EMBT long distance touring and camping means you absolutely must plan on how you will recharge your bike’s battery or batteries. I know, this site is about human powered travel but if done right you will ALWAYS be pedaling an e-bike , whether e-mountain or e-urban bike or anything in between. Not pedaling means very restricted range, making touring almost impossible.
BATTERY CHARGING OPTIONS:
1.) Carrying your AC wall charger and planning praying you can find a plug, either free or for a fee.
2.) Carrying an extra, charged battery
3.) Solar charging your battery/batteries
My E-CELLS brand EMBT is a 2 switchable to 1 wheel drive fat tire monster with 2 batteries. I have chosen the expensive charging route with a 220 watt Off Grid TREK solar blanket and controller. The controller goes between the solar blanket and the bike to regulate the max amount of DC current going into the bike. Fortunately my bike has a patented single frame mounted charge port that charges both batteries at the same time. Still, on a sunny Nevada spring or fall day it takes about 3 to 4 hours of charging to go from 30% to 85% , depending on cloud cover and time of year.
Still this setup gives me a lot of flexibility IF I have the time for charging. I use that time to explore on foot old mining sites or possible big game hunting areas. Also at this time I can set up camp and cook. I still use my UL backpacking gear for this type of camping. Lighter weight equals more battery range.
If you have access to a log trail as in a Rails-to-Trails path with towns along the way or friendly farm houses or cottages you can use your AC wall charger. This takes real planing to avoid pushing a heavy bike, loaded with camping gear, and dead battery, even with the UL gear I use.
Self sufficiency in any bike touring means being able to fix flats, repair broken chains, tighten loose bolts and many other things that can plague a bike tourer. The more remote the tour the more you had better know your repair skills. And that goes double for e-bikes.
All this e-biking is not to say I’m unfamiliar with traditional road bike touring. I’ve done it on my CANNONDALE touring bike with Cannondale panniers. But now I’m a geezer and prefer e-bikes and the Nevada outback.
