Riese & Müller Multicharger3

Two drop-offs and the ride to work, in one trip. The Multicharger3 is a longtail cargo e-bike, which is an ordinary bicycle with a long deck behind the saddle, rated to carry 65 kg. The children climb on, the bags go in the front carrier, and the worst twenty minutes of the day stops happening in a car.

Four builds, two frame sizes covering riders from 1.60 m to 2.00 m at no extra cost, and four carrying kits each with its own published rating. Sized to you, and serviced by us, at our Ivanhoe showroom seven days a week.

How far will it go? It is the question we get asked more than any other and there is no published figure for these drive units and batteries, so anybody who hands you one is guessing. On a loaded cargo bicycle the distance is set by five things.

• The total weight. You, the bicycle at about 30 kg, the children, and whatever is on the deck. This is the biggest lever, and it is the one an ordinary city bicycle does not have.
• The gradient. A climb draws hard and a long descent gives some of it back.
• The assist mode. Entirely yours, and the gap between the lowest and the highest is wide.
• Which of the four builds you chose. They shift in four different ways and they do not all cost the same energy on the same hill.
• Temperature, wind, tyre pressure and surface. Cold weather takes more than most people expect.

The battery is a Bosch PowerTube 750 Wh on the touring, vario and rohloff builds, standing vertically in the down tube and lifting out by hand so it charges indoors. The FAMILY build runs a 625 Wh PowerTube and the battery is not a choice on that build. A Bosch PowerMore 250 Wh range extender rides in a cage on the frame on the 750 Wh builds; Riese & Müller publish that it lets you carry on for another 50 km before stopping to charge, which is the extender's own increment and not the bicycle's range. Bring us the trips you already make and we will work the charging out with you at the counter.

How many children, and how big can they be? Riese & Müller answer in kilograms and age bands rather than in a number, because the answer depends on which kit is on the bicycle and which seat is on the kit. The Family kit and the Family kit Plus are approved for up to two children to a maximum of 50 kg. The Passenger kit is approved for up to two children to a maximum of 65 kg, and is used from seven years of age onwards. Up to two children between one and seven years may be carried, each in a separate child seat to DIN EN 14344, and of the six seats Riese & Müller name for this bicycle only two permit a double installation. Their own safety instructions travel with those numbers and we carry them as written.

• Warning. Only transport children with spoke guards properly fitted. Spoke guards are fitted as standard on every build.
• When two children are carried, the heavier child always sits at the front, directly behind the rider.
• When two child seats are used, a maximum of 10 kg on the rear seat, because otherwise the weight is seriously shifted off the front wheel and it could easily lift up.
• Two child seats can restrict access to the lock and to the pedalling area.
• Check the individual loading and handling of the loaded bicycle before you set off, every time.
• Australian rules on carrying passengers are set by the state. Check the Victorian transport authority's own bicycle pages, and ask us. A helmet is required for the rider and for every passenger.

Which build? There are four, and the frame, the sizes, the colours, the ratings and the carrying rules are the same on all of them. What differs is the drive unit, the battery, the display and how it changes gear.

• touring. Shimano Cues 11-speed derailleur and a KMC chain, on the Bosch Cargo Line and a 750 Wh battery. The gear lever everyone already knows, the widest choice of ratios on a loaded climb, and from 30.1 kg the lightest of the four.
• vario. An Enviolo stepless hub gear on a Gates Carbon Drive CDX belt, on the Bosch Cargo Line and a 750 Wh battery. No gear steps at all, and it changes ratio while you are standing still, which on a loaded bicycle is the moment it counts.
• rohloff. A Rohloff E-14 Speedhub 500/14 with an electronic shifter on the same Gates belt, on the Bosch Cargo Line and a 750 Wh battery. Fourteen sealed gears with the widest spread of the four, for a hilly route ridden loaded every day.
• FAMILY. A fixed configuration for transporting children, in Riese & Müller's own words. The Bosch Performance Line PX with up to 90 Nm, a 625 Wh battery, a Bosch Purion 200 display and a Shimano Cues 10-speed chain drive. Only the colour and the frame size are chosen on this build.

What happens on the hill? The climb is the part people ask about and the restart is the part that decides how the morning feels, setting off again on a gradient with fifty kilograms behind you. Bosch publish hill start assist with Hill Hold, and walk assist, for the Cargo Line, which is the drive unit on the touring, vario and rohloff. Bosch also publish two states for that unit rather than one, and we would rather you had both: it is supplied as standard at 85 Nm, 600 W and 400 per cent support, and can be raised to a 120 Nm ceiling through Bosch's own app. Both drive units are published at 250 W rated continuous output and Riese & Müller publish assistance to 25 km/h on every build.

Will it fit through your gate? Measure before you order, because on a bicycle this long that question ends more purchases than anything else. It is 193 cm long, 123 cm between the wheels, with a 49 cm stand-over. The wheelbase is about 20 cm longer than an ordinary bicycle and an independent reviewer of the same platform wrote that it fitted just fine in his shed. A cargo bicycle does not go on a train, so if it does not fit at home there is no fallback.

Will it fit you? Two frame sizes on all four builds and neither costs more than the other. The 47 cm is for riders 1.60 m to 1.80 m and the 51 cm for 1.75 m to 2.00 m, so a household with a 1.85 m rider and a 1.68 m rider is exactly the case the two sizes exist for. Most longtails in this class come in one size. Bring both riders and ride both frames.

Can you get on and off with the children on the back? It is a sporty diamond frame with a top tube and a published 49 cm stand-over. You lean the bicycle towards you and step over, and the children stay where they are. The top tube is what lets the rear deck sit as low and as long as it does, and that is why the bicycle carries what it carries. Come and do it here with weight on the back, because that is the version that matters.

What wears out? On the vario and the rohloff a Gates belt runs to a sealed hub: no oil, no rust, no stretch and nothing to mark a trouser leg. It is less upkeep rather than none, and the belt and its sprockets are a wear item in time. On the touring and the FAMILY it is a chain and a cassette, which any bicycle shop understands.

The battery lifts out and can be replaced on its own later; Riese & Müller guarantee a minimum of 60 per cent of capacity after two years or 500 charging cycles. The lights, the mudguards, the frame lock and its 130 cm chain, the bell, the kickstand and the spoke guards are all fitted from the factory, so there is nothing to buy before it is useful.

What will it carry? The gross vehicle weight rating is 175 kg, meaning the bicycle plus you plus everything on it. Take 175 kg, subtract about 30 kg for the bicycle, subtract yourself, and what is left is your load. Within that the rear carrier takes up to 65 kg and the Cargo front carrier up to 8 kg. Those are separate maximums and they are not added together.

A child seat on the carrier is permitted, as is a two-wheel trailer with a single attachment point and a tagalong; a single-wheel trailer is not. Riese & Müller add their own footnote to each of those and we carry it as written: please check national legislation. These are safety limits, not headroom.

Every configuration is open to you.

• Four builds: FAMILY, touring, vario and rohloff.
• Two frame sizes: 47 cm and 51 cm, neither at extra cost.
• Four colours: desert/black matt, utility grey/black matt, utility grey/curry matt and petrol/black matt, none at extra cost. The two utility greys are the same paint; on the curry option the rear rack and the front carrier are curry yellow instead of black.
• On touring, vario and rohloff: the 750 Wh battery on its own or with the PowerMore 250 range extender, the Cargo front carrier or the front carrier with an 18-litre bag, the Family kit, Family kit Plus, Cargo kit or Passenger kit, Bosch eBike ABS with Magura MT C brakes, and the Offroad kit with Schwalbe Smart Sam Cargo tyres.
• Or specify it yourself. Any specification Riese & Müller publish for this model can be ordered from the factory and takes about three months.

One thing to know before you order. The specification freezes when the order is placed, and three things have to be decided at the start: the Bosch eBike ABS, which cannot be retrofitted; the extra battery capacity, because the frame is prepared for it at the factory; and the build itself.

Who fixes it in five years? We do, at 1075-1087 Heidelberg Road, Ivanhoe, seven days a week, in our own workshop on the same site as the showroom. Every bicycle we sell runs the Bosch system, chosen because Bosch have an Australian support division that is independent of any brand or shop, the diagnostics are integrated, and it is straightforward for our own mechanics to service. You ring us, not Germany.

Riese & Müller is a German maker founded in 1993 by Markus Riese and Heiko Müller, based at Mühltal near Darmstadt, for whom cargo bicycles are a specialism rather than a sideline. They publish more per-configuration detail than anybody else in this class, which is why this page can answer questions other pages avoid.

The best way to know is to ride it. Twenty minutes on the bicycle with a load on settles the hill, the seat height, the step-over and the build. Bring your children's weights and the measurements of your gate. There is no pressure to buy on the day.