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Comment by xky | Hacker News Reader

I live in Berlin where many people live in low-rise apartments with no elevators and keep their bikes downstairs. I believe this is quite common for many cities in Europe. What I don't understand is how people are charging their bikes. Are they really lugging this thing up multiple flights of stairs and charging it in their apartments every few days? I've heard it's pretty heavy. Or, does it not need to be charged very often?

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They held a Q&A sessions and basically their answer to that question is two-fold if I remember it correctly:

- removable batteries can be stolen,

- can have issues due to bad weather.

They consider their design safer on those two points. It's imho a mistake.

It depends. As I could charge it both at home and at work, I would prefer to have something integrated and less prone to problems due to water/snow/ice. As I live in a cold country I really appreciate the internal hub with the protected chain which are rare to find on electric bikes under 2000 € (excluding low-quality bikes from unknown producers that have no specs nor website).

There are many companies producing electric bikes right now: I prefer to see a company that tries to do something different targeting a smaller market segments than seeing the same kind of one-size-fits-all model across multiple brands.

The "stolen" argument seems a bit odd. Sure, anything can be stolen.

When purchasing an e-bike a removable battery was a must have. The one I wound up purchasing has a pretty heavy duty locking mechanism for the battery so I never really have to worry about it being stolen.

Non-removable batteries are damaged by cold weather. Bringing it inside keeps it/you safer from theft, cold, and throwing out your back carrying your bike.

I knew that charging under water freezing temperatures could damage the battery, not storage or usage. Could you please share some details? I am evaluating to buy an electric bike, but during winter temperature can get to -20 °C/~0 °F, so it would be helpful to learn more about that.

In most ebikes (but I think pretty much all of them), the battery can be removed. Even in the ebike I own, whose battery is integrated in the frame, one can easily open the frame and take the battery out.

Ebike batteries' range is around 20 to 100 km (account something like 50% less when the battery starts to wear out). I guess that people using it frequently need to charge it at least every other day.

They weigh 19kg. Their range varies from 60km to 150km. Based on my commute, I would have to carry this bike upstairs about once or twice a week. That just seems highly impractical to me.

Lots of workplaces and any luxury apartment has bike storage with plugs in them. I'm in the midwest U.S.

This is not the norm. Even for luxury apartments ...

A friend of mine (in a small german city, not Berlin) keeps a bunch of bikes in a shared basement. I don't know the common situation in Berlin, but he could certainly charge there.

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