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After 4 months and more than 400 miles, our family has put the Specialized Globe Haul ST through its paces. But does it check all the boxes to replace the family car?
In this review Daniel tackles:
• Delivery and set-up
• Recommended accessories and installation
• Riding with kids (ages 8, 5, and 2)
• Ride experience and battery range
Transcript
This is a long term review for the specialized globe Hall ST e-bike, we’ve had it for a little over four months and have put more than 400 miles on it in that time. Overall, I’d say it’s about the perfect grocery getter commute, companion and child carrier.
This video will talk about the setup, accessories, ride experience, and even a few shortcomings. After several months of considering a family ebike. The Globe Haul caught our attention for a few reasons. First and foremost was the Specialized name. I’ve had a few Specialized road and mountain bikes over the years. And I’ve always really enjoyed the fit, finish, and most importantly, the support. We live in the Salt Lake Valley in Utah. And there are several awesome specialized dealers within a bikes ride from our house. This was a huge factor in our purchase because other e-bike companies simply can’t compare to the number of locations or the support network that specialized offers.
My wife and I also really just liked the look of the hall. It’s still utilitarian like most bikes are, but it seems a little bit more refined. And it seems silly, but we also really liked that cream color.
And lastly, the price. Well, it’s definitely not bargain basement, it actually seems pretty competitive when you take into account it’s a specialized bike when I was playing around with Checkout options, and I saw that we could get it for 0% Klarna financing over three years. That kind of pushed us over the edge.
The bike arrived super fast, probably because we’re pretty close to a specialized distribution center. Overall, the assembly process was pretty straightforward and took about an hour. One caveat is that I’m fairly comfortable with bike maintenance. So someone who’s less comfortable might have been intimidated by a few of the steps included with the bike are too simple torque wrenches and a pedal wrench. They’re very basic, but they get the job done and they’re good to have around to recheck the torque every month or two.
The instructional videos that explain the building process are really well produced and easy to follow and definitely better than the written instructions. I opened those a couple of times but generally relied on the videos as I was flipping through some of those physical instructions. However, I did see mention of a second bike, a Specialized Globe Haul LT, which I can only assume stands for long tail. I mentioned that in case you’re watching this video and you really want to carry a second kid or extra groceries. It seems like it’s only a matter of time before a longtail version of the Globe Haul is released.
Specialized also released a Globe app, but honestly, there’s not a ton to say about it. It’s a nice way to update the controller firmware. But aside from that it doesn’t do a whole lot else. I would really like it if there was some historical battery data, trip data, some of that stuff, but right now it seems about half baked the process of adding accessories was actually a little bit more annoying than building the bike itself. Not hard, but just finicky. At one point I had a nut for the passenger handlebar get twisted around. Let’s just say it was good that my kids weren’t in the garage during that moment.
It was also kind of annoying to have to remove the entire rear wheel in order to put in those passenger pegs mostly just because of the bike’s weight. But we’ll talk more about weight in a second. As I mentioned, I installed that passenger kit which includes the wheel cover, handlebar seat and pegs as well as the front rack and pioneer adapters. This put my all in price a little over $3,400 including tax and delivery charge. That also included getting to free cool cave pioneer bags as part of an intro promo and getting 15% off my accessories. As of the publishing of this video.
Anyone can get 15% off accessories on the specialized website, all you have to do is look for the pop up and enter your email address . . . or your second email address . . . or your third email address. Anyway, I definitely encourage you to get that accessories discount as long as it’s available.
My wife and I have three kids, ages eight, five, and two, and they all absolutely loved riding on the back. They literally will fight over who gets to go to the grocery store just because they want to get on the bike. The two older kids use that passenger kit, which they got used to after a week or two. At first it was a little bit weird because they felt like they wanted their back supported. But once they got the hang of it hasn’t been a problem. Our two year old rides using the burly dash child carrier which attaches right to the rear rack. One quick note is that the included rear rack is compatible with MIK HD, which basically means it should be easy to slide on and off accessories like a child carrier. I won’t go into all the details but basically it doesn’t really seem like there are a lot of child carriers compatible with MIK HD, and definitely I couldn’t find any available in the US. All of this is to say you probably just want to go with a Burley or Thule rack mounted seat.
One big selling point of the Haul is that it accommodates riders of different heights, and that’s definitely proven to be true. My wife is five foot four, I’m six foot one, and it handles both of us really well. One small complaint is that it requires adjusting the seat post in two different places in order to adjust the height, which is not a big deal, but it’s just a little bit of a hassle.
Okay on to the ride quality in the bike which is where I would say the Globe Haul ST definitely shines. I can’t speak to every e-bike in the market but I can say that it’s just really fun to ride. The motor power is great, and it’s programmed to give this little extra boost when you’re stopped at a stoplight, or you need to make your way up a hill.
I’m a pretty avid cyclist, and I keep the power turned to three out of five. But if I have a kid on the back or a heavy grocery load, maybe I’ll go to four or five to make my way up a hill. Given my weight, our location, the hills in our area, all those other factors, we get a little over 40 miles per charge, which is pretty good for our needs. That means we basically recharge it a couple times a week.
A small detail that we really appreciated is that hardwired headlight and tail light. It might seem like a small thing, but it’s nice to have the reassurance of that safety feature turned on automatically whenever you turn on the bike. The headlight can be adjusted with different patterns and brightnesses. while the taillight is just solid red. I think it might be nice to have a blinking option in the rear, but not a big deal.
Okay, on to the main downside of the Globe Haul, which is definitely the weight. It’s pretty heavy. You don’t really feel it when you’re actually riding it. But let’s just say toting it around a busy commuter train is not my favorite pastime. I probably wouldn’t recommend this bike if you live in a walk-up without an elevator because I wouldn’t want to carry it up and down stairs every day.
Now I know that weight is all about trade offs. And I’m not sure that I would really go for a lighter bike that had less cargo capacity, it’s really nice to be able to go to the grocery store with my eight-year-old, throw a bunch of groceries, and never even have to think about the capacity which is upwards of 420 pounds. The weight also has me dreading maintenance a little bit, which has been very minimal luckily, but flipping the bike over to do anything is just not my favorite.
To counteract the weight, however, the included disc brakes are super responsive, and you always feel really in control even when you have to stop pretty quickly.
One other trade off is a lack of suspension. Specializes included these big cushy tires which you can run at a really low PSI in order to provide a lot of shock absorption. Generally this works well enough, though I will say our city streets are especially bad this year after the historic amount of snow we received over the winter. When I’m riding with my two older kids I always call out “bump” when I see an especially a big one coming, just to make sure they’re holding on tight and prepared.
As a side note, the center mount stand is super awesome and much better than usual kickstands, though you definitely hear it when you hit a pothole.
The Globe Hall ST is marketed as a tool to avoid car trips, and I would definitely say it lives up to its mission. It’s really the perfect vehicle for a quick milk run, to pick up a kid from dance class, or to close the five mile gap between my home and the train station. And fewer miles around town in our car means it’s a little easier to justify the cost.
Buying this bike was one of those leap of faith purchases where you’re hoping something will fulfill a certain need that you have, and then it does!
Our experience with the Globe Haul has definitely convinced me that device can be the future of transportation, if enough people adopt them. Plus, they’re just way more fun. And that’s gotta count for something right?
Trailblasing 