What Bike & Ebike is best for Heavier Riders? Plus Size Riders Must Know This!

Hey, guys, Peter here at sixthreezero. Okay, what kind of bike should you get if you think that you're a heavier rider and that you're going to need more support? Let's talk about that.

Okay, so, again, Peter here at sixthreezero. We get this question quite a lot, it's just a topic that we hear a lot about, is what can you do if you feel like you're a heavier rider? Our bikes are rated for 300 pounds, that's what we say. You could ride the bike if you're heavier than that. It's not the bike. That's what, I think, surprised a lot of people. The bike is extremely strong, the welds, everything on it, very, very strong, and all that. The heavier that a rider is, the stronger that things would have to be in any case, but it comes down in most cases to the wheel, all right?

And so I have two wheels here. And before I get into those, let me just briefly say that even if you're a lighter rider but you're putting the bike through more intense riding, if you're doing some mountain biking, or you're doing tricks and you're going up in the air, you're downhill and getting just a lot of jarring and a lot of action to the wheel and the bike, also road riders, those guys are super light but they need a really strong wheel because they put those bikes, even though they're kind of on the lighter side or they're more fit, they're very, very strong and they can put that bike through a lot of forces and so they actually can't ride a bike that has a weaker wheel. They need a very strong wheel even though the bike's supposed to be very light.

That's one of the challenges of making a great road bike or a great mountain bike is making it both strong and light. That's actually why they cost so much. A lot of people wonder why would anyone pay so much for a bike. And really, a lot of times it's because it's necessary to make a bike that's both light enough to be competitive or be ridden up a steep mountain, but is also strong enough to take the forces that are put on it. As I said, even road bikes are put under tremendous force. I would say mountain bikes need to be even more durable because they tend to leave the ground more and hit things like rocks that can hurt the wheels.

But, the bike itself, if you're a heavier rider and feel like you need more support, it's not the bike, it's going to be the wheel. I don't know if you can see the wheel on this one in the frame here, but let me just... It's okay, Nate. I'll bring some wheels up here. I've got two wheels here, all right? And what we're going to look at here to compare is going to be the rims, okay?

Now, they're different colors obviously, but if you look at this rim, this is what's called a single wall rim right here and these are on more inexpensive wheels. The wheels like this just cost less, but they come with a cost. Even though the price is less, they come with a different kind of cost, which is that they're weaker. This is a great option for a beach cruiser because you're riding at a leisurely pace on gentle terrain and you're not going to leave the ground. You're not doing any jumping, you're not downhilling and ramming into boulders and rocks, and you're not sprinting and putting sideways pressure on the bike. So this is a great option, this single wall rim because it does cost a lot less. It's a lot cheaper to make, but also it's not nearly as strong as what we call the double wall rim, okay?

This is a double-wall rim. And you can tell if you look at the two profiles, how this one is wide, and then this one is relatively narrow in profile, right? So this one just has a single wall, which means it's just a piece of metal that's kind of bent into the shape of a staple, right? Whereas this one has a double wall, so it has that staple in it, but then beyond that, it has another bridge, another wall, and it does act like a bridge, like that extra support. And so on mountain bikes and race bikes, they're going to have this double wall rim. You'll always see this on bikes that are going to demand more performance and more durability.

So if you are a heavier rider, what you're looking for is not necessarily a more expensive bike. I wouldn't even recommend getting a more expensive bike. It may not be the right bike for you. Most of the expense of a bike is in making it perform better for people who want to use it, whether they're weekend warriors or if they're racing or competing, but you do want to get a stronger wheel.

A lot of times with the single wall rim, a heavier rider can crush a rim like this. It won't be strong enough just due to their weight, okay? Even if they aren't hopping it off of curbs and things like that, the single wall rim can collapse, okay? Now, do not worry. I mean, 300 pounds or so, it's going to hold you up; however, if you tend to maybe roll off of a curb, which is a pretty common occurrence, sometimes people will be on a sidewalk or something and then they'll just kind of roll off a curb or hop off a curb or whatever, that impact can do what we call "taco" a wheel like this, which means bend it.

These are not very strong wheels. They're made for a certain kind of riding. They're perfectly fine for cruising around, but they shouldn't leave the ground. They should never be jumped. I mean, one of the main types of riders that we see that damage wheels like these are high school boys. They're not heavy necessarily, but they are very rambunctious and active and are riding it like a BMX bike. And bikes that are made for riding like that just cost more because it's harder to make something that is stronger, better engineered, and also can have the lightness to be jumped and used acrobatically or in a performance-oriented way. So anyway, it's just about what you need, but I do recommend that if you are getting to 350 pounds or beyond that, the bike's going to be just fine, you may need a stronger wheel.

This bike already come with a double wall rim, so it gives me a lot of confidence that it's very strong for you. And this is the EVRYjourney in this case, and this is the EVRYjourney wheel with this rim right here. This is a strong wheel. I have a lot of confidence in this rim for holding up a heavier rider with the beach cruiser type of riding. But then, if you find that you get a bike like this and the wheels aren't holding up as well... That's where you're going to see the bike failing. It's not going to be in the welds or the frame or the handlebars or usually not in the seat and stuff like that, it'll be in the wheel. ... I would recommend buying a higher-quality wheel. I would recommend buying a mountain bike wheel.

Mountain bike wheels are going to cost more, but they are extremely durable. The more durable, generally, the more costly. Generally, a single wall rim like this can cost in the neighborhood of maybe $40, $50, or something like that. I haven't priced it retail in a while, but that would be something like that. A double wall might cost a little more, maybe $70, or $80. But if you're going to go for a mountain bike wheel, you can shop around, but you might want to budget a good $150 per wheel. I know it's a lot to pay, $300 for a wheelset, but physics may demand it and that will probably be all you need though to get your bike going and rideable.

So not to fear, if you do weigh more or if you're going to use your bike maybe in a more rambunctious way than a beach cruiser's normally intended, then you can get those stronger wheels. That's the key to the whole weight issue of what a bike can endure. It's just in the wheels and the strength of that rim, whether it's a single wall rim or double wall rim, and then the quality of the double wall rim. Again, the mountain bike is the strongest.

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