NIU NQi GT/S Pro | Road test

The reality is however that electric-powered vehicles are simply those which use an alternative fuel source; rather like diesel is to petrol. The big question is, therefore, is this scooter any good?

The NIU NQi GT/S Pro is a bit of a mouthful, but fortunately, you only have to ride it, not introduce it to your parents.
Produced in China with a Bosch electric motor in the rear wheel, the manufacturer claims a top speed of around 45mph and a range of 60 miles. The RRP is around £3700, which is not cheap, but if you plan to use it regularly, then maybe the costs aren’t so bad. The 2.1kWh would cost roughly 30p to 40p to recharge if your household electricity costs between 15p and 20p per kWh. If a petrol scooter does 60 miles per gallon then the equivalent petrol costs at £1,30 per litre is about £5.90. There is currently no VED to pay on electric scooters, no inner-city pollution tax, and when it comes to servicing no moving parts to worry about either. It’s basically wheels and brakes.

The top speed may not sound too impressive, and indeed a good 125cc 4-stroke scooter will easily exceed that. Even an average 125 should do better. But it depends on what you need. After all, you wouldn’t necessarily choose a Ferrari to tow a caravan and transport a family of five on holiday to the Lake District. This Niu scooter is obviously aimed at the commuter market, and as such that’s how I’ve treated it. I’ve been riding it in and around Nottingham city to put it through its paces and despite a mix of 50mph and 30mph roads, the Niu did well. Even out of rush hour on the open stretches I didn’t feel vulnerably slow, with the maximum recorded speed being 48mph according to the app.

Yes, it has a smartphone app which can tell you what you’ve done and how long the battery will both last, and once under charge how long to wait. The app also monitors your parked scooter, sending a text message to your phone should anyone nudge it or move it, which of course is a brilliant anti-theft device. Beeping when moved to warn any potential thief (or clumsy riders should they park their steed too close to yours), the app can also track your Niu scooter should it go missing and therefore aid its swift recovery. Equally, if you forget where you have parked it you can use the app for that and then when close, blip the lights and horn via a key-fob button. All this technology comes courtesy of ‘the cloud’, to which your scooter is connected, and the app is free to download.

There are three riding models on this Niu; Sport, Dynamic and E-Save. Sport gives you the best acceleration, which is pretty impressive to be fair and will take a few fellow riders by surprise from a standing start at the traffic lights. One of the beauties of electric power is that it can be configured to give impressive acceleration and Niu have done that here. Even in Dynamic mode, it is enough to set off from a standing start with only the most impatient car drivers breathing down your neck. Dynamic also has a capped top speed of around 30mph, and as you may have guessed uses less battery power than full Sport mode. Again, however, what is the legal speed in most British towns and cities? More often than not, it’s 30mph. So using the cruise-control button which also features on this scooter, open the throttle in Dynamic, hit the button and you can stay at the legal limit along open stretches of urban roads.

At night the colours on the dash are more defined and they change depending on the scooter’s status.
Speaking of night, the scooter’s lights are good, even on unlit country lanes. Even if you’re not in the metropolis that is London, this is still a valid way of commuting. Depending on your circumstances…

And here is the rub with this and all electric vehicles at the time of writing. Petrol and diesel are still readily available throughout the land and it takes minutes to refuel an empty tank. Batteries however take longer. This Niu has two of them to get you the claimed range, one in a locked compartment under the floor, and the other under the seat. This of course restricts what luggage you can carry, although there is a useful little tray inside the legshields. The Niu also comes with a large transformer to use when charging the batteries, which are pretty large. As is the transformer. You’re not carrying that around with you, and although the batteries are easily removable, they’re not exactly pocket-sized. So the first decision is where you plan to charge your scooter; at home or at work.

During a single day of mixed riding styles in the two main modes, I set out to deliberately flatten the battery. At around 53 miles, the scooter suddenly slowed down. It had automatically gone into E-Save mode, which apparently it does when the battery is very low. It was a bit of a surprise to me, but then I’d not read an owner’s handbook so it may have said something in there about it. The dashboard told me I had a range of nine miles left, and it seems this would all be done in said mode which is capped at 16mph. So while this will likely get you home or to your charging point, it is not exactly ideal for riding. My real-world riding therefore suggests that your safe range for this scooter is about 50 miles. The 60-mile range is not necessarily inaccurate, it just means that the last nine miles may take you about half an hour and on faster roads be potentially nerve-wracking.

That said, forewarned means you can plan, in the same way that if you know your petrol scooter has a range of 90 miles, you know that refuelling at around 80 miles is better than risking a push home. With the Niu, if your daily commute is five miles each way Monday to Friday, then a charge at the beginning of the week might just see you through until the following weekend. Unless you deviate far from your route to visit friends, go out to dinner, etc. So while making the calculations mentioned above regarding rival petrol scooters, add deviations into those miles. Likewise, when comparing costs to that of a bus ticket, factor in that any scooter gives you far more freedom than public transport at either end of their fixed routes, plus deviation. The manufacturer claims that full charge can take as little as five and half hours. At 53% the app said 3.6 then 3.3 hours to fully recharge. However, around two hours later, the app on my phone pinged that it was fully charged. In general though, there is no ‘splash & dash’ that you can do with a petrol scooter. Not yet anyway.