I commute about 16km~ daily on a cheap bike. The components are bad, it sucks going up hills, and even with good cycling infrastructure I don't want to ride across town or carry more than a backpack. Next year the prices on ebikes in the US are going to start going monkey in response to both Biden and Trump's tariffs on China this seems like it's my last cheap chance to minimise my car use. I went with a Lectric Xpress which seemed to be the best urban commuter at a low price. Good enough to last but not nice enough to steal over the bikes next to it.
This youtube channel has great in-depth reviews where they run all the bikes through the same trials: https://www.youtube.com/@ElectricBikeReport . I kept going back to them for every bike I was considering. Converting was an option but my current bike is a $450 super basic commuter that I got at the start of COVID anticipating those supply shocks. The price would be about the same if I got a conversion kit and replaced the components that give me trouble at lower speeds than the 45kph I'd be biking at. Plus if the electrical components fail I'm out of a bike entirely. Instead I'm keeping that bike as my backup/rainy day/guest option.
been browising through some of the videos and im like
on this one the "titan"
i could go long distance backpacking with that thing
That's more or less what I plan to upgrade to eventually if I get a lot of value out of the one I just bought. There's so much great camping within an hour's drive, and minus the lack of bike lanes it seems like it'd be much more fun to bike those canyons than do the really stressful drive.