Hi!
I have common problem with Strida belt twisting - few times I almost died or was injured due to immediate stop of the bike when actually needed to speed up!
Today it happened about 10th time at the middle of the tram way, two or three times on the crossroad, when avoiding ignoring me car driver, once on the crossing, when another biker turned on my way…
…and mostly it happened after exchanging the belt for a new one!
I love my Strida, but this bike is dangerous! Pay attention!
I also have problems with brakes - front one had to be replaced, but the rear one problem appeared due to the brake disc warping! How this brake disc warping happened pedaling with common human force?
That is very odd, I guess that must be too low belt tension.
Or, freewheel and beltwheel are misaligned for some reason…
Could you please check if the bottom tube bearings (part 100-03 and 100-04) are intact?
Here, I think, the belt crawled between disc and freewheel.
Was the disc warped in the spokes direction (to the inside of the wheel)?
Agree totally! But Ming cycle is definitely not interested to cooperate with experienced users, that is fact since many years
I had that issue with twisting belt few times.
The scenario goes always the same :
the rider wants to start the ride or accelarate rapidly →
belt flips →
belt collide with the brake disc →
belt being damaged or even torn due to that collision, the cosnstruction of freewheel and that little ring which is supposed to keep the belt in place.
consequences:
belt needed to be replaced immidiately or pretty soon
50% chance that the rear disc brake is bent
if so then no working rear brake any more untill the disc is replaced
riding with only front brake is quite safe and easy to learn but very dangerous in cases like when the rain happens because the front wheel when blocked on the rainy road may easily lost the track completely (let’s pray there are some fluffy bushes by the road when it happens ;)). On the road with leaves the situation is similar as if it rains.
The cause of the belt twisting:
belt is set too loose
freewheel is too exploited - the Strida freewheel’s teeth got smaller and smaller in time while riding and that is the main cause of the belt geeting loose.
My observation is that about 5000 km is the typical safe lifespan of the freewheel.
Another 1000-2000 km may be ridden safely if the tension of the belt is set to max position of the tensioning setup AND the rider is riding carefully avoiding rapid starting or accelerating .
But if the belt was twisted once it is pretty possible that it happens again. The belt propably got some damage and it lost the ability to keep in place especially when the damaged part is somwhere on the freewheel and you unfortunatelly are going to start or accelarate. The belt of Strida is not a good quality belt. I have replaced about 3 of them so far, during 5.5 years of “striding” .
The solution:
1st - check the tension of the belt regularly, take a look on the freewheel regularly
If the twisting starts to happen no matter the tensioning →
2nd - replace the freewheel
If the twisting is happening on the new freewheel anyway then the belt propably need to be replaced too.
Keep in mind that if the belt is not tense enough it may flip in rainy day also (l mean riding in rain, especially a heavy one).
If the freewheel is new or quite new it is always the matter of the belt tension only.
If the freewheel is exploited there is nothing more to be done. Replacement of the freewheel is needed and of course setting the correct tension too.
All I have written is my personal experience only.
Have a nice day
And of course there is an ultimate solution which solve that problem once and for all : put a chain instead of the belt drive on Strida. It is easy and it is cheaper if ot comes to repalcement parts. Unfortunately it is impossible to do it on EVO without producing one special designed part for mounting the chainwheel. But it is a different story.
Tons of true insight here, many thanks for posting
Interesting theme!
Do you have an EVO adapter ring left over?
Principially is all you need just a ring of anything (steel, aluminium, etc.), with the right size and eight holes (four for the adapter and four for the chainring) plus some spacers.
Do you agree?
What I lack to complete the design is that damned key to took the plastic beltwheel from the Strida KS gearbox and check out and measure what is needed to be measured
I do not know the thickness of the inner circle to position the chainwheel properly to get the straight line of the chainwheel with the freewheel plus some spacers I have no idea should look like on that moment.
Next to do is the first preproduction, it could be even in some light modeling stuff,
than some testing,
and final product on the CNC or something like that.
Next real road testing and propably some corrections, maybe upgrades.
And all of that to put a 10$ sturmey archer 17T freewheel + 10$ chain + that big 58T chainwheel for about 20$ bought on Aliexpress
to get rid of that belt and save 100$ a year on the strida freewheel only And to finally push the crank with full power without wondering if the belt work properly while on the messy road situation
The idea was born when the Strida was out of usage due to some issues with 16" rear wheel and freewheel simultanousely.
When winter comes,the weather got very bad and the Strida riding would be impossible (only snow can do that to be honest) I try to move that desgin forward.
Hello Piotr
Strida is a great bike and it is very safe if driven properly and with some skill .
In my opinion it is not the problem with the bike itself but with the very poor or almost lack of the information what the buyer should really keep in mind while using it, like that belt-freewheel stuff.
Of course tensioning of the the belt requires some technical skill too and the real problem here is that not everybody would like to work on it by itself and not every bike service would know what is going on with Strida too.
I agree that some things should be rethink and redesigned. In my opinion the option with the chaindrive should be definitely available on the market by default to make the service work easy and cheap to manage. That bike is not cheap, parts are not cheap - its maintenance is quite expensive if the bike is used day by day - the design of Strida encourages to use it in that way. I just grab the bike and go outside, I just grab the bike and go inside. It is small, it is fast and it is fun to ride.
One more thing - If you have a Strida LT or SX the conversion to the chaindrive is quite easy.
I would have done it by myself long time ago but I’ve purchased Strida EVO which is a little bit more complicated to converse.
Best regards
and got started to think of some kind of adapter.
The design of my adapter looks sophysticated couse of the final weight not to be too high.
My design stopped for the moment couse I use Strida daily right now and got to keep it that way till the winter at least.
Here is the inspiration but it is Strida SX
And to finally push the crank with full power without wondering if the belt work properly while on the messy road situation 
very sophisticated 
