Update June 2021: I used to rate Swagtron as 5 stars. But they have quality issues- I know because I purchased 6 swagtrons. Every single one had battery issues. One battery died after 6 months. The other battery died after 2 years of VERY LIGHT use. A 3rd battery dead or its power controller dead aft
er 1.5 years. And when I say dead, I don’t mean from my negligence. They would go from fully functional to glitching, like having to turn off & on battery with the key to work in the middle of a ride, to then completely dead despite a functional fuse and contacts. Every time the issue resolved when I bought a new battery. I have learned these battery issues are common for all electric bikes. And swagtron’s battery prices are more reasonable than most other electric bikes. So no longer 5 of 5 stars, but one of the better electric bikes to buy. Read my original review before I knew of quality issues: I own 5 different electric bikes for different height people in my family: 1) the Addmotor Hithot H1- for me, I am 5'11'' and this is perfect size for taller people. 2) the Genze Series 200 16-inch frame step through- for my 5'5'' wife. 3) the Swagcycle EB-6- for my 11 yo son. Perfect electric mountain bike for kids and about the only electric pedal bike I could find specifically designed for kids. 4) And finally the Swagcycle EB-5- which is this bike you are looking at for purchase. 5) the Swagtron EB7 Of all the bikes mentioned above the most versatile in fitting all the different size bodies in my family is this EB-5. It is amazing in that I can easily adjust the seat & handle bar up to fit my 5'11' long legged body type and it still looks like I can adjust the seat even higher. I can ride it very comfortably without feeling awkward at all. As if it was a bike designed for someone my height. And it is the only electric bike that I can adjust all the way down in height so that it fits my 9 yo daughter (she is 45th percentile for height and weight for her age). The seat and handle bar goes down far enough where she can stand comfortably. I must say that at first I noticed her pedaling seemed awkward, like if she had to bend her knees way too much and I thought perhaps its because the pedals have a bigger adult diameter. But I simply put the seat height up a little so that she has to stand on her tip toes now while on the seat and now her knees look pretty normal while peddling. Not to mention her knees looked super bent on her normal bike too, I guess I had not noticed that before and the bike shop says that is normal for little kids. So basically this bike fits my 4ft 7in and 60 pound daughter and my 5ft 11in 180 pound body, and anywhere in between. It felt like a normal bike to me, no compromise in how it feels geometrically as a bike for me. I asked my little daughter the same question and she said the same, “no it does not feel funny, it just feels like a normal bike, just like my other bike.” I have no idea how Swagtron accomplished this versatility but they did. This EB-5 is powerful. I live on a hill and it easily brings by 180 pound body up the hill. I also saw a youtube review where it easily handled a 260 pound guy, which is the upper limit of recommended weight for this bike. It is so powerful that my little 9 yo daughter & 11 yo son have to be careful while on it. I think my daughters little 60 pound body does not put enough weight stress on the bike so that it takes off like a damn rocket. It explodes when she hits the throttle or uses the pedal assist. You just have to supervise them the first few times so that they are aware of its power and get used to it. If not, I can easily see how an accident might happen. This is especially true with the pedal assist. When they pedal even a little to go slowly, if the pedal assist it is on then it explodes them forward like a rocket. What I have done to solve this is that she can never have the power on when they first start on the bike. I first have her ride a little to gain speed and then she is allowed to turn on the power. If you do it this way then there should be no accident. It is reasonably quick. About 10 to 15 mph depending if its riding my heavier body or my super light children. It is also an extremely light electric bike. My other electric bikes are 50 to 70 pounds. Yet this weighs no more than a regular 20 wheel inch bmx bike. The one and only downfall of the bike is that it does not have an adjustable pedal assist. It is either on or it is off. There is no in between. For example, my Addmotor bike has 5 different levels of assist, from helping just a little at level 1, to going full throttle at level 5. But in fairness my Addmotor bike costs $1500 dollars, three times more than this EB-5 with only 1 level assist. The swagcycle seems to go at about 80 to 90% power with the pedal assist on and there is no turning it down. So it helps a little too much when going up hills. I wanted it to just help a little. The only other negative is that without the pedal assist the pedaling is tougher than a regular bmx bike. Tougher as in aggressive workout tougher. As if they do not have the perfect chain length to pedal ring ratio, which should be easy for them to fix and to have thought about before producing this bike. Another negative is if you turn off the pedal assist then you turn off the ability to just use the throttle. Since it does not have a multilevel pedal assist, at a minimum I wish the pedal assist could be turned off but then we could just use the throttle when we needed it. But it does not do that, either the pedal assist and throttle are both on, or they are both off. Swagtron should at least fix this, which would be easy without having to provide the more expensive multilevel pedal assist. Simple have the pedal assist on or off separate from the throttle would be my advice. But in the end, for the $499 price I paid for it then it is easily a 5 out of 5 star. Especially since it seems to be one of the only quality electric bikes that could fit my 9 yo daughter. I bought another 2 of them as gifts off the Swagtron website cheaper by $20 with a coupon code. The entire family enjoys biking now on the bike routes with tons of hills, we are exercising more and getting healthier. Where as before they refused to go biking due to the difficult of the hills. So get this bike, it helps defeating family TV watching, helps getting entire family outside to exercise.
...
show more
Reviewed in the United States on May 17, 2018 by Amazon Customer
