Well i've got a very unique looking e-bike right here it's called the HONBIKE and it's a
foldable e-bike with 20-inch rims 160 millimeter mechanical disc brakes but that's really about
where the similarities to other e-bikes i've covered in because when you look at the design
it has actually won a few awards for it you'll see why because the front fork it's single sided
the rear fork 2 single sided and it has a drive shaft in there so that drive shaft
means no gears no chains to have to worry about lubricating maintenance on this is supposed to be
maintenance-free up to 45 000 kilometers so claim HONBIKE so the motor is located in the front here
which is unusual normally it's in the rear hub or the middle mid mounted motor it's 250 watts
maximum speed is 25 kilometers per hour and we do have five pedal assist levels so it can take you
up to they claim around 40 kilometers the range of it but i'll be putting that to the test also show
you the design of this bike why it's so unique the build quality my road tests how it climbs
and my overall opinions of this bike now using it for a couple of weeks the front crank here
doesn't use a speed sensor it has a torque sensor and that's really good it even incorporates a gyro
too so it knows when you exceed or get close to 30 degrees it'll cut out the motor and because it's
a torque sensor it uses that means the power delivery is very smooth with that front motor
in my time testing it so far the pedals like the whole bike is foldable so you simply just press
them in and then you can fold them up for easier stowing and it just means they take up a little
less room they've got reflectors in them and they're made out of a quality abs style plastic
the tyres HONBIKE wentworth are a known brand they're kinder and the size of them is 20 inches
by 2.125 inches and they are row tyres and the tyres in the sidewall do have this reflector
strip all the way around which is a nice touch for added safety we have a strong kickstand and this
one doesn't rattle which is great i simply hate rattling stands on bikes and so far nothing's
rattling on this including our mud guards which are made out of plastic both the front
and rear mug guard the disc brakes these ones are mechanical and 160 millimeters front and rear
and our battery packs located here so six amp hours or 214 watt hours
you can just simply pull this down like so and you can see that it's a little battery right here
now it just clips back in place you slot it in like so you hear a click when it goes in
and it's lockable so there's this key here that locks it in place and then this bracket here goes
up right here we've got the hinge and the latch here so there's a little security right here
you push that in and then push again and that undoes the latch and you can fold it right in
half handlebar is similar there's just a little button at the top so you've got to push that down
and then you can pull down the lever which is a little tight but it's quite secure
and then that handlebar will drop down too
the seat here is of an unusual design because it doesn't have the part that normally sticks out
here at the front normally have like a triangular shaped seat but it does away with that completely
it takes a little while to get used to but the design of it is quite nice and there's plenty of
sponge here at the top so it is a comfortable seat now we do have it numbered here the height on it
for different riders it'd be very easy to swap between because you know which number is yours
and it's just this here simply loosen is off and you can drop that seat down or up and it does
cater for various different rider heights and this is what it looks like and it's completely
folded down state so that's the pedals in the seat down handlebars folded down and folded in half
the front of the handlebar has a reflective strip we've got a reflector right here too
and then a powerful led headlight and there is another bright led tail light in the rear
then we've got these unique style brakes here that are sticking out the front and not your
typical style now they are not adjustable here but they are down at the caliper so we have the front
brake lock grips made out of very good rubber here they're not going anywhere there's a bell
reasonably loud and then on this side on the right here we've got our rear brake and we have
the power on pedal assist mode up down and if you hold the pedal assist up that turns on the lights
then our display so this is nice and clear even in direct sunlight we've got our speed the assist
level so that is one through to five which they call the sport mode trip meter odometer and here
is our battery life gauge at the top so each one of those bars represents approximately 25 battery
so i've got a perfect day here now finally it's taken quite a few outings to get some really good
weather to just show you what it's like to ride this home bike here so with that front 250 watt
motor drive shaft and its torque sensor and gyro so it is very comfortable to seat even though it's
a little bit different this normally triangular design we have with the seats is not here with
this one it means it's a little bit easier to mount but it's got plenty of padding in it
now you can probably hopefully see my knees here they're not too close to the handlebars and i've
got plenty of room in fact the riding position on this is quite upright and it's very comfortable
so pedal assist level one as soon as you start to give it a bit that torque sensor straight
away delivers the power and it is smooth and you hardly even hear that front hub motor so most of
the e-bikes that i do review they normally have a rear hub motor or sometimes mid-mount ones so this
is a different way of doing it and it seems to work quite well especially with that torque sensor
now what's the top speed like because of its gearing the ratio they've gone with
i'm only really getting up to about 30 kilometers per hour and that's peddling my guts out so now
you can see i'm really pedaling quite fast and i'm just able to do 30 and it really is
quite difficult to go over 30 with the way it is geared and of course we don't have any gears just
that fixed ratio drive shaft i'm now at my climb test point here so how is the home bike going to
fare with a 25 30 degree climb like this it's relatively steep now this bike does have that
torque sensor the gyroscope built within it now that gyroscope is able to detect we've got to
climb so it should give me that assistance right from the get-go so let's test it out
okay so i tested out a level three pedal assist so it should with that sensor give me that pedal
power and the torque sensor straight away and i'm feeling a little bit coming but this is slightly
difficult here having to put a bit of muscle power into it so level five now that's the maximum
and this steep climb is getting a little easier i certainly wouldn't want to do this without the
motor because of course there's no gears no low gear you're basically stuck in a high gear so
i can get up this okay so it's going to keep you fit this bike and my braking test so when
i get to the post there approximately 30 kilometers per hour full-on braking
and it made it before this other post so that's pretty good that's approximately
about 20 meters there i think just an estimate so do find for mechanical disc
brakes 160 millimeter ones they're actually pretty good no real complaints with them
decent enough breaks especially once you beat them in you can stop when you want to stop that's the
main thing and they don't squeak away or rattle or make any noise which is another positive there
and here i am at the end of the test route that i take with these e-bikes
it has been a very good ride pleasant smooth no rattling so the front wheel
even though it's got a motor at the front it's only 2.1 kilos the weight of that motor
this is not adding a lot of weight to it and the best part is just no rattling whatsoever
nothing which is great all right and what about the range of it so they claim 40 kilometers
but i'm only getting around 28 to 30 kilometers worth of this but i weigh 81 kilos and the climbs
that i've been doing have been relatively steep so it's only a six amp hour battery i think
it's fearing all right now when you go over 25 kilometers per hour the motor cuts out you get
no assistance then the torque sensor is not going to do anything and it will not then pull you along
so that does save a little bit of battery so it's all going to depend on of course where you're
riding if you've got a lot of just hills around then it might not really be the bike for that but
if it's a city kind of commute you're doing which is mostly flat it will be great for that it's a
very smooth ride i like the torque sensor on it delivers that power straight away the front motor
doesn't make a lot of noise at all now with the steep climbs that i did with it i did notice that
it's not quite as powerful some of the other e-bikes that i have reviewed it's 250 watts
and the torque on it's fine but you still will have to pedal a little bit now because there's no
gears the gearing on it if you want to try and go and ride over 25 kilometers per hour when you're
doing about 30 you really are pedaling quite fast like this so you do get a bit of a workout with
this bike but on the flat it's very easy going and a cruisy ride super comfortable the seat more
comfortable than it looks because it doesn't have the typical traditional seat design on it which
would be triangular no it's cut off it's more of a d shape to it but nice and comfortable the
quality of this bike is excellent so nothing rattles on it i can do it now nothing rattles
not even the stand not even the plastic mud guards it's good the brakes 160 millimeter ones
better than i thought they would be they actually like brake really well and i've got no complaints
there at all with it the other thing to do with the display here that it gives you a lot of
information it's it's clear it's good the lights on them are good and good to see there's an actual
rear light which a lot of manufacturers just opt to not even put in there it's all up it's
a good bike it really for me is just two things that it has the cons and that is the fact that
it is expensive but you're paying for the build quality and this unique design the foldable design
and the other is the range i do wish it was just a little better now they do apparently sell
a portable battery pack that you can connect up to it to double your range so do look into that
if you're thinking about getting this bike here so thank you so much for watching my
review of the home bike and i hope to see you in my next e-bike review bye for now