Dustin Gyger
April 27, 2022
Hey, guys. Dustin here, CEO of Sixthreezero. And today, I'm going to answer the question, how far can an electric trike go? Stick around.
All right. So today, we're going to answer the question, how far, or what is the range of an electric trike? But before we do, hit that subscribe button below. Stay in touch with us here at Sixthreezero, be the first to know about all the new content new products, and of course, the giveaways and contests we're doing for bikes, e-bikes, and accessories. You'll want to know, hit subscribe.
All right. So behind me, I have the EVRYjourney electric tricycle. Today, I'm telling you what range can you expect to get out of your electric tricycle. Now, this is a complicated question to answer, but I'm going to try to do my best to give you a ballpark. Now, the range of an electric bike or electric trike is dependent on, let's say five or six things.
Number one, it's going to be the battery size and the motor size. Number two is going to be the load that you're carrying. And that load includes the rider and anything you may have in the basket, bags anywhere else that's going to add to the weight that the electric trike is having to bring along with it. Number three is going to be topography. How are you riding, flat ground, Hills, how steep are those Hills.
Number four, is going to be terrain, are you riding on pavement, are you riding on trails, how much resistance are you putting on the tires. Number five is going to be weather conditions, what's the wind like, and how much wind resistance are you riding into. And number six is going to be, how are you actually riding the bike.
What I mean by that, is what level of assistance are you using, are you using the throttle, how frequently are you doing it, what level of assistance are you doing as you're going up Hills, down Hills. All of those things play into it. So let's touch on each one a little bit. Number one, I said battery size, motor size. Now on the Sixthreezero electric trike, we have a 36 volt, 10.4 amp-hour battery.
This equates to about 380-watt hours. The watt-hours are the actual full size of the battery. And that tells you, or that gives you an idea of how far that battery will take you. The bigger the watt-hours number, the larger the battery, and the more range you will get. Now, this is a 250-watt motor.
So if you had a 500-watt motor with the same battery, you'd get less range out of the battery because you'd have a bigger motor on a smaller battery. It would be pulling down more power. Generally speaking, 36 volt, 10.4 amp-hour for a 250-watt motor is a good even balanced match.
And I'll just tell you guys right off the bat, before we get into this, my expectation on this is you're going to get about seven miles to 20 miles using full throttle. And with pedal assist, you're going to get anywhere from 10 miles to about, well, I'll say 15 miles actually pedal assist. Actually, I'll say 10 miles up to about 30 miles pedal assist.
Now those numbers could be shorter and can be longer depending on all these factors. So going back to what I said about the battery and the motor, if you have too small of a battery for a bigger motor, you're going to drain that battery too quick. Now, if we put a larger battery on here, the ranges that I just told you will extend, especially if you only have a 250 watt.
If we were to add a 48 volt, 14 amp-hour battery. Now we're up at about 680-watt hours. We may have just doubled the range actually that we would get. The other thing to consider though, is the larger the battery, the more expensive the product. So all these e-bike designers, including Sixthreezero is trying to strike the proper balance between range and cost.
And then also matching that to the customer and the use case. So like us at Sixthreezero, we don't want to over-design or over spec with too expensive of a battery. Now we drove the cost of the trike, let's say over $3,000. We've basically giving our customers way too much and the price has become too expensive.
So it is a balancing act between finding the right battery, and the right motor for all the right price to match up with your customer or the customer that will be riding the electric trike. Now moving into number two, which is the load. Something a lot of people don't think about, but the rider's weight has a great effect on the range of an electric trike.
Including also, in this case, you've got a big basket back here. So there's actually a video of us and I've sat back here with Alana driving me. And so combined, we're going to be 350 pounds plus, and the trike moves, no problem. But of course, that's going to drain the battery a lot quicker, as opposed to, if you just had me riding by myself, you've eliminated a hundred pounds.
Or if you just had Alana riding, you eliminated me, 220 pounds off of the bike as well. So that weight is going to have the biggest impact. A 100-pound rider is going to get much more range than a 200-pound rider or 300-pound or 400-pound rider. It's not that the trike can't actually carry those weights, it's how much range you would get out of the battery.
In those cases, sometimes I would just recommend buying an extra battery and bring that extra battery with you on a ride. That will help extend the range and get you farther distances. So the ranges that I gave you, I'm going to say again, will depend on the weight of the rider. The ranges are general where we think no matter what your weight is, no matter all these other conditions you should end up in these ranges.
But you may be surprised to find when you get your electric trike at home, your range is far greater. You also may find that your range is worse. I would just say that it's not necessarily the company's fault. It's without some precise calculation, you can't get that exact range in mind. Now, moving to topography. The other thing that has a major role is the size of the Hills.
If you're riding on flat ground and that's all you do, you're going to get tremendous range and the bike's going to go a very long time. You add in a couple, of very large Hills and a very large load in the back, the battery's going to drain very, very quickly. I personally have experience adding very large Hills into rides and I might have had five batteries, five bars of battery on my display.
I get to a huge hill, and by the time I'm at the top, I may have lost one or two batteries. Again, I'm a heavier guy, and it depends on the length of the hill, and the steepness of the hill. So Hills have a major impact on the range of the battery. Segue going into, so does the terrain, meaning pavement or trail. Flat smooth pavement is going to be best for range because wheels are going to glide right over it and roll super easily.
You get onto a trail, dirt, anything that's going to add resistance to those wheels just means the motor's going to have to work that much harder, which means it's going to suck more battery out. So keep that in mind. Okay. Now, moving into what I said, number five is the wind. Wind will play a role. Sometimes I ride down to the ocean and when I'm going to the beach, there is a strong in your face, wind of 20 miles an hour.
And it is a lot of resistance as I'm pedaling. And one thing I can do to alleviate battery drain is to decrease my pedal assist. But if you're still trying to hit 20 miles an hour into a 20 mile an hour wind, and you put it in level assist five, that battery's going to drain very quickly. So wind can have an effect positively or negatively because on the way home I can decrease my pedal assist level and the wind can do a lot of work for me, make it super easy to ride.
So you might fight it on the way there and coast it on the way back, you could find a perfect balance. Now, number six on your range, and what you can expect to get is really how you ride the e-bike. You have a pedal-assist option. You also have the regular option and the throttle option.
One suggestion is if you keep the pedal-assist in level two or level three, you're going to get way more range out of that battery. If you keep it in level five and you are just cranking at 17, 18, 19, 20 miles an hour, going to drain that battery a lot quicker. So it's up to you to figure out what kind of range you are looking to get and how you can ride your e-bike in that manner.
If you want to eliminate all questions, like I said, buy extra batteries and keep them on hand. Then you don't have to be as cognizant about how much rain or how much range you're going to get or how effectively you ride your trike. But just like an electric car, if you've never had one, it takes a little while to get familiar with the type of driving you're due and the range you're going to get because electric cars are not a perfect science either.
Neither are electric bikes. So once you get your electric trike, you'll start to get your routes familiarized. And you'll start to understand, "I get this much range out of this. If I do this on a Hill, I lose this much battery. If I ride this type of terrain, I get this." So you'll start to know what range becomes particular to your type of rides and over time you'll just develop on strategies.
"Okay, I'm going to leave it in level two for this. I'm only going to do level five on this Hill." So you'll find the balance on how to minimize your effort or maximize your effort and preserve your battery or not preserve your battery as whatever's best for you. But coming back to the ranges, these are what the expectation is. Worst case scenario, your range should be somewhere in the ranges that I gave.
And for our electric tricycle, it's going to be like I said, now I forget, but I'll have to remember. I think I said 10 to 30 miles for full throttle. Or I believe I said even could be even less, seven to 20, seven to 20 for full throttle, and about 10 to 30, 10 to 40 for pedal assist. And again, I confuse myself because it really depends on the rider.
We should do a test at actually to see the range we get out of this electric trike. If I had to estimate, I would say with my body type, I'm going to get about 10 miles full-throttle on this. And I think I could get 20 miles easy in the pedal-assist mode if I'm staying in the two to three range for the pedal assist level.
So if you have any questions specific to the electric trike and the range or anything else, comment below, or shoot us an email, at theteam@sixthreezero.com or call us at (310) 982-2877. Also, if you're in the market for an electric trike, you can check them out on our website, sixthreezero.com. If you're in the market for an electric trike or electric bike or trike and don't know what you need, take our proprietary body fit quiz on our website.
Our proprietary algorithm will ask you a few questions about your body and your life and will recommend the perfect e-trike or bike for you. And we have a 90-day test ride or e-trike or e-bike policy. If you don't love it within 90 days, send it back. No questions asked, no money out of your pocket. And we have a 365-day warranty that starts right after that 90 days.
So in 365 days, if anything goes wrong, we'll take care of it, and get your bike working. No questions asked, no money out of your pocket. Lastly, join our communities, and our Facebook peddlers group, and download the Sixthreezero app available in the app store and the Android Google Play store as well.
You can see riders riding this very electric trike right now. You can see them logging miles on the app. They also post photos in our pedalers group. You can also ask questions before you purchase, see how they like it, and ask them the range that they're getting.
And once you purchase, you can be a part of our awesome community competing on our app for the weekly challenges, for giveaways of bikes, e-bikes, and accessories. It's not about your range, it's just about logging a ride every week, sometimes multiple rides to be entered to win. So thanks for sticking around. And don't forget, it's your journey, your experience, enjoy the ride.