Differences between Off-road and City scooters

First, let’s start with the definition, roughly the two types can be divided depending on the terrain they are built to ride on. City scooters, are generally meant to be driven on relatively smooth surfaces with maybe just a couple of expected bumps here and there like a speedbump you can see and get ready to ride over. It’s important to note that a smooth surface doesn’t mean flat as many city scooters including Langfeite have a lot of power from dual motors which are especially put there to tackle hills. Actually, scooters are very popular in hilly cities like San Francisco.

So if the city scooters have the power why do we need special off-road scooters? Well, it’s basically about the ground clearance, traction, and having suspension ready for much harder bumps and potholes you’d see in the city.

First off the tires are switched from smooth and easy-rolling city tires to nubbed ones. While slick tires with some channels to direct water are the best for smooth surfaces due to them having less resistance for movement they are pretty much useless on loose surfaces like sand and mud.

This is where bigger and nubbed tires come in, basically, you sacrifice some of that smooth rolling to increased traction. The large nubs of the tire dig in deeper to the surface making it possible to ride in these demanding conditions and the larger size doesn’t go deep into potholes so easily.

Another point is the suspension. As city scooters usually opt out of spring suspension as they are effective, light, dependable, and cost-effective to make. Basically, they are perfect for city scooters and the hydraulic suspension is normally seen only on off-road or particularly heavy super performance city scooters.

Hydraulic suspension is superior to spring suspension in reaction speed, smoothness, and perhaps even reliability – although that is debatable – the main reasons they aren’t in normal city scooters are that they need more space, are more expensive, need more maintenance, but to put it bluntly, they would be an overkill for riding in the city.

When Off-roading the increased performance of the hydraulic suspension really makes sure that the wheels stay on the ground where there is traction and decrease the shock from bumps, holes, and rocks when you ride thus helping you to maintain the control of your scooter.

Finally the ground clearance. With city scooters, you actually want the least amount of ground clearance possible. It’s the same reason as you see with Formula 1 and sports cars. Having the center of gravity as close to the ground as possible results in better control of the ride, especially in corners. This is also the reason why electric cars and scooters both prefer to place the batteries on the bottom of the car / in the deck in scooters – check out last week’s blog if you want to know more about escooters batteries and their placement options.

Again the Off-roading scooters do a trade-off, they increase the ground clearance a lot at the expense of high speed and cornering performance. While it’s true that an off-road scooter would do worse when competing with its own lowered and slick wheeled model the city model would be useless on rocky roads even with nubbed tires.

The ground clearance is there so that your scooter doesn’t literally hit the ground and rocks when you hit those bumps or even when you are riding over a rocky area to reach the top of the hill. Even on mud, the increased clearance helps you not to get stuck and not get your deck covered in mud so easily.

Summa summarum Off-road scooters trade in weight, cornering, and smoothness for better suspension, traction, and ground clearance. City scooters then are really for cities.

Lastly, there is a middle path between these two extremes. As most of us get an escooter for commuting in urban areas and the off-road fun is reserved for weekends and holidays we at Langfeite have designed our new 2022 line up to have pure city scooters and midway models that have respectable ground clearance, nubbed tires while maintaining lighter weight with spring suspension and good handling in corners.

Langfeite’s new lineup has the right model for all commuters and those who want to have some off-road fun with their scooters in their free time. Dealers check out our models and contact us for quotations today.