Electric Motorcycle Idea from Big Cheese Enterprises

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

Obviously this is not going to be massively practical or marketable, but here goes

Build a self contained motor and battery pack that looks like an air cooled in line 4 engine, battery transverse at the front where the engine would be on an inline 4 and the motor where the gearbox would be, then sell it with different engine mounting plates so that it could be fitted in old Suzukis, Kawasakis and Hondas, all of the original engines in these are huge, so there'd be tons of room, no need for an exhaust so a cooling radiator could go at the front.

A speaker and a cone could replace the existing exhaust tailpipe to make that authentic inline 4 howl.

[Taipan]

Plenty of places started doing leccy car conversions, so I imagine bike ones will follow...

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

It'd be great if someone did this, the big problems with old inline 4s is knackered engines, rusty fuel tanks and carbs that don't like modern fuels, the frames seem to last fine.

[Yorick]

Would need a noisy zorst

[Whysub]

Bloke on YouTube built an electric bike using a CB750 as its base. His mate built the battery packs from scratch rather than buying one already made, likewise the controller which seemed a nightmare to set up.

Looks a bit odd being very square, but for less than $4000 it's something that could be built as a unit to be dropped into a rolling chassis with a bit of a chop and weld.

[Mr. Dazzle]

The E-Type which Jaguar do replaces the engine block with a battery pack and then puts the e-motor on the back axle combined with the diff IIRC. You could certainly do something similar here, i.e. put a battery pack where the engine is then a motor roughly where the gearbox would be on a bike. EVs tend to be single speed and a 100bhp electric motor isn't much bigger than a bean can. Catering size bean can maybe.

Certainly sounds feasible to me.

controller which seemed a nightmare to set up.

We make electric motors...motors for EVs are basically our only product. We've got a whole software department. Tells you how complex the controllers are

There are some big currents so I don't envisage them being DIY kits. People arent allowed to do their own household wiring so I can foresee some sort of regulation one day.

Big currents and big voltages. Up towards 1000V and 1000A these days.

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

You'd want it as a bolt in lump, with the only connections needed being the chain and throttle, certainly for Suzuki and Kawasaki replacement engines you could use plates to fit to the existing engine mounts as the engines are very similar, for a Honda CB900F you'd just need bigger plates because the engine/gearbox is bigger than the Suzuki/Kawasaki lumps.

100bhp would be plenty for any of these frames, the original engines only make a maximum of that (GPz1100A and GSX1100)

[Mr. Dazzle]

EVs are generally running a few hundred volts...I think the latest ones are 850V architecture with higher values yet to come.

The high amps only exist in the motor itself, but high vokts and high amps go hand in hand.

Tell you what though, if I were a firefighter I'd be wanting some pretty serious new training!

[Mr. Dazzle]

The throttle would be fly by wire.

[dern]

This might be of interest if you've not already found it... https://www.electricbike.com/converting ... -qs-motor/

[Mr. Dazzle]

This might be of interest if you've not already found it... https://www.electricbike.com/converting ... -qs-motor/

Just to give you an idea of scale, one of our motors is almost the exact same size as that one - but it's more than 50 times more powerful!

Probably not far off 50 times the cost though

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

The whole thing would have to cost under £4K, that's about the price on an inline 4 engine, rebuild (including parts) and carbs.

[Bustaspoke]

I'm sure some of the electric bikes racing at the TT were based on rolling chassis's from the R6 etc.Anyone know?

[Whysub]

This cost under $4000 to build in parts. God knows how many hours labour, which obviously is never mentioned....

Screenshot_20211122-164230_YouTube.jpg (467.64 KiB) Viewed 145 times

Styling not to my liking (bit like those Hipster CX500 builds) but not much you can do to pretty up the battery pack without adding moulded plastic panels to it to disguise it.

[Le_Fromage_Grande]

If you painted the battery black it would look better, same goes for the orange cables, if you added fake cooling fins and crank ends on the battery it would look a lot, lot better.

Looks like it's based on a 1980ish CB750F

[Whysub]

If you painted the battery black it would look better, same goes for the orange cables, if you added fake cooling fins and crank ends on the battery it would look a lot, lot better.

Looks like it's based on a 1980ish CB750F

Yep, mid 80's CB750, an unloved and cheap bike to start with. If I remember correctly, the red cables are a legal thing on EV's in the States to identify high voltage.

[Mr. Dazzle]

the red cables are a legal thing on EV's in the States to identify high voltage.

Yeah that orange cable is the standard high voltage stuff, you see it absolutely everywhere. I don't know if it's actually a legal requirement, or it's just the accepted colour for high integrity high voltage cable and everyone just sort of rolls with it. It's reasonably expensive (as cables go) and it probably wouldn't make much sense to try and qualify a new type. Could well be a legal requirement though.

Tesla...



Ferrari...



Formula 1...