A throttle to rule them — which Ebike throttle least suck?

Most reputable sellers of any e-bike kit will give you a variety of options when it comes to throttles. The six most common are:

The right hand thumb

The left thumb

Right turn

Left torsion

All right twist

Left the twist

For unsophisticated e-bike makers, this can be a daunting option. I’ve tried all of them, and in this article I’ll try to summarize my thoughts on them and suggest what I think is the best approach and why.

Standard BBS02 kit comes with right hand thumb throttle. This was very much my throttle of choice, but I never fitted it on the right side. Why would I do something so crazy instead of just buying the left thumb throttle? Let’s talk about monorail riding first.

On a monorail, my usual hand position is two right fingers on the rear brake, one left thumb on the accelerator, and all the other little pigs holding on to the handlebars. I never put an electronic brake on the rear brake because it has an incredible 2 second cut as soon as you touch it. Usually, there’s only a few milliseconds between when I hit the gas and when I hit the brake. I kept hitting both of them, almost never just with the wind. Sometimes I even broke the cardinal sin by stepping on the brake and gas at the same time, which you should never do. It puts a lot of pressure on the motor, it’s not recommended and I’m said to still do it from time to time.

My left hand only has my thumb spread out, my other four little pigs can cling to the handlebars, and my right hand has two fingers and thumb, which again means I can grip well as the bike plows through the roots at 16 miles an hour. When you cover the brake with 2 fingers and try to use the thumb throttle, it doesn’t work well. It’s too bad. Believe me, I’ve tried. All that’s left is your ring and little fingers and put that hand on the handlebars, which I don’t think is enough.

Why don’t I use the regular left thumb throttle? That’s a good question, and it’s more about personal preference. The right thumb throttle is mounted on the left side and you can rest your thumb against the main part of the throttle, which does not rotate and lock your speed like cruise control. By rolling your thumb up and down slightly, you can adjust the speed without taking your thumb off the throttle. Pushing the non-rotating throttle body gives you more stability and grip to keep your hand where you want it. The standard Eight left thumb throttle “floats” in mid-air, with nothing to keep your thumb steady. I have found the standard eight left thumb throttle works well for commuters but is generally not suitable for monorail riding for this reason.

Many people complain of “thumb fatigue,” when they try to commute on their thumb accelerator. If these people spent more time doing “one, two, three, four I declare thumb wars,” then they wouldn’t have these chronic thumb fatigue problems. Apparently, there are plenty of pacifist thumbs out there that can’t handle the pressure of pushing the gas pedal for long, which brings us to our next contender.

Since twist throttles have been standardized for motorcycles and scooters, it must be better than thumb throttles, right? I have ridden all kinds of motorcycles for many years and I have no problem with the standard right hand throttle. However, when I ride an e-bike, I find that twisting the throttle is very unpopular. On a motorcycle, you just have to move and twist the throttle to get incredible power. With an e-bike, you have to twist the throttle as much as you can to get almost any power on my small bike under 1,000 watts. Moving your wrist down this far will throw you out of position and make holding the rear brake awkward. The problem is slightly improved when you use the left torsional throttle, as you rarely need to hold the front brake when riding in the woods. However, when you’re riding down the street and you really want to stop, you need to hit the front brake, you need to hit it hard. The front brakes do most of the parking for you, and if your wrists are down and out of position, it’s harder to apply the brakes quickly and confidently.

The other big problem with turning the throttle is the gear shifter. In order to use the rear chain shifter correctly, you need your thumb in a very specific position. If you are using a right-handed throttle, you must make sure your wrist and thumb are aligned with the shifter to shift, which makes it difficult to control the throttle and shift at the same time.

When installing a “half twist” throttle, make sure 1/2 handle does not rub against the twisted throttle body. This “locks” the throttle to the open position, providing stimulation, overflow and chill for everyone. This should not be a problem for “full twist” throttle with the entire handle twisted. I don’t recommend full throttle as they are most prone to unintended acceleration when moving bikes around the garage. If you forget to turn off the bike and press the throttle against something, it will twist on its own, causing the bike to take off without you.

The biggest drawback to mounting the right thumb throttle on the left side is that the wire is facing the outside of the bike and looks strange. I’ve found that once you install it, after a while you don’t even notice it anymore, and neither does anyone else. If you wind the wire back into itself and zip it around the throttle body, it looks good. The right thumb throttle is more hidden than the huge horizontal left thumb throttle and is much better for me than any half-twist or full-twist throttle I’ve tried.