Originally Posted by oldiron

I've ridden bikes my whole life, I'm 6ft 3in/350 or so lbs and riding has never been a source of weigh loss, I was a big kid many years ago, and am just as big now. I played sports, rode the tires off which ever bike I had at the time, and have never been someone who eats junk food. For whatever reason I've never liked sweets, I'd rather have another ear of corn than desert.
The biggest thing that affects me size wise is bread. If I eliminate bread, I drop size fast, but find that anything I lose seems to come right back the instant I go back to a normal eating routine. I avoid breakfast foods, things like eggs, pancakes, and sausage tear me up bad, so I do a mid day meal, mostly meat and veggies and nothing more. I work a labor intensive job 12 hours a day, but I maintain my size. I've been a 46" waste size for about 30 years or so. At 15 I wore size 38, at 22, I moved up to 42" jeans and stayed there, despite working then in a high temp environment for 12 hour shifts. Now as i approach 60 I'm 50 lbs heavier, still working a physical job hand loading trucks and riding as much as I can but as arthritis starts to get worse I ride less and less.
I've tried a few electric bikes, everything from those with powered hubs to mid motor bikes, non seem to offer much 'help' when it comes to riding.
I've not been on one yet that will take off without considerable help from me if I just use the throttle. Most only slightly add some relief while cruising on flat ground.
I did have the opportunity to ride a few full on electric motorcycles, and the two I rode were quite fast, but range was limited, likely because of my size.
While acceleration was sufficient, it was not impressive, so at that point I sort of gave up the idea of an electric assist bicycle. If an all electric motorcycle struggled, there wasn't much chance that a tiny motored E bike would do much more than waste my money.
Not to mention E-Bikes are not cheap, and battery replacement down the road, which is inevitable, is also not cheap. A neighbor, who is roughly 230 lbs, bought a mid motor E bike, after watching him buzz by the house one day at what I'd say was roughly 30 mph, I wanted to know what he was riding. His is a hub powered 48 volt model, but he's at the max weight for it. I tried it, and although it seemed to maintain speed somewhat when i stopped pedaling, it would not pull me up any sort of incline, but it did just fine with him on it.
Its a narrow tire, city bike configuration and he told me he paid just over $3,200 for it so he could save money on gas going to work.
The problem is he lives only a mile from his work. By the time it saves him any money on gas, it'll be due for a new battery. I doubt I spend that much on gas in five years, so saving money is not its strong point.

I find that setting up a normal bike with good tires, and a proper low gear ratio works best for me right now, maybe someone will build an affordable E bike in the future but I don't see that happening. I'd have a hard time putting more than few hundred bucks out extra for anything electric unless its going to save me more than just a gallon or two of gas every month.