Ravi Kempaiah & Zen Electric Bikes from Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada

R

Ravi Kempaiah

New member
Local time
7:12 AM
Joined
Feb 3, 2024
Messages
9
Location
Halifax, Canada
Hey Folks,
I want to introduce myself and my company to this growing community. I am an avid E-bike rider like the rest of the community here. I started the journey in 2013, and in the last 11 years, I have seen the market grow exponentially.

I used E-bikes extensively from 2013 to 2020 during my Master's and Ph.D., and the culmination of academic research and passion for E-bikes led me to start the company Zen Electric Bikes towards the end of 2021.

A pivotal moment came in my life when I happened to set the Guinness World Record for the longest journey on an E-bike in 2016, and it inspired me to address challenges in the space and dedicate my career to it. You can see some details below.

Some details of the ride here: https://leedsbikes.com/electric-bik...s-world-record-5100-miles-34-days-across-usa/

More importantly, as the E-bike market keeps growing, we are committed to advancing the technology of batteries and overall products.

1707008759824.png


Day 30-Giant sequoia tour thu tree.jpg


In 2021, after earning my Ph.D. at the University of Illinois and working with some great scientists at Argonne National Lab, I moved to Canada to build this electric bike business with some of the best scientists. I was fortunate to have the backing of investors, and we started building high-quality, belt-driven E-bikes, and then we started developing safer, longer-lasting batteries for the E-bike market.

1707009278909.png



Here is our US website: https://zenebikes.com/

Canada website: https://zenebikes.ca/

Our office contact number: 782-446-1714

As of 2024, we at Zen design and manufacture E-bikes in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and are proud to service the North American market.

banner-bays-building-1920x640.jpg



We would love to be of service to this growing community by sharing our experience and knowledge.

Our 2023 Photon Pro model.

1707009170614.png


Our upcoming 2024 Photon pro model.

1707009542559.png


Our flagship "Samurai" model is in production using the Bosch Gen4 motor.

1707009208398.png


1707009492531.png
 
Ravi Kempaiah said:
Hey Folks,
I want to introduce myself and my company to this growing community. I am an avid E-bike rider like the rest of the community here. I started the journey in 2013, and in the last 11 years, I have seen the market grow exponentially.

I used E-bikes extensively from 2013 to 2020 during my Master's and Ph.D., and the culmination of academic research and passion for E-bikes led me to start the company Zen Electric Bikes towards the end of 2021.

A pivotal moment came in my life when I happened to set the Guinness World Record for the longest journey on an E-bike in 2016, and it inspired me to address challenges in the space and dedicate my career to it. You can see some details below.

Some details of the ride here: https://leedsbikes.com/electric-bik...s-world-record-5100-miles-34-days-across-usa/

More importantly, as the E-bike market keeps growing, we are committed to advancing the technology of batteries and overall products.

View attachment 13164

View attachment 13165

In 2021, after earning my Ph.D. at the University of Illinois and working with some great scientists at Argonne National Lab, I moved to Canada to build this electric bike business with some of the best scientists. I was fortunate to have the backing of investors, and we started building high-quality, belt-driven E-bikes, and then we started developing safer, longer-lasting batteries for the E-bike market.

View attachment 13169


Here is our US website: https://zenebikes.com/

Canada website: https://zenebikes.ca/

Our office contact number: 782-446-1714

As of 2024, we at Zen design and manufacture E-bikes in Halifax, Nova Scotia, and are proud to service the North American market.

View attachment 13172


We would love to be of service to this growing community by sharing our experience and knowledge.

Our 2023 Photon Pro model.

View attachment 13166

Our upcoming 2024 Photon pro model.

View attachment 13171

Our flagship "Samurai" model is in production using the Bosch Gen4 motor.

View attachment 13167

View attachment 13170
Click to expand...
Congrats on the world record--quite a ride! Just placed my Photon Pro pre-order. Looking forward to following ZEN as a company and enjoying the technology. Looks like this bike could be a real game changer for a first time e-biker.
 
For the past couple of months, I have had trouble getting ANYONE from Zen to reply to my requests for a status update on an order that I've had with them that was supposed to have been to me by the beginning of the summer (they already have a deposit from me). Has anyone else had issues lately or know what is going on with them?
 
kzzkrf said:
For the past couple of months, I have had trouble getting ANYONE from Zen to reply to my requests for a status update on an order that I've had with them that was supposed to have been to me by the beginning of the summer (they already have a deposit from me). Has anyone else had issues lately or know what is going on with them?
Click to expand...
I was in the same boat. Made an order in late June and it was supposed to ship sometime in August, then the end of August, then twice in September, then first of October. Well, it's the 11th of October, and I just got informed that my Photon Pro has been packed to ship. I should see it by the 18th to 20th of October in California. The wait and delays have been painful - I missed the whole summer for riding it, but I am still excited for the bike to finally get here. My brother has one and it is a great bike. I am really looking forward to the upgraded model I am getting.
 
This is an ad for Ravi's eBike company, not really a trip report. There's a map and one pic from the trip, and the rest is all about his education, research and company.

I hope he has paid @Anton appropriately, as I didn't even see the requested link back here from his site. (unless it's buried somewhere)
 
Smaug said:
This is an ad for Ravi's eBike company, not really a trip report. There's a map and one pic from the trip, and the rest is all about his education, research and company.

I hope he has paid @Anton appropriately, as I didn't even see the requested link back here from his site. (unless it's buried somewhere)
Click to expand...
All I asked for was a simple link to our forum from his website and he never got back to me!

I added a forum for Zen out of goodwill, so maybe it's time to send him a reminder.
 
kzzkrf said:
For the past couple of months, I have had trouble getting ANYONE from Zen to reply to my requests for a status update on an order that I've had with them that was supposed to have been to me by the beginning of the summer (they already have a deposit from me). Has anyone else had issues lately or know what is going on with them?
Click to expand...

It looks like our team was able to resolve your issue and issue a refund.
The motor and the battery were designed to run at 52V and we worked with Enviolo for over 8 months and the Automatiq system would not work well with 52V system. If we switched to 48V system, then we would not be able to offer the UL-2271 certificate that we currently have. Finally, our team decided to fully refund you instead of shipping a 52V system with Enviolo manual system.
 
Maurice N said:
I was in the same boat. Made an order in late June and it was supposed to ship sometime in August, then the end of August, then twice in September, then first of October. Well, it's the 11th of October, and I just got informed that my Photon Pro has been packed to ship. I should see it by the 18th to 20th of October in California. The wait and delays have been painful - I missed the whole summer for riding it, but I am still excited for the bike to finally get here. My brother has one and it is a great bike. I am really looking forward to the upgraded model I am getting.
Click to expand...

Hey there,
The delays happened because of the motor development project we undertook.
Instead of 500W mid-motor, we worked with manufacturer to offer 750W, 160Nm motor that is 2.5kgs lighter than Bafang ultra. This effort and the updated frame development took 3 months longer. We refused to ship something that was not tested.

The final result is something that we are comfortable shipping. I believe your bike was shipped last week. A few images of updated 2024 Photon pro.

1729145873461.png

1729145831838.png
 
Anton said:
Yeah for sure, I can add Zen Electric Bikes to the list. https://ebikesforum.com/search-forums/zen.376/

@Ravi Kempaiah Is it possible for you to link back to our forum from https://zenebikes.com/?
Click to expand...

Thanks for the reminder. I have not checked this forum in a few months.
Please advise where we should link it on our website. Preferably, I would love to have a conversation with the admins so I know the team behind the effort, and this is how we have built relationships with Electric Bike Review and Electric Bike Report since 2013.
Happy to work with your team, and our team would be glad to contribute to this growing community.
 
Ravi, may I make one suggestion for improvement on your eBikes?

Extend the front fender down lower, so that the rider's shoes are kept clean when riding on wet pavement. As far as I can tell, only Specialized does this so far, with their "DRYTECH" fenders. Here's their Turbo Vado 4.0, for example:

1729173979528.png


Currently, your eBikes' front fender stops at about 9:00, which is not enough, on an all weather commuter bike.

In your travels, I bet you have seen users add their own custom mud flaps to the front fenders to extend this protection down further. I used to see it on 125 cc motorcycles in China.
 
By the way, I like your integral rear rack*, which is normally only seen on cargo bikes. Ditto the removable front rack. Frame-mounted front racks are under-utilized, esp. considering most eBikes are so heavily weight biased toward the rear.

* better than Specialized, except in terms of it being required weight whereas it's optional on Specialized. However, I bet it holds a lot more weight.
 
Back
Top