The Best Family eBike: RadWagon 4 Review 2022

This is the RadWagon 4 electric cargo bike, from Rad Power Bikes. With a ton of mountable accessories and strong hub motor, my wife and I with our two little kiddos love to take cruise rides together, and it feels like the ultimate utility bike. I’m Ben Schmanke from AuthenTech, let’s check it out. Starting with a quick unboxing and assembly, the bike arrived very well packaged and protected, lots of padding. Also included in the package is the user manual, toolkit, pedals, couple bolts, LED headlamp, and charging brick.

The main steps of assembly are to attach the handlebars, the centered kickstand, its pretty beefy and secure. Mount the front wheel…, attached the pedals.

…, and that’s basically it! The design and engineering of this eBike is well thought-out which I love to see.

Here’s just a few of my favorite things. There’s a TON of strong mounting points all over the bike and frame, which adds to that “modular” design I’m kinda obsessed with.

Straight up naked and it still looks pretty cool and unique, but Rad Power was kind enough to send me a few key accessories for my kids and I to really enjoy the bike and I’ll show you how easy it is to mount those in a second. The seat is telescoping, and they recommend the rider height’s between 5″1 to 6’4″. The steering stem and handlebars have a quick adjust of height and angle without tools needed.

How much does a RadWagon 4 weight?

The bike itself weighs 76 lbs, but can carry a payload up to 350 lbs! The LCD display is fairly bright, Shows battery life, odometer, speedometer, wattmeter, and pedal assist level, the higher the number the more the motor will boost you when you pedal. You can also turn this down to zero which means if you’re throttling only, and accidentally turn the pedals it won’t accelerate away from you. There’s even a USB charging port to charge your gadgets on the go.

What is the motor on the RadWagon 4?

The single rear hub motor is 750W, powered by a 48V 14Ah battery.

With the half-grip throttle, I hit a max speed of 20 MPH. However, with the simple speed unlock, hold up and down button, then press Mode to get to max speed, I raised mine up to the max which is 40 KMH, that’s the equivilent of about 25 MPH, and it actually makes a great difference! Even when I’m under heavy load with kids riding in the back, it still has sufficient power to keep use cruising at fun speeds. As for battery range, they rate it to offer an estimated 25-45 miles per charge, and between 3-7’ish hours to recharge.

People love to get up and arms about these numbers, but there’s a hundred variables that can drastically change this range from rider to rider, especially since this ebike is all about towing cargo, and don’t forget the obvious, there’s PEDALS, so as some riders might want to throttle ONLY, plenty of other riders like to utilize the pedal assist capabilities.

Either way, I’ve PERSONALLY found that when I go out for a ride with my kids, the battery has seemed to last plenty long for my cruises, and then when I get back home I put it back on the charger.

Have I gone out for a test ride of 50 miles?? Heck no, that brings me to my ONLY major wish list item on this eBike, and that’s the seat. It feels pretty firm and hurts my buns after a while of riding.

Thankfully it’s easy enough to swap out the saddle for a more plush seat or maybe a memory foam padding cover. I do wish their included seat was a bit more comfy though, so THAT is why I’d never go out for a 25 mile cruise, I would want to upgrade that seat first.. remember there’s no suspension system on this bike. The bike comes with a 7 speed Shimano gearing system with thumb shifter, this worked well enough for my needs, though I’m usually just using throttle.

Tires

The 22-inch by 3″ tires are Nice and stable, good tread and helps to absorb a little bit of the bumps. That’s probably my only other wish list item, it would have been awesome to have a dual suspension system on a cargo ebike like this, but I could see that causing the price to rise drastically which as it is, it’s priced pretty competitive! There’s reflective striping in the tires, integrated brake taillight, front LED headlamp, all working well together for high visibility and low light riding.

Does the RadWagon 4 have regenerative braking?

Mechanical disc brakes that have great stopping power and that are comfortable to squeeze, very nice handlebar grips too. Now let me show you the Star of the Show, that integrated rear rack that lets you carry your cargo, up to 120lbs, from child seats, to UberEats, and anything else you could dream up.

First I mounted the Thule Yepp Maxi child seat, it’s super easy to attach, and there’s even space to mount TWO of them if you wanted. I removed the back cargo deck on that rear rack, then the child seat sorta clicks down into the rack, tighten the knob, there’s a safety link as well. This is just my 30second overview assembly for you, if you’re going to install one on for your child, PLEASE watch and read all the safety instructions they provide! The other awesome accessories I really like, the Caboose, Running Boards, Deckhand and Deckpad. I love how easy they designed that rear rack to attach these different accessories to strong mounting points.

The running boards give my passengers a safe place to rest their feet. Also shoutout to the included plastic wheel guards, keeping little feet and hands from getting pinched at the wheel.

Next I removed the Wooden Cargo Deck and screwed on the Deckpad for a cushioned and more comfortable ride for their little tushies. I love the tool-less installation on this one. Now they also have this Deckhand passenger handlebar that gives them something sturdy to hold onto, but I think I’m going to save this for when my kids get just a bit older, and instead use the Caboose.

This adds extra stability and security for children sitting in the back with a large rail bar going all the way around, making it much harder for them to accidentally fall off, plus it gives them extra places to hold on. I really like that it even fits around the Child Seat, and when my little girl grows out of that thing, there’s an adjustable inner rail I can screw on to center them more tightly in the middle. I love that expandability design.

Conlusion

Overall I can see why Rad Power Bikes is one of the biggest players in the eBike world, they just raised $150 MILLION dollars, their products look and feel top tier, very thorough design and engineering, just a pleasure to ride, and for this RadWagon 4, just scroll through the LARGE list of optional accessories you can mount on this bike, and that love seeing all the different unique possibilities.