Great for pavement and light trails, the Coston CE comes with pedal assist and throttle up to 20 MPH, and up to 35 miles per charge. Special features include integrated lights and fenders. Thus, the [integrated] lights and the brightness make the bike great. Also, being older, I love the throttle which makes starting off at a light much easier schwinn dealers and safer. Strong and able to handle what I enjoy doing.” — Philip D.“We live in a very hilly area. My spouse has always had difficulty riding her standard bike uphill, to the point that she stopped riding.
This is a class 1/class 2 e-bike in that it can be a pedal-assist bike up to 20 mph or you can use a dedicated throttle lever without pedaling. You will want to check your local regulations to find out what is legal in your area. Most places are fine with class 1 e-bikes, but different municipalities have different rules pertaining to class 2 and above. I understand that some e-bikes have torque assist operation. They sense how hard you are pushing on the pedals and provide enough boost to offset headwinds and hills. But they tend to be higher end models that can cost a considerable amount of money.
As is often the case for expensive, weird, new things that don’t have a well defined use case, within a few short years, the bikes were being closed out for under $1000. They were down to $700 in 2013, and can now be found for $350 with bad batteries on eBay. Surprisingly few websites seem to have actually gotten around to riding the thing when it came out. Most of the reviews seem to be “paper reviews,” with a few reviews written by people who had never ridden an electric bike before, rode it briefly, and came away impressed (not a high bar). While riding, use the “+” button to increase the level of assist as desired, and use the “-“ to decrease.
With her e-bike she can now enjoy (and complete) our rides.” — Jose A.“Excellent bike! It is a large bike but a small/medium fit me perfectly at 5’9. The suspension seatpost is an amazing feature.” — Jovan C. Another problem was Schwinn’s failure to design and market its bicycles to specific, identifiable buyers, especially the growing number of cyclists interested in road racing or touring.
I’m sure that keeping it in low pedal assist will still net riders the claimed maximum of 35 miles that Schwinn promises. I’m not about to pedal around in the lightest pedal assist setting all day, especially since this isn’t a high power e-bike to begin with. So if you’re using liberal throttle, keep in mind that you’re going to wind up with limited range. Another consideration to keep in mind when choosing an e-bike (or any bike for that matter) is your height. Schwinn has electric bikes that fit riders from 4’8″ all the way up to those who are 6’4″.
A growing number of US teens and young adults were purchasing imported European sport racing or sport touring bicycles, many fitted with multiple derailleur-shifted gears. Schwinn decided to meet the challenge by developing two lines of sport or road ‘racer’ bicycles. One was already in the catalog — the limited production Paramount series.