Hot on the heels of two other small wheelers – the Orbea Katu-E and the Kalkhoff Sahel – comes this intriguing AE21 city bike from Peugeot. As you can see, it's a little bit left-field in terms of its looks. Peugeot describe it as "Smart, agile, urban and compact... Peugeot's new bike is a stylish, ingenious approach to city cycling". So what's going on here?
The AE21 is a 20"-wheeled compact city bike, with a front hub motor. In order to be as compact as possible for keeping in the hallway of your flat, or sneaking into the office, the handlebars fold down and the pedals fold too. So it has a very small footprint. It's not a folding bike in the sense that'd you'd convince the train conductor – the frame doesn't fold – but for stashing it away, it's useful.
The alloy main frame of the bike (the black bit, on this bike) is covered with a plastic fairing (the white bit) and that gives a space inside the main part of the frame. The battery is at the bottom of the hole, and into the hole fits a pretty stylish leather satchel for you to carry your sandwiches or your laptop.
There's a small plastic storage box at the front of the luggage space, and that contains an Abus folding link lock. That's a lot more secure than a frame lock that you might find on a city bike, although it's not as good as a D-lock. You could chuck one in your bag though if you're parking somewhere less secure.
The 250W hub motor is connected to a 334Wh lithium ion battery, and you get three levels of assistance from the bar-mounted LED display. Peugeot claim a range of up to 50km which seems realistic, although you won't get near that if you like the higher power modes or have a lot of hills to climb. There's a USB port on the display if you want to give your phone a bit of a boost on the way to the office. Often you'll have the problem of where to put your phone if you're doing that, but with the AE21 you can just lob the phone in the frame bag.
20" wheels are quite a popular choice for electric bikes and the Peugeot uses Vredestein Moiree 1.75" tyres that look good for tarmac. The AE21 has low-maintenance drum brakes front and rear, as well as mudguards, a full chainguard and a kickstand so it's well set up for the city. The Shimano Nexus 3-speed hub doesn't have the gear range of a more expensive hub gear or a derailleur transmission but for city riding it should be plenty, especially since you have the help from the motor.
As well as the black/white colourway we have here, the AE21 is available in black/black and black/orange. We'll be getting the city miles in aboard our review bike, so look out for a review soon.
