I got some good news – the kind of thing a lot of people celebrate by buying something major. I don’t drive and I have a nice place to live and I feel like I have most of the stuff I want. I realized that this is the kind of thing that earlier in my life I would have had a lot of fun fantasizing about. So I bring it to you, Lemmy: what would it be for you?
oh man I am looking at the mten3 and trying to argue with myself about whether I’d even be able to learn to ride it
oh hey, I have thousands of kilometers on my mten3 already, if you have any questions about it I would be happy to help
how hard is it to ride… slowly? or how long does it take to get good enough to maneuver politely on the sidewalk.
mten3 has a rather wide tire, so it’s a lot easier than on other wheels both to maintain low speeds and maneuver (except on specifically bumpy roads, then it becomes a disadvantage), so, if you don’t have any prior experience, you could easily ride at ~3-4 km/h and maneuver between people on sidewalks at great speeds within like a couple of days
there’s some learning curve to riding any euc and mten3 in particular (it’s so small that it’s hard to hold it tight enough with your legs) but most people learn to ride it okayish within the first hour
this is real tempting, I gotta tell you.
I was even thinking about those “e bikes” that are just electric scooters with pedals stuck on for legal purposes, but then the specs look… approximately equivalent to an euc, (speed/range) except then you have to park it somewhere. do you find yourself putting the mten3 in a backpack ever?
not a lot, because I try to ride everywhere on it whenever I can, but whenever the destination is too far or it’s very rainy or maybe there are no bike lanes available (very often sadly) I tend to carry it in a backpack
on smaller distances (<100 meters) I tend to just pick it up and carry it by hand, i desperately need to modify it with a trolley handle, because even though it’s pretty light by euc standards, it’s not very fun to carry
by the way, you probably already know this, but just in case, those specs are often not very accurate, it is the case for any electric vehicle, as the officially declared ranges are performed by a somewhat light person, on perfectly flat terrain with no wind and no acceleration and deceleration
in case of mten3, with reasonable riding speeds and not too aggressive acceleration/deceleration I get about 30 kilometers of range, you could probably go to 40 if you’re lighter and less aggressive about your riding style (that’s on a 512wh battery version)