Almost every safety improvement on a bicycle in the last century has been passive: a reflector, a light, a brighter jacket. The rider still has to turn around to find out what is behind them.
The RadRunner Max has rear-facing radar. It watches the road behind you and tells you when a car is approaching, which is a feature borrowed from cars and from expensive road-cycling computers, on a $2,299 utility bike.
The safety package is the product
Radar is the headline, but it arrives alongside integrated turn signals, hydraulic disc brakes and a torque sensor. Each of those is a thing that regularly gets cut from a bike at this price.
The battery matters just as much. Rad Power's Safe Shield pack is certified to UL 2271 by ACT, and the complete bike has been tested to UL 2849 — the standard that increasingly decides whether you are allowed to charge an e-bike inside a building at all.
Rear-facing radar detection for approaching vehicles.
Integrated turn signals and hydraulic disc brakes.
750 W rear hub motor producing 90 Nm; 28 mph top speed.
420 lb total payload, 120 lb rear rack, 275 lb maximum rider.
Range Extender and second battery take it beyond 125 miles.
Rad Power quotes 19 to 61 miles from the standard pack. That is an unusually honest range statement, and it is the right way to publish the number.
Read the two payload figures
420 lb is the total: rider, passenger, cargo, bike accessories. The maximum rider weight is 275 lb, and the rear rack is rated to 120 lb. Those are three separate limits and all three apply at once.
For a genuine car-replacement bike, this is the right way to specify it — but it does mean a 270 lb rider with a 120 lb load and a passenger seat is doing arithmetic before the first ride.
Who it is for
People replacing car journeys: the school run, the weekly shop, the cross-town commute on roads with traffic on them. The radar and the signals exist because Rad Power expects this bike to be ridden among cars rather than on a bike path.
At 82 lb it is not a bike you lift, store on a balcony, or take on a train. Buy it if you have somewhere at ground level to keep it, and buy the Range Extender if your days are long.
See it for yourself
