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Everything you need to know about recumbent electric tricycles.
Hey everyone, I'm Dustin. I have nearly 20 years of experience in the bike and e-bike industry. And today I'm going to talk to you about everything you need to know about recumbent electric tricycles. All right, so right here, I've got two recumbents. I have our Relaxed Body 500-watt E-bike Recumbent, and then I also have our newest, which we haven't quite named yet. It is on the website under our electric tricycles. This is our recumbent with a full chair, 750-watt e-bike. E-trike, this thing is cool. We'll get into that in a second. Now, there are other styles of recumbents out there for e-bikes as well. There's even more lay down where you are lying down, almost lying down completely on your back. So, the first thing you should know about recumbent and the word recumbent if you're searching for a recumbent is there are various levels to the recumbent angle, should we say. You could have a full lay down where you're very low to the ground and you're sitting back on an angle like this. You could have something like this where you're sitting and you're still having the forward pedal. This is also what we call sort of a semi-recumbent, relaxed body because the pedals are shifted forward pretty significantly.
But again, you're not in a full laydown position. So The idea of a recumbent has expanded over the last five, to 10 years. And now you're getting all these variations of what a recumbent can mean. So again, if you're out there searching, think about what's most important to you. Do you want to be very low to the ground? Do you want to be in an almost lay-down position? Do you want to be in a sitting position? Do you want to be almost in a normal-style bike setup, but still get forward pedaling? All three of those options exist out there. And so it's important that you think about what's most important to your body, what's most comfortable, and what's going to allow you to do the type of riding that you want to do. You know, a full lay down recumbent, you're going to be pedaling straight out in front of your body for the most part. So that may be something that's either harder or easier on your body. It may be harder or easier on hills for you. Now, if you have a very powerful motor taking on hills, it shouldn't be an issue regardless of the sitting position you're in. Now that's the next thing I will jump into, which is motor size. When you're looking for an electric recumbent trike, you wanna think about motor size. So our Relaxed Body is 500 watts and our seated upright Recumbent Trike here is 750 watts. So the motor size is important because If you're not doing a lot of hills, you don't need a lot of power necessarily. If you're a heavier rider, you may want power. So we've done a couple of different things. On this one, we've opted for a more powerful motor because we want riders to be able to go around their community, and also take on hills. So this can double as a personal transportation device and also as a bicycle. So having the extra power just gives you the ability with the 750 watts to ride around and get out and enjoy wherever you wanna go.
And designed to either use the pedals and the pedal assist or just use the throttle, there's a twist throttle right here. So it's cool because it doubles as, again, like a scooter meets electric trike, pedal if you want or don't. Now the relaxed body with the 500 watts We assume more people will use the pedal assist. Now you do have a throttle as well. It's a thumb-throttle here. But the 500 watts is still gonna be good for riders up to 300 pounds. In particular, anybody under 220, you're gonna be able to do hills just fine. I've done a video of me throttle only up a hill. I'm 225 pounds, 500 watts is great. But the benefit too is if you wanna use pedal assist, like I said, 500 watts is more than enough power. You can also find recumbent electric trikes in 250 watts, which if you do a lot of flat ground riding and you still want to get leg exercise, that's going to be more than enough power as well. So depends on how you want to use the pedal assist, depends on how much you weigh, and also the terrain that you're going to take on. So just think about those needs. And like I said, we put 750 here because we think a lot of people may want the throttle. Go up and down hills. We put 500 here because we think more people may opt for the pedal assist using it like a regular bike, but you still do have the throttle as well. Now, also with the recumbent trikes, you've got different wheel sizes and tire sizes. There are fat tire sizes out there as well. Just know that if you opt for a fat tire, you're gonna want a larger battery because it's gonna create more drag.
So a lot of times if you see recumbent trikes with fatter tires, you may see the price elevated because you're probably gonna have to have a larger battery. Now, with the thinner tires, you're gonna have less drag. Also with bigger motors, you're gonna have bigger batteries because the motor's gonna require more power, which will drain the battery faster. So put a larger battery on there to ensure that you can make the trips you wanna make while you're using the motor and you're not burning out the battery. So, something to pay attention to. Now, a lot of people say two wider titers, you know, make an e-trike or recumbent electric tricycle more balanced. They can help, but it's not always true either. So, on a recumbent bike or a recumbent trike, you could opt for the fatter tires. Now, on a regular two-wheel bike, the fatter tires may help a little bit with balance, but they're not going to keep the bike upright. So, if you do a lot of pavement riding, I don't necessarily recommend the fatter tires for a two-wheel recumbent. It's going to create drag. Now, these are 2.125 inches, which is still wide enough to give you some good balance you go to three inches or four inches, it's going to create more drag. It's also going to add, excuse me, a little more difficulty on the turning. Now, not too much, but you're gonna feel it with bigger tires. So that's something to also keep in mind. And like I said, bigger tires mean more drag, more drag on the motor. You need a bigger battery and, a bigger motor as well. Now on the trike side, the fat tires can be advantageous.
They can create a more balanced riding setup. But what also goes into the balance of a recumbent trike is just the general setup, right? The width, the length, and how everything goes together. So it's hard to say that having wider tires is better. You just wanna make sure that excuse me, the geometry is safe and proper to keep you in a balanced riding position. So something to think about. The other thing I didn't even point out was when you're looking at the recumbent space, you've got two wheels and you've got three wheels. A lot of the lay-down recumbents are gonna be three-wheel. Now there are two wheels as well with two wheels directly in line. Those exist as well. That's something to think about. So number one, do you have any issues with balance? Number two, what are your goals on this recumbent? Because there's a lot of people that do ride recumbents that go very fast and they're sitting down and they're laying down and they want to fly around. So are you looking to cruise? Are you looking to go fast? Got to decide that. And there's also on the lay down recumbent two wheels, you're gonna have smaller tires, bigger tires, and a whole degree of varying prices as well. So just something to think about. So the range of recumbent e-bike styles is vast. The most important thing to remember is what type of position is gonna be best for your body. How much power do you want?
Where are you gonna ride so you can make the best choice? Again, there's lay down styles, there's sitting up, there's fully in a chair style where you're still getting that leg extension. It's a vast array. If you have any questions at all, comment below. I'm happy to help try to steer you in the right direction of a recumbent e-bike. We offer a 30-day test ride on your e-bike policy. If you don't love it in the first 30 days, send it back. No questions asked. No money out of your pocket. In addition to that, we're going to warrant everything for one year. If anything goes wrong in the first year, send it back. No questions. No, don't send it back. We'll send you the parts and labor. Take care of parts and labor to ensure you can keep riding. Lastly, join our Facebook group called sixthreezero Pedalers. There are thousands of members in there. Join the group. Ask existing members questions before you purchase. Then when you have your bike, Hosting the group Make Friends, it's tons of fun. So thanks for sticking around and don't forget, it's your journey, your experience. Enjoy the ride.