Gravel Ebike

Something like Yamaha looked good to me:
https://electrek.co/2019/03/18/yamaha-wabash-electric-gravel-bike/

Canyon just came out with an Urban (aka hybrid) ebike that looks beautifully put together.  That could be a good gravel bike, albiet with flat bars.  If they ever make an electric grail - that could be the holy grail!

I built my own 6 years ago to make it very light and fast.  Its fun, but back in those days I felt I was doing good to get 32mm tires on a frame.   It would be more fun with 40mm tires.   Still, being a drop bar bike with no obvious motor or battery - no one knows it is an ebike as I fly by...

Not exactly cheap (but all the cheap electric bikes seem pretty chunky and not really suitable for gravel rides to me) but check out Orbea Gain. The D31 is a light electric gravel bike that looks awesome. I test rode one of the road models with this same frame and it's pretty amazing. It's light! Not like carbon road bike light, but under 30 pounds for sure. I think it's actually in the mid 20's. With zero assist it felt pretty comparable to my Surly Crosscheck in responsiveness. But then hit the assist button and you have a delightful "going downhill" feeling. It's on the short list for my next N+1.

That one looks interesting.  I'm thinking if you have any hills, you'll want a mid drive.  I'm kinda intrigued with bikes with the Fazua motors since they are mid drive and rather look like traditional bikes.  

jincopunk wrote:

...There are cheaper hardtail electric mountain bikes but she would prefer drop bars.

Is the point of a gravel bike vs mountain bike geometry & drop bars or weight?

All Ebikes are pretty heavy, a few more lbs for front suspension wouldn't be that noticeable.

Yeah, anything worthwhile is going to be at least $2700.

The point of a gravel bike is to have a road bike that goes off road.  Honestly, 25 years ago all mountain bikes were really flat bar, fat tire road bikes (I still ride mine).  Today's mountain bikes are mostly concentrated on going downhill fast - meaning they are longer, lower slacker (i.e. more stable less agile).  Many people think "gravel bikes" are just a recreation of 1990s mountain bikes now that "modern" mountain bike geometry has deviated so far from the all purpose do it all bikes we used to have.

Given the same tire clearance, there is a lot of overlap between a fat tire gravel bike and a cross country mountain bike (although these days mountain bikes tend to focus on "trail" bikes or "enduro" or "downhill" not so much cross country).

If she likes drop bars, she must be roadie!  ;-)  But a hard tail mountain bike can be pretty similar to a fat tire gravel bike.  I'm guessing they are more plentiful and easier to find as gravel/road bikes are relatively new to the ebike scene (which I why I built my own back in the day).

 Ended up coming across a used Haibike HardSeven 4.5 for $600 and couldn't resist.
It seems that Haibike has discontinued this model but still seems like good bang for the buck. Lack of drop bars aside it seems to get the job done. The plastic fenders are pretty flimsy so I removed them. I swapped the knobby (29x2.1?) tires for Specialized Sawtooth 700x42.

I was definitely having trouble keeping up with the e-bike on eco mode, especially when it came to the hills.

The bike is HEAVY and the top tube shape doesn't mesh with the rear rack on the car So I've got to load it into the car if we're going to the edge of town to find gravel.