrel in coil or air.

Supposedly the high end air shocks are pretty good and came a long way. They may allow me to adjust the tension exactly how I want it.

I wonder if air would be better or worse dealing with our heavy rear. I wonder if it would be worth buying a used one on ebay to try it out and if it sucks just resell it with a small loss.

Wtih your weight of 135#, you may get away with it. No way will it work for me. The fox Float X was barely good enough on my specialized enduro which weighed 31 pounds. No way on an Ebike. If you go that route, let us know whay you think. I think you would better benefit from the Crane Creek Double Barrel myself. Raptor provides guidelines for spring rates based on rider body weights, how close do you think they are they with hitting that mark?

 

[marcn]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuSiBsL0nvU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1mVYResxnY

Great vids Rick! What an awesome playground you've got. Where is that, looks so baron?

 

[Rix]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuSiBsL0nvU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1mVYResxnY

Great vids Rick! What an awesome playground you've got. Where is that, looks so baron?

Thanks for the compliment Marcn, I hope my videos will give some of the Raptor owners some guide lines on suspension set ups. I am almost exactly 200 miles straight north of AREA 51 in Groom Lake Nevada. East of Fallon. The only thing we have out here besides a neat little city with lots of Casinos surrounded by Indian Reservations is the Naval Strike Air Warfare training Center, more commonly known as NSAWC, or way more commonly known as Top Gun. One of these days, I will be riding and hopefully get a bunch of F18 Super Hornets taking off on video.

 

[Rodney64]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YuSiBsL0nvU

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q1mVYResxnY

Great vids Rick! What an awesome playground you've got. Where is that, looks so baron?

Thanks for the compliment Marcn, I hope my video will give some of the Raptor owners some guide lines on suspension set ups. I am almost exactly 200 miles straight north of AREA 51 in Groom Lake Nevada. East of Fallon. The only thing we have out here besides a neat little city with lots of Casinos surrounded by Indian Reservations is the Naval Strike Air Warfare training Center, more commonly known as NSAWC, or way more commonly known as Top Gun. One of these days, I will be riding and hopefully get a bunch of F18 Super Hornets taking off on video.

Ar Rick, I didn't think area 51 existed. Yes im enjoying your vids as well and I know the work involved in making them. Hope to have some Raptor vids up shortly.

 

[Rix]

Thanks Rod, Yah are 51 is for real. Look up Groom Lake Nevada on Google Earth and the Area 51 Base is out the south west end of the dry lake bed. When I said 200 straight north, I meant straight northwest. Yah, I am looking forward to some vids from you as well, can't wait to see some Raptor footage.

 

[Offroader]

I think I blew my fox DHX rc4 shock. I noticed I was bottoming out way easily. I then put a shock pump to the bottom out pressure valve and it seemed to have no air in it. I pumped it up and the pressure quickly drops to 0. It should be 160PSI.


I then put the pump on an old air shock I had and the hose blew on the pump.

I'm not sure yet if the hose let the air out but I doubt it because I was watching the gauge while installing and never saw pressure. This would also coincide with the fact that my bike was bottoming out way easily and that seemed abnormal.

I guess that log jumping practice wasn't a good idea after all, but I'm not really sure when it broke as it took me to jump to flat ground at around 3 feet to notice the rear shock wasn't right.

This kind of sucks because these bicycle components just don't hold up with a 130lbs bike. The raptor should be designed with a dirt bike shock, similar to how the stealth bomber is designed.
NO reason to save a pound of weight and have a weak shock on a motored bike.

The other issue is these bicycle shocks are made to hold much less unsprung weight compared to a dirt bike, which doesn't make the shock handle so well with a heavy hub motor.

I'm going to contact Qulbix and see if they can design their 140 frame to use a dirt bike shock where I would still get around 10" of rear travel. They don't have a 10.5x3.5 dirt bike shock, so the swingarm will have to be redesigned for smaller dirt bike stroke.

The other thing is it seems I'm the only one having problems like this, I wonder if I really drive that much harder than everyone else. It is surprising because I only weigh about 135lbs and I would think you 200+ lbs guys would be having more issues. Makes me believe the bike weight is more important than rider weight for how the bike holds up.

 

[snellemin]

You do ride a lot harder than I do. I too blew my 10.5" shock out. I'm back to mine 9.5" shock, but this time for onroad riding. The cheapy Fast Ace 9.75x3 shock is a lot beefier for our bikes. I never bottomed that one out. I used a 500lb spring and installed it in the same top hole as the 10.5".

 

[Offroader]

You do ride a lot harder than I do. I too blew my 10.5" shock out. I'm back to mine 9.5" shock, but this time for onroad riding. The cheapy Fast Ace 9.75x3 shock is a lot beefier for our bikes. I never bottomed that one out. I used a 500lb spring and installed it in the same top hole as the 10.5".

We really need motorcycle shocks. These bicycle shocks just won't cut it. If you offroad the bike it's even that much worse. The raptor frame is bullet proof and should be used with a real shock.

 

[snellemin]

I'm eyeballing the Fox Racing Shox Mini Quad Float MXR Shocks. Almost 10.5" from eye to eye.

 

[Rix]

I'm eyeballing the Fox Racing Shox Mini Quad Float MXR Shocks. Almost 10.5" from eye to eye.

Whats the shock stroke lenght on that?

 

[johnrobholmes]

In a few days we will have inventory of 19x1.6" aluminum rims that will be a great match for the Raptor bike. They are lighter than 19" Prowheel rims, and also have the proper nipple angles to work with common MTB hubs and large diameter hub motors. Can't wait to throw a set on my ebike 8)

 

[snellemin]

In a few days we will have inventory of 19x1.6" aluminum rims that will be a great match for the Raptor bike. They are lighter than 19" Prowheel rims, and also have the proper nipple angles to work with common MTB hubs and large diameter hub motors. Can't wait to throw a set on my ebike 8)

Nice!! What's the price for a wheel, spokes and nipples for a Cromotor?

 

[snellemin]

I'm eyeballing the Fox Racing Shox Mini Quad Float MXR Shocks. Almost 10.5" from eye to eye.

Whats the shock stroke lenght on that?

advertised is 3".

 

[Rix]

I'm eyeballing the Fox Racing Shox Mini Quad Float MXR Shocks. Almost 10.5" from eye to eye.

Whats the shock stroke lenght on that?

advertised is 3".

That will work!

In a few days we will have inventory of 19x1.6" aluminum rims that will be a great match for the Raptor bike. They are lighter than 19" Prowheel rims, and also have the proper nipple angles to work with common MTB hubs and large diameter hub motors. Can't wait to throw a set on my ebike

Thats great JRH!, can't wait to see them.

 

[Offroader]

Looks like I may not have blown my shock as originally thought. I'm not sure if maybe I did lose some air in the shock or I didn't give enough bottom out control.

Either way, I blew it up to 170PSI, ran it today with proper bottom out, didn't bottom out over the jumps, and after a long ride I checked PSI and it was 170PSI. This is a great relief as maybe the shocks can hold up and I don't have to deal with getting it repaired by fox.

 

[Rix]

Looks like I may not have blown my shock as originally thought. I'm not sure if maybe I did lose some air in the shock or I didn't give enough bottom out control.

Either way, I blew it up to 170PSI, ran it today with proper bottom out, didn't bottom out over the jumps, and after a long ride I checked PSI and it was 170PSI. This is a great relief as maybe the shocks can hold up and I don't have to deal with getting it repaired by fox.

That's strange, so now its holding, but it wasn't. Things that make me ask WTS(what the $h!t) :?

 

[Offroader]

Looks like I may not have blown my shock as originally thought. I'm not sure if maybe I did lose some air in the shock or I didn't give enough bottom out control.

Either way, I blew it up to 170PSI, ran it today with proper bottom out, didn't bottom out over the jumps, and after a long ride I checked PSI and it was 170PSI. This is a great relief as maybe the shocks can hold up and I don't have to deal with getting it repaired by fox.

That's strange, so now its holding, but it wasn't. Things that make me ask WTS(what the $h!t) :?

It is strange, I'll surely be keeping my eye on it as the shock can be damaged with PSI lower than 120.

I'm really uncertain at this point if the shock released the air or if my broken pump released the air.

 

[John Bozi]

Can you join the cool bikes club if you have one that is spelt differently?

Nah awesome glad I checked in here after 100000000000 posts Rix your video makes me want to go drink tequila with snake blood in it

ola

then snort coke on the border with mexico...

and have you try to catch me

 

[Rix]

Can you join the cool bikes club if you have one that is spelt differently?

Nah awesome glad I checked in here after 100000000000 posts Rix your video makes me want to go drink tequila with snake blood in it

ola

then snort coke on the border with mexico...

and have you try to catch me

I am laughing my ass off, I can be at the border in same day drive. In fact, I made it from here to Tijuana in 9hrs once, but I was moving a bit over the speed limit.

 

[Merlin]

back from holidays
Rix, where have you mounted the camera in your videos?! It looks cool in that perspective.
needless to say, you have the best freeride location ever *sigh

 

[Rix]

back from holidays
Rix, where have you mounted the camera in your videos?! It looks cool in that perspective.
needless to say, you have the best freeride location ever *sigh

Yah, its pretty rocky shit where I live, and there is terrain like that for a hundred miles in any direction. On the last vid, I mounted the camera under the handlebar with the camera filming upside down. That's why you can see the tire in the video, then using GP editing studio, I flipped the image over in editing before editing frames. It worked out pretty well and I like it better than the other videos I made where the camera was mounted on top of the handlebar. The only down side is I have to pay attention to mounting underneath the handle bar as the throttle wire, or regen wire blocks part of the video. On Monday I will make another video shooting East of this location near Sand Mountain. I won't ride it at Sand Mountain, as that is a 200 meter tall Sand Dune several miles long, but the area around has lots of rocky trails.

 

[Mammalian04]

Grrr... Ok, I am having trouble figuring out how to accomplish shifting with a right hand throttle. I purchased a Shimano XT M772 Shadow 9 Speed Short cage to shift on the 5 speed sunrace freewheel but the trouble is the shifter with a right hand twist throttle.

Marcn suggests a couple grip shifts (won't work with twist throttle). I think Snellemin has a left hand throttle to address this (old post?).

Anyone have any ideas? The 5 speed needs a 5.5mm index. I was thinking the Shimano Rapid Fire Plus but I can't find the indexing distance (I think a 7 speed is the lowest made).

 

[Rodney64]

Grrr... Ok, I am having trouble figuring out how to accomplish shifting with a right hand throttle. I purchased a Shimano XT M772 Shadow 9 Speed Short cage to shift on the 5 speed sunrace freewheel but the trouble is the shifter with a right hand twist throttle.

Marcn suggests a couple grip shifts (won't work with twist throttle). I think Snellemin has a left hand throttle to address this (old post?).

Anyone have any ideas? The 5 speed needs a 5.5mm index. I was thinking the Shimano Rapid Fire Plus but I can't find the indexing distance (I think a 7 speed is the lowest made).

I've purchased a different throttle which can be used left hand ill try it tomorrow only just installed it so will need to see how it goes. The way its made it fits under the brake and grip but this inturn puts it a long way from natural thumb position. Maybe ill get used to it ill see.



This freewheel I went for at least its 7 speed and its easier to find a shift that will work.

http://www.ebikes.ca/shop/ebike-parts/fw7spd1132.html

Below is my throttle.

http://www.aliexpress.com/snapshot/6201997962.html

Bike building can be frustrating sometimes.

 

[sacko]

Thanks for the link, looking for a throttle just like that for variable regen on the Adaptto!

 

[litespeed]

Grrr... Ok, I am having trouble figuring out how to accomplish shifting with a right hand throttle. I purchased a Shimano XT M772 Shadow 9 Speed Short cage to shift on the 5 speed sunrace freewheel but the trouble is the shifter with a right hand twist throttle.

Marcn suggests a couple grip shifts (won't work with twist throttle). I think Snellemin has a left hand throttle to address this (old post?).

Anyone have any ideas? The 5 speed needs a 5.5mm index. I was thinking the Shimano Rapid Fire Plus but I can't find the indexing distance (I think a 7 speed is the lowest made).

You can also just put the shifter on the left side. I have a (made for the left side!) left hand rear dérailleur shifter for a 7 speed, took all of about 2 gear changes to get used to it.

Tom