The sales staff at Scootamoto were initially very encouraging when I enquired about the Emax, but their response to learning that I live at the top of the Greenmount hill was "forget it". But I was not to be put off easily and a trial ride up the hill convinced me that the Emax was up to doing what I wanted. From Midland, our principle local shopping area, up Great Eastern Highway to home in Darlington (the Greenmount Hill) is a 250 m climb in 5 km, a 5% climb. This is not a steep climb and the Emax handles it with ease on boost and maintain 40 to 50 kph, as fast as many heavy vehicles. Going down is no problem with the Emax cruising at 70 kph.
Other hills in Darlington are much steeper than the 5%. From the Darlington village to our home is a 100 metre climb in 1 km, 10% on average with some sections at 15%. Compared with my alternative bicycle transport, the Emax performs well only briefly dropping under 20 kph. I find this quite acceptable but 15% does seem to be its limit as stated in the manual. There is a shorter route from the village to home up a 20% climb, the Emax just dies on that. By taking a little care in route choice and using a lot of boost power, the Emax performance in the Darlington hills is quite acceptable. I have not yet been able to assess battery performance on the hills. So far I have only done 16 km rides and recharged immediately. I don't want to be caught with a flat battery at the bottom of a 250 meter climb. Unfortunately it is almost always up hill to get home. I would really like to have an accurate "fuel" consumption meter (ammeter) and fuel tank (amp hours remaining) gauge.
I find the times that I would really like a bit more performance is when negotiating traffic. A bit more boost to get through gaps in the Highway flow would be very much appreciated. The brake switches that delay application of power after a braked stop adds to the traffic negotiation difficulty.
The brakes could do with some improvement for steeper hills. The rear drum brake requires a lot of pressure to be effective on a 15% down hill and on my scooter the front disk, although effective, seems to over heat and distort causing it to scrape until it cools off. I have noted that all the new "coming soon" EMC scooters have discs on front and back. Another brake problem on the slopes is the lack of weight on the front wheel means that facing up on a steep slope with the front wheel locked will not stop the scooter sliding back. The front wheel just skids on the bitumen as soon as weight is taken on your feet for balancing. And I definitely don't recommend gravel tracks.
