How I Made My E-Bike Street Legal (Step-by-Step)
That’s right. This ebike is officially street legal in all 50 states, meaning I can ride it pretty much anywhere and not worry about getting impact. Well, as long as I’m not doing wheelies and other hoolan. So, how did I pull this off, you might ask? This feels weird. Seriously, do you not have Google? Just kidding, guys. Making an ebike street legal was very confusing to me at first, especially because this bike didn’t come with an MCO or a title. just this little number plate with what could be a VIN on the side. Now, vehicle registration is different in every single state and I have heard of some people having success in getting their Surirons, Tarias, other ebikes registered in states like North Carolina or Texas, but TLDDR, I’m in Pennsylvania, and it’s a no-go here. So, after giving up on the dream for a little bit, I started doing more research and eventually found dirt legal. Basically, dirt legal is an optimized way to get anything street legal. So, it could be side by sides, cars, dirt bikes, even ATVs. Even if you’ve got no title, lost a title, or even imported a vehicle. Essentially, they use states like Montana where outofstate people can register vehicles under an LLC, and there’s no in-person inspection required, and they can get you a legit title that is 100% legal, no funny business. So, here’s what I did. I bought the Montana Street legal registration kit for an ebike. This cost me $699. Now, I also needed to create an LLC. I could have done it myself, but I just had Dirt Legal do that. Just the registration cost me $6.99. The LLC portion cost me $2.99, so a grand total of $1,000. Few days later, I got a checklist of all the necessary documents that I needed to complete to actually get this bike straight legal. And before we proceed, yes, you could absolutely do the Montana route yourself, doing the LLC, shipping in all your docs, but that takes a lot of time and it’s very tedious, and I wanted just a simple process. I also wanted to make sure that it was all above board and I didn’t accidentally do anything illegal. So, let’s go through what you need real quick. First off, if you don’t have a title or an MCO for the bike, you’ll need a bill of sale. So, yeah, I sold my RTR to my buddy and he sold it back to me. Next up was the power of attorney form. This basically lets you act as an agent of the LLC that your bike is registered under. You just need to sign it and get it notorized. I use notorized.com because I wasn’t about to go sit in a notary office and it cost me $25. Then comes all the photos. Super easy. I just took a photo of the front of the bike, the rear of the bike, the side of the bike, the other side of the bike, the VIN, the odometer, and my driver’s license. Easy peasy. And now for the hardest part, the VIN inspection. This one railroaded me for a bit because I actually was initially trying to get my old Taria X Street legal, and I just could not get any cop to inspect it. In PA, if the bike is 2011 or newer, a law enforcement officer has to physically verify the bin on your bike. Took me four different police stations before I found someone willing to help. Philly cops wanted nothing to do with it as they kind of thought it was sus cuz it is a Montana form. But I was luckily able to find a small town police department that filled it out for me with literally no question which was crazy. Shout out that detective. Once you get that done, you’ll also need a photo of the officer’s badge and business card. Now, once I had all the docs done, I just uploaded all of them to Dirt Legal’s online portal except for the VIN inspection form and the bill of sale. Dirtle Legal sent me a prepaid shipping label to mail those items to them specifically. So to emphasize, bill of sale and Montana VIN registration form have to be mailed. They cannot be uploaded online. So once I got all the docs mailed and submitted, it was on October 21st and I literally had my plate and registration on November 3rd. So super quick turnaround. The title I do not yet have, but it should come in the next 3 to 4 weeks. And this will be a legitimate MC motorcycle for road use title. Now the last thing I did, you technically don’t need insurance on a motorcycle in Montana, but I got some anyways. Dirtle Legal has some referrals for unique insurance companies that deal with these sort of unique vehicles. Uh, I got a quote. It was $390 for the year, which isn’t super cheap, but I have insurance that I can produce to an officer should I get pulled over. All in all, it was honestly pretty easy. The hardest part, like I said, was just getting the VIN inspection form cuz I pulled up to a police station, pulled my bike out of the van, gave the form to a cop, and he had to fill it out. He basically just looked at the side of the bike, made sure the bike wasn’t stolen, did a quick search, and verified the VIN that I was claiming was in fact the one that was on the bike. So, all in all, pretty simple. You just have to find a chill cop. Now, since the bike is just Montana legal, it has to follow Montana regulations. So, to be legal in Montana, you need headlights, tail lights, brake lights, reflectors, a horn, and DOT approved tires. Most of which I now have, which I’ll show you right now. While Montana’s pretty lax on what they require, I wanted to go above and beyond just to make sure I was safe. So, first thing I put on was the Electron Co. 12vt headlight kit. The kit is stored under the seat and it comes with a bunch of extra plugs. This is important when we talk about our tail light, turn signals, and horn. So, the whole system runs off of this one switch. This switch turns on the headlight and it turns on the tail light. Now, the tail light you can turn on and off with this button here on the bars. This is from a pure and I have a whole install video last video on all these parts. But, we have the tail light which goes on the rear. It doesn’t technically have a brake light, which in theory it should, but it doesn’t currently. You could wire one if you wanted, but we have turn signals. So, this is left and this is right. In the front, we also have turn signals. I wanted to put them on the fork legs, but they couldn’t reach, so now they’re just on the side. Montana doesn’t necessarily even require turn signals, but I wanted to do them on the front and the rear just to be safe. We also have a horn, which works super well. We’ve just got it stuck right up under here and it’s good to go. Lastly, we’ve got a mirror, just a single barend mirror from Amazon. I’ll link that below, but this has everything. So, it looks the part and it actually is the part to ride legally on the street. The only other thing we’re missing is technically a license plate light. But one thing I did want to have is if I was riding trails or like bike trails where maybe I don’t want this to be shown. This is super easy to remove. So I just have a magnet on the back of the bike and on the back of the plate so I can clip it on. We’re good. We’re legal. Take it off and we’re just another ebike. Quick break in the video to thank today’s sponsor, Yeil. If you’re like me, finding time to hit the gym and most importantly get your steps in can be a hard time. That’s why I’ve been using this Yeil TS3 Plus treadmill. gives a full training experience in the garage. This thing is built for fun cardio. It’s got a massive 21inch rotating HD display with Bluetooth speakers so I can stream YouTube, Spotify, or even Pelaton classes. And with 10% auto incline, it actually feels like you’re climbing hills. Perfect for realistic workouts. And when I’m done, it folds up in seconds and fits right up against the wall. It’s perfect for small apartments or anyone short on space. Now, I’ve never actually thought about buying a treadmill, but if I did, I’d definitely consider this because this is a great screen. The speakers work well, and I can just watch YouTube while I walk. That’s pretty sick. And if you’re into Pelaton and all that other crap, you can also do that. But there’s one last thing I want to try. Whoa. Yeah, it’s a little too big. So, if you are looking to ride your ETM RTR on it, that might not work. This treadmill gives you premium performance and entertainment for a fraction of the cost of other treadmills. Click the link below if you’re interested and save on yours today by using my code. All right, time to ride. Hopefully that doesn’t fall off. First test today. Also, something interesting. A quick fact for y’all. These look very similar, don’t they? That’s right. Dirt Legal and Grid Shift are actually sister companies. Not sure if you guys knew that, but Grid Shift sells all the surround stuff, eBike stuff. This headlights from Grid Shift. Yeah, Dirt Legal and Grid Shift, sister companies. Pretty cool. All right, let’s turn on the system. Headlight, tail light. Let’s freaking go. Onto the streets we go. use our turn signals. Woo! Of course, we’re rocking the 72VT 45 amp hour touring battery for this high-speed road stuff. It’s funny cuz I feel like I technically shouldn’t be out here right now, but I’m technically legal. Guys, this bike does have registration. I got it in my little bag here, so it’s registered, licensed, insured. So, this is all legal now, which is nuts. It’s also freezing cold in the Northeast now. It’s like 40° today, so very chilly, but can get pulled over and in theory, I should be okay. All right, so the question you guys are all probably wondering, why the hell did I do this? Why did I take an ebike and make it street legal, make it a motorcycle, make myself trackable? Isn’t that the whole point of ebikes, that you can just ride them anywhere? Well, yes and no. So ultimately when I lived in Philadelphia or in any city for that matter in most cases the police there were pretty chill about things. But as these bikes have got more popular over time I see a lot more police involvement and interactions with these bikes and these bikes getting impounded. There’s someone I know local to this area stealth that just the other day got in trouble with the law on his RTR light right around here. And you know I wanted to be able to get out and ride enjoy the bike do my thing and not have to worry about the police. So that was really the primary goal. Now, yes, could I get in trouble for doing wheelies on this bike with a license plate? Absolutely. But I think I’m going to be calculated in how, when, and where I do my wheelies while I’ve got this plate on. And that doesn’t necessarily mean if I’m going to a ride out that, you know, you know what I’m saying? Or if I’m riding off road, I’m not always going to run the plate. Ultimately, for me, it was just important to be able to have something that I could ride around sort of like the Gro I had, but is still electric and has all the the beauty and fun factor and logistics of an electric bike, which I love. Stand up. So, that’s really why I wanted to do it. Um, and I won’t lie, I’ve been fine around here for the most part as far as law enforcement, but I’ve also deliberately avoided them. So now I feel a lot more chill being able to go out and ride and not have to worry about the police getting on me about this and potentially impounding it. Now another question y’all might have is what would happen if you did get pulled over? You may ask. Well, if you got pulled over, I would just pull out my I mean my registration and I would show them registration. They would see that it’s registered to this bike. The VIN will show everything will pull up. The plate itself, it’ll show, you know, in their system that they pulled up. It’ll be like Electro and Co. ETM RTR 2025. So, it’s all legit. Now, I can’t say that some of them might not be sus about the whole Montana plate thing and me being a PA resident, but you know, we’ll just have to cross that bridge when we come to it, but it’s still going to be the same approach with police. Anyways, I’ll try to be respectful, try not to wheelie around them, especially if I got a plate on. But, I mean, legally, I’m technically covered, but it also depends on the copy meet cuz PA technically is one state that I’ve heard is a little more strict on the Montana plates. Even though it’s completely legal, they still are not huge fans of PA residents having an LLC in Montana to get plates. So, we’ll just have to see what happens. I do think though that’s more of a problem for like if you register a UTV or an ATV, which inherently can’t be legal in PA anyways. That’s where I think it’s more important. But this is technically like a motorcycle if you will, and motorcycles are street legal, you know, everywhere as long as they have all this stuff. So, it’s not uncommon to see a street legal motorcycle a side by side. Even if you did the whole registration process and everything, that’s going to look sus if you’re just riding a sidebyside on the road. This might look a little sus, but kind of just looks like a little Gromp. So, yeah, if you got pulled over, you show them your registration, your license, your insurance, just like you would if you got pulled over in or on any other vehicle. So, it’s pretty straightforward. Again, it just depends on the cop if they’re going to give you a more explicitly hard time. But, you know, you can never guess what they’re going to do or how they’re going to react. So, we are just street mobbing now. Oh, feeling nice. 52 53. Oh well, I guess we can get a little wheelie in. I definitely need to move this cluster over a little bit cuz it’s kind of hard for me to reach. I won’t lie. That guy beeping at me. Oh, the beautiful Hershey, PA. Guys, look. There’s Hershey’s. I guess one of the chocolate factories. Another question you might have is what if you want to transfer the Montana title and tag into your home state? From what I’ve heard, you can do that. It is registered under an LLC, though, so it’s a little bit unique. I think it’s probably a little weird if you as the owner of the LLC then sell it to yourself out of the LLC. You’re probably better off if you want to get the tag and title into your state if you maybe sell it to a buddy. Like I might sell this bike to my buddy, have him get it registered in PA, PA title and so on and then I’ll have him sell it back to me. I’ll get a PA tag. So that would be a workaround, but I’m not even that inclined to do that right now cuz then you are subject to the Pennsylvania inspection, you know, taxes and so on. See if we can beat this Toyota full power. [Music] Oh, we gapped his ass. Oh, yeah. This bike obviously isn’t super ideal on uh quicker roads like this, but it will be ideal in a second when we’re just popping around like kind of the cities and everything. So, we’ll come into Hershey proper. I’ll show you guys Hershey Park. Not much out here besides that. I am very interested to see if I do encounter a law enforcement officer how they will or won’t react to this thing. A little afraid, but we’ll see. Police officer right there. Pull up and show you guys the park. All right, so here you have it. Hershey Park, buddy. I’m pretty sure Hershey Park actually had a couple of incidents as of recent this year that didn’t look too too great for them. One of which was literally a four-year-old walking across the like monor rail system, which is crazy. That’s something I’m going to keep doing is forgetting to turn these turn signals off. But dude, pretty lit that we can just come up here. Come out here. [Music] This seems as good a spot as any to uh get some circles in. Oh, very slick. Oh my god, that is like so slick. Yeah, all in all, the dirt legal process was pretty dang easy. The hardest thing, like I said, like three times at this point was just getting a cop to inspect the van, which once we got someone to do it, that was literally all I needed cuz everything else I just was able to fail myself and or do online. So, it was super simple. But to now be able to legally navigate around here and there’s police right there, hopefully they don’t turn around on us. It still feels wrong. Like I still feel like I’m doing something illegal, but I’m not. It’s legal. I don’t think he paid me any mind. I think the headlight from Grit Shift actually does us a lot of favors because it literally looks like a street legal motorcycle headlight. Like it looks like a dirt bike headlight like on a dual sport. It doesn’t look like a dirt bike with the front plate and the light bar that I had before. It just looks proper. So I think that also is a good addition that makes me look more legit. You can smell the chocolate in the air. It’s crazy. It almost just smells like a bakery. I’m just so excited to be able to take this thing to like different events now. Like I think it’d be super cool to pull up to like a cards and coffee on this thing just cuz people be like, “What is that? It’s electric and it’s street legal. How?” And I’ll just be like, “Yo, go watch Conor Gy Media. I’ll show you how. I’ll tell you how.” Now we’re just on this swivel for police. The are you beeping at me forhead? I’m street legal. Now we’re in our wheelie spot. Oh, I’m sliding off. My pants are sliding down. Don’t break your mirror. Oh, I love this bike. I’m going to love it even more with that new controller. We’re at the freaking roundabout, baby. Well, guys, we’re back from the ride. I just love the fact that this thing has a plate. It’s so funny to me. But first, street legal street street legal. Yeah, not street legal anymore. Street legal ride was a success. Uh, I’m excited to see what future content I’m going to get on this thing like while it’s in it street legal form because it’ll be interesting to see like how cops will treat it and deal with it. They definitely think it’s interesting. Obviously, we had some people on the road that didn’t think I should be on the road, but hey, buddy. What’s that? What’s that right there? Freaking license plate, my dude. Otherwise, guys, huge shouts out to the Dirt Legal team for helping me through this process. They are super helpful. So, if you want to do this to your bike, your RTR, your son, your whatever the hell it is, your unicycle, I don’t care. They’re super helpful. They’re great resources and they can walk you through the whole process. So, honestly, I’m really happy I did it. It only took me a year to get it done, but that was partially on me finding the right cop to inspect the inform. But, if you have any questions, please feel free to leave them down below. But, Street Eagle RTR, much more to come. I’ll see you next time, though. Peace. [Music]
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