Clip Ebike Conversion Kit: An Affordable but Inconvenient Solution

The final electrical mountain bike I examined price $8,000. That’s lots of dough, and lots of working elements to troubleshoot when issues go sideways, as they finally will with any bike. Alternatively, the Clip, which markets itself because the “first plug-and-play bike-upgrade system” begins at $500 and doesn’t even want a companion app.

Designed in Brooklyn with city commuters as its goal demographic, this straightforward, clamshell-shaped system clamps to the entrance wheel of a commuter bike, immediately electrifying the trip. Even earlier than Clip started manufacturing the system in 2021, it earned a spot on Time journal’s Best Inventions of 2020 listing. The next yr, it hit Quick Firm’s World Changing Ideas Record. With one billion bicycles in circulation worldwide, it’s straightforward to see why this straightforward, cost-effective resolution has such immense attraction.

Plug and Play

Suitable with highway, commuter, and hybrid fashions—any bike with 26- to 28-inch wheels and no entrance suspension—the Clip is available in two sizes. There’s the 8.8-pound Commuter, with a 96-watt-hour battery and 450-watt motor for a four- to six-mile vary, and the 9.8-pound Explorer, with a 192-WH battery and 450-watt motor for a 10- to 12-mile vary.

{Photograph}: Stephanie Pearson

They each work the identical easy method, and also you don’t want any instruments. Simply press a button on the high of the system, which opens the Clip’s clamshell. Align the Clip, like an open clam, over the entrance wheel of your bike, and it attaches to the fork blade by way of a rubberized groove. Two small pink arms additionally lengthen out across the fork. If you lock it closed, the arms match tightly round every fork blade. On the high of the wheel, a plastic curler is all the time in touch with the rubber tire.

As soon as the Clip is safe in its three positions, the bike is able to roll and might be electrified each time the rider chooses to interact by way of a friction drive. A friction drive differs from a standard motor in that the entrance wheel’s energy is activated by floor friction slightly than the enamel of the cogs in a motor. (Due to this want for friction, it’s important to maintain the entrance tire inflated to 85 PSI always.)