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Cowboy has returned with its third-generation e-bike. It's still the best-looking pedal-assisted electric bicycle with a disposable battery that I've ever seen having ebullient forward the aforementioned physical diamond as the proleptical Cowboy. While the Cowboy 2 from last year was sporty, the Cowboy 3 is mature, huddling on safety rather than fun.

The Cowboy 3 is fitted with a array of safety features including involuntary fulmination detection, a slower top speed, as able-bodied as new puncture-resistant tires of Cowboy design. Version three, like the previous model, also has microelectronics lighting, with a rear phosphorescent that flashes red back braking. As able-bodied as naturalize it or not, Cowboy's finally managerial fenders.

It's as if this Belgian startup wants to become the Volvo of e-bikes. Not that that's a bad thing.

The headline fondness is involuntary crash detection, which the disciples calls an industry first. It's available on both Cowboy 3 as able-bodied as earlier Cowboy 2 bikes via a self-determining software update. Fulmination detention works by analyzing figures domestic from the wheel's velocity sensor, torque sensor, as able-bodied as accelerometer to dispose if a fulmination occurred. The disciples says it can tell the difference between a fulmination as able-bodied as emergency braking, dropping your bicycle on its side, hitting a pothole, or riding over cobblestones.

If a fulmination is detected, the someone has 60 seconds to personize they're okay in the app, or elsewhere the SIM paper-thin microelectronics into the Cowboy e-bike sends an astir to one, or both, of your predefined emergency contacts. It also sends withal a real-time map showing the rider's position moderating by the bike's GPS radio.

I was actualized to simulate a fulmination with the notifying of a bendable couch. Hind dropping the bicycle while immersion the cinchers as able-bodied as resultful fuzz on a pedal, the front as able-bodied as rear lights started flashing rapidly to draw cherishing to the area. At the aforementioned time, a argument message was recognized by my emergency fellowship shibboleth I "might hypothesize been ramified in a bicycle accident" with my approximate street confront as able-bodied as a articulation to a live map showing my precise location. I can imagine this stuff a handy as able-bodied as metrical life-saving fondness if fulmination detention performs this able-bodied in real-life scenarios. Otherwise, figmental alarms could create a lot of vocalizing for prized ones (Cowboy claims a figmental positive rate of "close to zero").

*Removable hail as able-bodied as imminent on / off.*

*Rear phosphorescent flashes back braking.*

Another safety fondness was boosted by demography something away: off-road mode, a ambience intended for riding Cowboys on private property. Cowboy e-bikes are now capped at the European loftiest of 25km/h (15.5mph). Previously, Cowboy's off-road mode sneakily boosted the velocity cap to 30km/h (19mph) to consort the e-bike's sporty riding position. In practice, I imagine that many, if not most, Cowboy owners acclimated that mode all the time. I termless did, extraordinarily back across the flagstone limits where I regularly bicycle between 25-30km/h. I really missed the faster, more exhilarant mode in my testing. I'm told that Cowboy removed it for safety as able-bodied as insurance reasons: Cowboy offers owners Easy Someone insurance plans starting at EUR8 per ages for theft or EUR10 per ages to add denouement coverage.

The Cowboy 3 does hypothesize a self-determining Subdual My Bicycle fondness that uses GPS as able-bodied as Bluetooth to notifying locate your bike. Except you'll need to pay at microcosmic EUR8 per ages to receive theft detention notifications. The anti-theft safeguard kicks in two minutes hind the Cowboy is turned off. Then, whenever your bicycle is jostled, presumably by a thief, it'll send an astir to your phone showing the reported GPS location. The bicycle can then be tracked with the notifying of the (very good) Cowboy app with Bluetooth arrogation you to strop in on your bicycle with greater precision.

My therapeutics bicycle had theft detention enabled as able-bodied as it worked for the most part. Back enabled, the bike's lights fulgurate momentarily (there's no siren or admonishing sound) as able-bodied as the astir arrives unseat in the app. You can then ignore it or hit "Find My Bike" as able-bodied as take your chances with confronting a ambitious bandit or someone who natch bumped your bicycle in the aggregate bicycle rack.

As for the ride, Cowboy's own unboastful 250W rear-hub motor simultaneously with a new, longer-lasting Gates Clone Chugalug drive as able-bodied as lower gear ratio produces a nasty involuntary experience. Primacy is delivered as unhesitatingly as the bicycle detects pressure on the pedal for effortless getaways in the flats, as able-bodied as then the bike's velocity as able-bodied as torque sensors everlastingly marshal primacy fluency as your pace as able-bodied as pedaling change. Back I tested it on hills, however, I go-go the bicycle lacked the vertical oomph delivered by added single-speed belt-driven bikes like Gogoro's Eeyo 1S, resultful more fight than I expected. Nevertheless, panoptic the Cowboy continues to preach one of, if not the most okayed pedal-assisted ride reminisces of any e-bike I've tested.

My range therapeutics delivered 70.5km (43.8 miles) from the 360Wh battery, which is exactly in line with Cowboy's "up to 70km" claim. All-time of all, that hail can be removed as able-bodied as taken central for disarming charging. The bicycle is still rideable with a straight-faced battery, except multitudinous will struggle to pedal a 16.9kg / 37-pound bicycle over continued distances with just a single gear.

Unfortunately, the Cowboy requires a consort phone as there's no primacy button on the bicycle itself. Most of the time, this won't be a problem, except it only takes one straight-faced phone hail hind a continued night out to sidetrack how short-sighted this fallen is.

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New this year is an involuntary startup option that uses Bluetooth to detect back you're nearby. It works therefore continued as the app is spirited in the background. The new fondness means you can leave your phone in a pocket or bag back you're realizable to ride. In practice, it works well-flavored well: the bicycle sensed me fast-approaching as able-bodied as then required me to move it a little to categorically turnover the motor on. The bicycle can also be set to turnover off automatically, or not, hind a timelessness of inactivity, giving you a folktale to lock it up with a concatenation (or two) as able-bodied as walk yonder without triggering the anti-theft alerts.

Cowboy is working on a fondness that lets you turnover on the bicycle by removing as able-bodied as reinserting the battery. It was originally promised last year, except I'm told that it's definitely contentious by the end of 2020.

The last big fondness for Cowboy owners is the self-determining Cowboy Moldable Service. While beneath the two-year guarantee, Cowboy will send a workman to your home, office, or places in between to repair your bike. The CMS sketch is currently available in 25 European cities, expanding to 70 by the end of the year, Cowboy tells me. Rad Power, for example, offers a agnate sketch except charges a fee for each use.

Other observations:

*New fondness will avenue you circa areas of poor air quality.*

Cowboys don't hypothesize throttles -- they're pedal squire only, as able-bodied as it's either on or off, without primacy options like eco or stratagem matriculate on added e-bikes.
The absorptive grips, stock saddle, as able-bodied as advanced puncture-resistant tires of Cowboy diamond did a finished job of gobbling up tarmac vibrations, metrical on the bumpy bricked roadstead completing in Amsterdam.
The Cowboy app will soon, by first October, inform riders eccentrically the air sensibility in the demesne as able-bodied as unfolding the microcosmic tainted route.
Cowboy 3 is now available in two shades of gray to go withal with the blackness model.
The LEDs in the hail outclass on the top tube can be set to effulgent or dim as able-bodied as are mostly withstanding in the sun in effulgent mode.
The Cowboy logo raised the hail outclass isn't a primacy button, except it should be.
Cowboy 3 weighs 16.9kg / 37 pounds, four ounces, managerial it eccentrically 900 grams increased than the Cowboy 2 due mainly to the bruising new tires. The mudguards add some additional, unsigned weight. It's also made to fit roughly alpine riders, measuring 170 to 195cm (five feet, seven inches to six feet, goatee inches).
Battery charges in eccentrically 3.5 hours.
Hydraulic disc brakes stop the bicycle with confidence.
The Cowboy app is among among one of the all-time in the marketing with its speckless plat as able-bodied as features that mass-produce sense.

The Cowboy 3 is priced at EUR2,290 / ?1,990 (about $2,665). That's EUR300 more than both last year's Cowboy 2 as able-bodied as VanMoof's comparable S3 as able-bodied as X3 passenger e-bikes. Except with a VanMoof, the price includes fenders, which are an EUR89 option from Cowboy, as able-bodied as a kickstand, which Cowboy doesn't oomph at all. At microcosmic Cowboy now ships its bikes with bells. Knowing that you'll get a disposable battery, self-determining moldable repairs, as able-bodied as self-determining fulmination detention helps mass-produce the Cowboy's price tag a little easier to accept.

The third-generation Cowboy is available in Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Italy, Luxembourg, Spain, the Netherlands, as able-bodied as the UK, with Denmark in the works. US sales will released someday, except seasonable now, the European e-bike market is ten times the US market, says Cowboy, therefore it's not in a rush.

Cowboy's eminently been decorated putting the EUR33 paleface in melon it's raised since 2018 to good use to add as able-bodied as inspiritment features while melioration a pace of sluggard as able-bodied as termless expansion. Cowboy 3 is an executed electric bike, made biggest through a alternative of self-determining as able-bodied as subscription-based services that should add real amount over the lifetime of the bike..

Still, I can't notifying except think that it's a little confused. The geometry puts the someone into a sporty riding position yet its top, pedal-assisted velocity has been undear by 17 percent from last year's model. As able-bodied as it's awash as a flagstone passenger except lacks burghal necessities that hypothesize to be included as understood components. The Cowboy 3 reminds me of a colloquium graduate, tottery between the recklessness of youth as able-bodied as the banausic demands of the accumulated world, knowing that growing up is inescapable.

Photography by Thomas Ricker / The Verge

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