this new e-bike from honbike is their u4 so it's very different to the foldable 20-inch bike that
i reviewed from home bike this one focused more on long-distance city commutes so it does have
much larger wheels they're 27.5 inches by 2 inches this bike does have a 250 watt rear hub motor that
can take us up to 25 kilometers per hour which is the legal limit here in europe now with the motor
it does have three pedal assist levels and even a gyroscope that can detect that we have a climb
and give us the pedal assist and the power when we need it straight away the bike does weigh 20 kilos
and it has a very modern look to it this frame and within the frame you'll find the battery
which is unfortunately non-user removable it's 12 amp hours which on hornbike does claim will give
us around 100 kilometers total distance which is a lot of course i'll be putting that to the test
and it does have a gates carbon bound drive to this so there's no gears there's no chain you have
to worry about maintaining oiling or a derailleur that's getting out of alignment and it should last
for up to 10 000 kilometers they claim which is a lot maintenance-free the pedals we have here with
the home bike are made out of an abs style plastic they do have reflectors in them so they're not a
well go pedal and they're not metal ones but so far they seem to be holding up well and i guess
they've gone for a lightweight pedal here so the disc brakes at the front here they are mechanical
discs unfortunately not hydraulic and i think at this price point they should be hydraulic
brakes now they're braking all right now but initially i did need to bed them in quite a bit
so you see there's no quick release here it's just a nut under this little plastic cover there
to make it look all streamlined and nice but it's going to be difficult then if you need to
swap out the tire or change the inner or whatever because you get a puncture because you can't just
quickly remove it or placing this bike in the boot of a car for example the trunk of a car you can't
just easily remove that front wheel our tires are 27.5 inches by two inches wide they don't seem to
have any brand name that i can see on them so no brand tyres the treat pad and as you can see here
is more of what i would call a cross country style tread now the good thing about them is the side
walls do have this reflector strip all around as you can see now at night time great for safety and
we do have an led tail light which is reasonably bright and our front headlight with reflector
again good for safety and it lights up the path ahead of me enough that i can ride safely at night
the seat is nice and wide a good bit of sponge to it overall it's comfortable i've got no complaints
with it this homebuy q4 uses plastic mudguards both front and rear they don't rattle and you
don't have to worry about them ever rusting or corroding they're a lot more durable than having
steel painted mud guards so having this gates carbon drive here is both a pro and a con the good
thing about it is it's smooth it's maintenance free there's no oiling you don't have to worry
about getting a derailleur out of alignment none of that however there are no gears it's just a
single speed setup now these belts are supposed to last for at least 10 000 kilometers even up
to about 20 000 kilometers so without any gears it means we're stuck in just that one fixed speed so
if you've got a lot of steep climbs then you will have to put a bit of effort into it it's certainly
a bite that would get you fit with the steeper climbs but later on i'll be doing my climb test
and i'll let you know exactly how it fares the humbike q4 uses a 250 watt motor it's running off
a 36 volt system it is a very small rehab motor you barely even notice that it has a motor and it
does not make a lot of noise but i'll be testing out just how powerful it is later with my climb
test of course so the seat post is adjustable and it does cater for rider heights of 160 centimeters
up to 190 centimeters maximum load of 120 kilos the handlebars well you cannot adjust this
they are sadly fixed in place so there's no way to raise it or drop it at all so we have
a bright color display here that is a little difficult to make out in direct sunlight now
i can just see it here but you can see it at night time because it is backlit so we do have
three pedal assist modes using the plus and minus buttons here on the left so we do have
if you hold it down then the function to turn on the headlight and the tail light
is separate okay that one's just got a battery within it it's running off its
own power source not the bike and then if you press and hold this you get the walk mode too
now you notice that we do have this accelerator with this eu version it's only really just for
engaging the walk mode it's just good for pushing off and starting that said it won't get you up to
25 kilometers per hour you do need to pedal with the pedal assist for that so the grips right here
while they are locked grips they do have an allen key right here uh they spin around a little bit
and for me that's slightly annoying considering the price of the bike that shouldn't be happening
the brake levers they feel good but i do wish they were hydraulic as mentioned our front
brake lever has a bow here that's incorporated into it it's loud enough to alert pedestrians
that are walking in the bike lanes which often happens here they think it's for them
and their dogs not for bikes even though it's clearly labeled bike lane now with our display
here we have our speed pedal assist level and then right at the top that's our battery gauge
and it does represent each one of those bars 20 of course to let you know just how much battery
you do have now to test out just how the hum bike u4 rides so the frame size is good i wanted to
point out too that that kickstand has not let the bike fall over it doesn't rattle either
which is one thing i really hate so the seat is comfortable now there is no quick release with
the seat post so that's one thing you need to bear in mind if you're swapping riders you need to take
the correct allen key for that so you can then of course adjust it or drop it down now the riding
position it is reasonably upright not as much as the swept back handlebar style but not too bad
now when i start to pedal it's got a gyroscope so it'll know that if you've got a climb or anything
like that but the pedal says it kicks in very quick it's only about one two kilometers or so
when it will kick in when it detects that you are peddling now if you do use this accelerator here
note that it's very slow and it's really just for pushing off or just walking the bike because
it will only take y'all to slow right down now it's only going to take me up to about seven
kilometers per hour so i press down on it now and very slowly i'm pulling away and that's it seven
kilometers per hour is all it's going to allow me to do so that's quite slow i think but i'm
not too sure though i think this is just the eu version that does this i think on the us models
other regions it will allow you to go up to 25 kilometers per hour with it so it is very smooth
the gates carbon drive and the motor can barely hear it so we've got the three pedal assist levels
i'm in the maximum i'm normally using either level two or three so when i'm pedaling ahead
well i can hear that motor a little but compared to some of the other bikes especially the 48
volt ones it's quiet not that loud at all so a smooth comfortable ride good riding position
so as soon as you do get up to 25 kilometers per hour the motor will cut out and it won't really
let you go over that because it is very hard the way it's geared with that single gear the ratio
you really need to absolutely pedal your guts out to get over 25 kilometers per hour i have found
so if i really really really push it i can get it up to about 30 but i'm spinning so fast and
pushing really hard it's not ideal so my knees aren't anywhere close to the handle bars plenty of
space right there and see how this bar is coming in at an angle now that was what originally put
me off quite a bit when i first rode this bike it felt like i was riding crooked and my handlebars
weren't straight because compared to other bikes you'd always base where your handlebar is off
this bar and it feels like i always need to keep turning to the left to keep the bar straight but
if you don't focus on that you just focus on your front wheel because your front wheel and your seat
however are in alignment they have to be and they are otherwise it would feel very awkward if it
wasn't so once you get over that it's great riding the bike right now i've got a very gentle steady
climb i'm having to put a little bit of effort into this but it's not bad at all it's quite easy
i'm doing 22 kilometers per hour but i'm riding now to where my steep test point is
and we'll see how the single gear and the 250 watt motor is going to fare so this is my test
climb point now straight away it's giving me power assist pedal assist which is great because it's
got the gyroscope built into it it knows that i'm going to need it straight away now this is about
25 degrees this climb so it is steep and this by i think is only rated to about 20 it's a new 250
watt motor they really do need to change the eu laws to increase that because it's just ridiculous
so now i'm having to put quite a bit a bit of effort in i do feel like now i need to drop it
down a gear but i don't have any gears of course so putting more effort in it's okay actually this
is doing a lot better than i thought it would seems to have a reasonable amount of torque
i'm starting to build speed up now i'm at 13 kilometers per hour 14
15 so it isn't too bad this is fearing better than i thought it would
at these climbs but yes you will have to put a bit of effort in it's getting even steeper now
and i'm having to push quite a bit harder
now for my braking test at approximately 30 kilometers per hour from this post here we go
full on emergency brake there that actually wasn't too bad but i have beard these brakes and now
of giving them a probably about 20 kilometers before they
start to break and bite at a reasonable rate which i would consider acceptable
lots of tourists here at the moment it is a cool summer so this is normal they've closed it off
to cars we've even got the little tourist train out that will take people right to the end of the
coast here and what about our range so what kind of distance can i cover so each of those battery
bars represents 20 percent battery and i am losing one of those bars every about 15 kilometers for
me so i'm looking at a range for me and these conditions that i'm riding of about 75 kilometers
not quite that 100 kilometer range that they do claim this could do now i can see that being
possible if you ride around mostly on the flat i've gone up some climbs here i've got a steep
climb to get all the way home as well and let's talk about those climbs so because it's got a
built-in gyroscope if you happen to start pedaling on a climb this is the great part about it it
gives you that power straight away the assistance where other bikes it would take a very long time
so do like that we've got the three pedal assist levels i mostly use pedal assist level two
and three just when it was steeper for some of those climbs now the climbing performance
it handled about up to around 20 degrees really quite well you have to put a little bit of effort
into it and 25 and over when i got to about just over 25 you do have to put quite a bit of effort
into pedaling then so it's a bike that will get you fit going up steep climbs because of the
lack of gears that's the downside to this carbon belt setup the positive side is of course there's
no maintenance that should last for about 10 000 kilometers even more than that there's no oiling
there's no noise from it it's very smooth and just basically maintenance free which is what you want
really out of these bikes now there's no rattling coming from this bike whatsoever which is another
positive it's a big thumbs up from me i hate it when bikes rattle away and it's not doing that
at all it has a good set of lights on it they're not too bad the front headlights sufficient enough
that you can ride around at night time safely we've got the reflectors on the sidewalls of these
tires which is good but what i don't like about the tires is the tread pattern and they're very
thin ties at that for a city bike i would put on more of a city tread pattern there and something
would have better rolling resistance but also more puncture resistance i've always already had one
punch already with this particular bike which is not the best of course that you don't want that
so the 27.5 inch wheels do roll a lot better and you can get up to a top speed pedaling by yourself
of about 28 29 not too bad but you do have to put quite a bit of effort into it the bikes weight 20
kilos not bad and overall i think it is a quality bike here but it's expensive it's around 1600
euros but when you factor in the competition it's not actually priced too bad considering it's got a
12 amp hour battery other bikes have only 7 amp hours and it's a quality frame and a little bit
more different a more modern look to it of course which was a bit off-putting to me in the beginning
having the frame angled like that but the front wheel the seat post and the rear wheel are all
in line it's just the frame kind of puts you off a bit thinking you're not riding straight or the
handlebars are straight but once you get over that it's perfectly fine so what other things i don't
like about it well the brakes i think they should be hydraulic the braking performance is fine but
this price point they should be hydraulic they're also starting to squeal quite a bit and squeak
which is a little annoying the grips here well i do think they should be different they should
swap these out because they're moving about even though they're locked grips i've tightened them
up to the maximum they're still moving about a little on me but overall this is a quality
decent bike from them good frame finish good paint job it does get a thumbs up from me the on bike u4
so thanks a lot for watching this review here i hope to catch you in the next one bye for now