The NIU KQI 200F is advertised as having a 33 mile range, and I wanted to travel to a store that’s about 9.6 miles from my home. I did have to take some detours due to construction, and went up a couple of small hills, so I suppose we could round up and say it took me about 11 miles. On the way back, I only made it about 6 miles before I ran out of juice, and I had to Uber back home.
The scooter was fully charged when I set out. I have my max speed set to 16 mph, and for much of the ride home, it automatically dropped to 12 mph to save fuel. The only thing I can think of that may be an issue is that I did brake and accelerate a lot, stopping every couple hundred feet at the end of each block since I am in a busy urban environment.
But even if we assume I somehow added, like, 3 miles with detours, that only gets a total of about 19 miles, less than 2/3 of the advertised range.
I find it really hard to believe that I could drain the battery that much just by stopping every couple hundred feet for about 2/3 of the trip, but could that really be what happened? And if so, would it be better in the future if I simply decelerate and slow to a stop?
But if this is genuinely a problem with the scooter, what should my next steps be? Reach out to the manufacturer?
Edit: It looks like people are unanimously saying that that “max range” is for controlled conditions, ugh. I understand what’s going on now, and will not try any trips to more than 7-8 miles away from where I live.