Re: My Bafang Ultra Mountain Bike! Frey AM1000

Micah here - I’ll have more to share soon but the Frey exchange has been epic so far. I’ve never seen such value for eMTBs and the people that founded and run FREY are seriously salt of the earth people. Just amazing.

Sinbord1981 is also a hell of a guy, most positive dude I’ve ever met :lol:
 
Sinbord1981 said:
https://youtu.be/4JjrwKDGbRM

Guys here’s a quick teaser video showing the first ride and unveiling of the new Frey EX and Frey CC bikes. I’ve been part of the whole Exchange Tour week with Frey in China and when I get home I will be producing a full video of my week from the first person perspective. Please enjoy and provide any initial comments.

Thanks for watching.
I noticed you guys riding above the water feature.like a susp bridge thingy. Curious to see what hsppens to the battery when fully submerged in the water
 
I'm delighted to show some footage of the 2020 Frey EX bike going down the brave peak bike park in China. It's a fantastic bike to ride.

[youtube]4Z5mJ-hOn_4[/youtube]
 
Hardcore said:
I'm delighted to show some footage of the 2020 Frey EX bike going down the brave peak bike park in China. It's a fantastic bike to ride.

[youtube]4Z5mJ-hOn_4[/youtube]

Great video! Is the balans different? Because it looks like a AM1000 with 2 batteries:)
 
Grantmac said:
75# is a really heavy bike unfortunately. I was hoping then be more inline with other ebikes around 55 or so.

I still never understand why one wants a lighter e-bike. If you want high power, you need a bigger motor, bigger battery, strenghtened rear suspension due to the sideways torque, bigger brakes, bigger front fork, wider handlebars, bigger wheels and tires, and add those up to any regular set of components and you get to 30+ kg.

I've heard stories that back in the 90s, lighter bikes became the trend to the extend where riders put their lifes on the line with underconstructed frames, thin wall'd rims, and rim brakes. Nowadays, bikes actually became heavier, look at disc brakes, dropper posts, suspension forks, larger and wider wheels, wider handlebars, etc. .. would you like your bike without? Ebikes have most the weight in the right places, because of the placement of the motor, battery, controller, in the downtube and cranks. The emtbs weight conveys an enormous degree of confidence and provides undreamt-of grip through corners with incredible stopping power and makes ease of any uphill section. Just to mention, some downhillers have even placed lead weights on their bikes for the exact same reasons.

Now where is the disadvantage of weight, you name it, acceleration and uphill, or if you want to transport the bike unassisted. All these can be neglected if you just get a big enough battery and motor and I believe frey has hit a sweet spot with their EX that with one battery weighs about 30kg (34 with both batteries).

Now please, give me your view on this as I am eager to hear your side.
 
You can really feel the weight trying to jump or run them hard through rock gardens. I have a DH conversion which sits at just under 70# and it's very noticeable even with a whole lot more travel than and generally better suspension than these.

Guy are completing CYC builds on aluminum enduro frames around 50-55, the LMX64 sits at ~55 and apparently the 14kw Boxxbike will build around 80#.

So these all sit 10-15# above any sort of benchmark which is unfortunate since they seem like a decent company in terms of quality.
 
Thanks for the reply, from my experience, every bike will handle differently and weight is indeed one important aspect. But rock gardens and jumps depend also on geometry and suspension quality. Hence, comparing different bikes is rather difficult, but you gotta outweigh motor power, battery size, and almost most importantly, price. From my own experience, and this excludes all your mentioned bikes, but jumping the 30kg ebike is more stable than my 17kg mtb, same goes for rock gardens. I jumped the EX with one or two batteries (~3 kg diff) and there was no noticeable difference for me. The question is, is it possible to do, yes absolutely. Is it different for every bike, yes. Now maybe there is an optimum in the middle but in all honesty, I'd rather know my bike won't crack in two than to worry about a bit in jump height.

About the information you give, LMX64 claims 27 kg, while from memory they started with 29kg. I don't know anything about the others you mention other than what the company claims, but would love to try them out, they sound like fun. In terms of battery size, the Boxxbike is similar to the 34 kg EX with two batteries but comes in between 39 - 42kg (claimed not measured). I assume the difference is in the other components. Now compare the price point of each of your mentioned bikes. Coming back to the weight, I'm sure you can lower the weight of the Frey bikes a bit, but by how much, and at what cost price? I'm sure you will find something that suits your needs specifically.
 
Micah's second article about Frey; https://electrek.co/2019/10/11/frey-bikes-ex-cc-electric-bike-suspension/
 
Here is the battery information from Ivy at Frey:

IVY wrote:
EX Max battery 48V14Ah inner+48V14Ah outer.
CC Max battery 48V17.5Ah. both do not apply for 52V.

Here is how the EX handles two batteries with auto-sensing of voltage:

IVY wrote:
About EX battery how they work I answer you below:
if 2 battery on bike, the? higher voltage will discharge firstly. till the 2 battery at same voltage , then 2 battery will together to discharge. so it is very convenient

In my mind this seems like a great way to handle two batteries and the bike should have a full 28AH useful charge. Too bad about the lack of 52 volt availability for these models. However, the 48 volt 21AH batteries Frey is supplying now come with a 40 amp BMS instead of a 30 amp BMS. This should lower the voltage sag at full 1500 watt draw.
 
One correction I need to make to my above post:

The BMS(s) in the Frey batteries are NOT 40 amps. They are 30 amps. The FUSE has been upgraded to 40 amps.

they did this because at full throttle the bikes pull a full 30 amps and some of the fuses would fail over time. (ask me how I know this.. :) )

My apologies for mistakenly posting incorrect information.

I did have an after market 52 volt Dorado battery (totally unrelated to Frey) that had the BMS fail. When I opened it up I found a 25 amp DALY BMS! Duh, no wonder it failed! I replaced it with a 40 amp DALY BMS which was physically larger but I made it fit and anchored it securely.

Now this battery works better and has much less voltage sag. To me this highlights that the BMS can cause voltage sag if you run it near or over the rated limit.

I wish ALL dorado battery packs came with 40 amp BMS, even though we only pull 30 amps maximum at full throttle on the Bafang Ultra. Less voltage sag and longer life....

I bought these 14S 40amp BMS (s) for about $20 delivered thru Alibaba.
 
cvin said:
would like to know the weight on the CC

thank you

I emailed Frey. They responded the CC bike including 840WH internal battery is 32KGS.
 
Sinbord1981 said:
Grantmac said:
I'd love to see some weights for Frey, especially from 3rd party testers.
‘Weights’ as in weight of the bikes? I’ve got the AM1000 - that weighs 32KG. We weighed the new EX whilst in the Frey factory last week - comes in at 34KG and I think that was with both the batteries fitted. My personal view is that these bikes wear their weight well in that the power of the bike, even on the lowest assist settings, more than offsets that. The quality of the components used also means they jump very well.

Why is am so heavy? 32 kg is way too much
 
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