We’re here today to show you the new Argon.
This is a completely new model for us, we’ve been working on this for about three years. The goal has been to produce a bike that’s lightweight, easy and simple to ride, doesn’t require much maintenance and can go the distance. A bike that anybody can ride easily.
We wanted something of high quality, we’ve tried over the years importing bikes and they just didn’t have the quality we were looking for at Optibike, and that’s why it’s taken us three years to finally finish the Argon.
The Argon is 37 pounds, and it also has a 37 volt 14 amp-hour li-ion battery, now that’s very very light for a bike with this battery capacity. There are other bikes that claim to be lighter but they have about half the size of the battery. This means you’re going to get a much longer range.
To get that lightweight build we did some special things, this bike features a carbon fiber fork that takes some weight off, it also has 700 x 38 millimeter tires, so that’s an inch and a half wide tire that’s going to give you more grip on the road and more security.
Now this bike is very simple has a belt drive, and a belt drive means there’s no lubrication required, no maintenance, and also means your pants legs don’t get dirty with grease.
It features a 500 watt rear hub motor that is basically silent, you just can’t hear it when you’re riding, it’s a very integrated experience.
One thing that’s special on this bike is it has a double-sided torque sensor.
There are three ways of controlling this type of bike one is with a cadence sensor that just goes when you pedal, the other is a single-sided torque sensor which only one side of the pedal responds, and this has a double-sided torque sensor.
We did this for several reasons, one is you can get going on hills, that’s something a lot of these other lighter bikes don’t do because they don’t have the torque sensor, and they have a smaller battery, with only a 250 watt motor.
When you combine the 500 watt motor the 14 amp hour battery and the dual sided torque sensor you can easily get going and climb 10 percent grades on this bike.
The bike’s easy to ride, we didn’t put any gears on here because a lot of people just don’t want to shift. This is a bike if you live in town, it’s simple you turn it on and you go.
Now let’s talk a little bit about the the power control, it has a really nice small lcd display and it has five power levels so you can adjust it to maximize your range.
It has Shimano disc brakes front and rear so that means you have excellent stopping power.
The frame is aluminum, the battery and the controller are housed in the frame, they can’t be stolen this way. The bike is easy to charge with a charge port on the side, you just plug it in and charge.
The lightweight build means you can pick this bike up and you can put it on a bike rack, or if you live in the town and need to carry it up your stairs you can do that. 37 pounds versus 55 pounds is a huge difference for people that need to move their bike around easily.