Electric Motorbikes

[Count Steer]

Went into WHSmiffs for a ball of string and browsed the mags.

Lo! 'Electric Motorbikes' brought to you by the 'makers of MCN'. Obvs I bought a copy and y'know what? It's quite interesting and some of it is (whisper it quietly) quite exciting.

Stuff like Cake, a 250mph bike, a hybrid motocrosser/bicycle/custom, a Sur-Ron v Bultaco face-off...etc etc.

The future may not be so bad after all.

[Yorick]

Count Steer in his Bradford Uni days

[Mr. Dazzle]

If the Triumph TE-1 looks even 64% as good as it's concept art suggests I might actually put my hand in my pocket and buy my second ever brand new bike. Assuming it's not £25k that is.

My first was a Peugeot Speedfight 50 with free insurance when I was 16 BTW.

They're forecasting 170bhp - a 170bhp electric bike will rip your face off, it's got 170bhp everywhere rather than just at the top end. Also reckoning on ~225kg.

[Count Steer]

Count Steer in his Bradford Uni days

I was just about to pop a wheelie.

(My lab coat was never that clean).

[Count Steer]

I think someone posted a link before but the Curtiss One looks like Skeletaur's ride.

[The Spin Doctor]

I cover the latest developments on my https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=P ... cR2qVT75Kf webcast - almost every show now has some story about electric bikes.

Right now, for short range commuting, they make a lot of sense with 'moped' performance electric scooters now on the market for no much more than £2000, and 125 equivalents around £4k, even if the currently-cheap 'fuel' won't stay that way for long once there is a wholesale switch away from petrol and diesel - the exchequer will need to fill the hole in revenue currently brought in as duty on fuels.

For bigger machines, certainly the performance is there, but where there are problems is combining range with performance AND keeping the weight manageable. You could just add more battery but the weight (and size) would balloon. Zeros are compromise - the top of the range ones offer surprisingly light weight (the SR-Z weighs less than my XJ6) with surprisingly rapid acceleration and a ~100 mile range if you opt for reasonable rather than rapid cross-country performance, but try sitting on a motorway at top speed and you won't get anything like that.

Which leads me to conclude some of the 'leccie bike performance promises are actually relying on breakthroughs in battery technology to significantly increase energy density.

There are suggestions that a big step forward could be around the corner by combining micro-capacitors with more or less standard batteries (I'll be looking at the latest update on Elevenses on Wednesday) but we're still waiting for a bike built round that technology.

[Mr. Dazzle]

The aforementioned Triumph uses battery tech which is being developed in conjunction with Williams Advanced Engineering and they're claiming leaps in performance. Of course, everyone is claiming that, but WAE make among other things the batteries used in Formula E and they know a thing or two about the tech.

The motors are being made by Integral Powertrain - who are the reason I live in MK incidentally - and they also know a thing or two. Their motors are nearly as good as ours

[The Spin Doctor]

The aforementioned Triumph uses battery tech which is being developed in conjunction with Williams Advanced Engineering and they're claiming leaps in performance. Of course, everyone is claiming that, but WAE make among other things the batteries used in Formula E and they know a thing or two about the tech.

The motors are being made by Integral Powertrain - who are the reason I live in MK incidentally - and they also know a thing or two. Their motors are nearly as good as ours

Yes, I have been covering the Triumph development since the first announcement... and the Williams / Integral links should give them a leg up the development ladder.

The proof will be when we see something on the road at a competitive price. No good if the technology is at F1 prices.

[Rockburner]

(I thought we had a 'leccy bikes thread.... )

Currently I'm very nearly tempted to pick up one of these :




It's obviously an 'East-Asian' product of relatively dubious manufacturing quality and I've seen the same photos under at least 3 different brand/model names across the various leccy-bike websites, with differing specs, eg:
https://www.whizzbikes.co.uk/e-mopeds/milano.html
https://urbanebikes.com/collections/ele ... rtisan-evc
https://www.electricbikescootercar.co.u ... motorbike/

It's a 125cc 'equivalent' and (allegedly) will do about 50, and have a 60mile range - which should be ok for country roads and plenty for in town.
It's relatively cheap and would do us perfectly for a run-about to get into town / down to the coast and we can then save the car for longer journeys (and getting caught in traffic).

This place ( https://www.whizzbikes.co.uk/e-mopeds/milano.html ) is just down the road from us and is happily punting them out, so I won't have to go far if anything fails.

[Dodgy69]

What about...

https://www.autocarindia.com/bike-news/ ... led-422389

[Rockburner]

Is it just me - or is there a certain emptiness in the e-bike market where 'mid-range' bikes are?

E-bikes still seem to be either 50 or 125 equivalent ("learner-legal" or "ride on your car licence" (same thing)), eg the larger Super Soco bikes; or full on top-of-the-range "high-capacity-equivalence" (eg Zero, Energica etc).

There doesn't seem to be a "300-500cc" equivalent - top speed around 75 (ie motorway capable), range of around 100 miles, but lighter-weight frame and modest running gear: the equivalent of a CB500 as it were.

Unless I've completely missed them??

[dern]

I think the power delivery that electric motors bring looks really exciting. Just waiting for the charge times to come down, the range to go up and the price to go down... like everyone else.

[Count Steer]

Is it just me - or is there a certain emptiness in the e-bike market where 'mid-range' bikes are?

E-bikes still seem to be either 50 or 125 equivalent ("learner-legal" or "ride on your car licence" (same thing)), eg the larger Super Soco bikes; or full on top-of-the-range "high-capacity-equivalence" (eg Zero, Energica etc).

There doesn't seem to be a "300-500cc" equivalent - top speed around 75 (ie motorway capable), range of around 100 miles, but lighter-weight frame and modest running gear: the equivalent of a CB500 as it were.

Unless I've completely missed them??

The BMW CE 04 is supposed to do 75mph and 80 miles range (but the range at 75mph is probably only about 30 miles and they say they don't plan to introduce a longer range version). The mid-range stuff will surely follow though.

That ^ scooter looks interesting at under £3k, but, as you say, I'd want the dealer to be close by!

[Mr. Dazzle]

You either fit a generic off the shelf-ish motor and a small battery that's basically a cube, or you make a fully integrated motor/battery/frame solution which has loads of power.

Making a battery 'a bit bigger' but not making it custom fitted around all the frame is still quite hard. It's also worth remembering that battery size and battery power are intrinsically linked. Long range batteries also give you loads of power and there's no real advantage in make a large battery vehicle with a small motor. Really powerful electric motors are perfectly capable of runnning at high efficiency even when only doing 10% of their maximum, unlike a piston engine.

Imagine how weird ICEs would be if the size of the pipe coming out of the fuel tank was inseparably linked to how big the tank is.

[A_morti]

Is it just me - or is there a certain emptiness in the e-bike market where 'mid-range' bikes are?

There doesn't seem to be a "300-500cc" equivalent - top speed around 75 (ie motorway capable), range of around 100 miles, but lighter-weight frame and modest running gear: the equivalent of a CB500 as it were.

It's seemingly dropped off the planet, but I had/have big hopes for this:

https://electrek.co/2021/04/09/exclusiv ... irst-look/

The NIU electric scooters aren't too bad for what they are and they have a good dealer network, so I wouldn't be too worried about buying one. I might not want to let it sleep outside, mind.

[Taipan]

Is it just me - or is there a certain emptiness in the e-bike market where 'mid-range' bikes are?

E-bikes still seem to be either 50 or 125 equivalent ("learner-legal" or "ride on your car licence" (same thing)), eg the larger Super Soco bikes; or full on top-of-the-range "high-capacity-equivalence" (eg Zero, Energica etc).

There doesn't seem to be a "300-500cc" equivalent - top speed around 75 (ie motorway capable), range of around 100 miles, but lighter-weight frame and modest running gear: the equivalent of a CB500 as it were.

Unless I've completely missed them??

Zero M/cycles cover that area but they are crazy expensive.

[Mr. Dazzle]

Zero M/cycles cover that area but they are crazy expensive.

That's probably 'cause they're using a reasonbly bespoke set of motors and batteries to fit around their bike - or they've fitted the bike around them, same thing really. They're designed together.

The effort to do that doesn't scale with performance, so it's just as expensive to do it on a 70bhp bike as it is on a 170bhp bike, give or take. As above, for a low powered thing you've got wiggle room on battery size and placement, as soon as you get a bit juicey you need a nice well fitted in battery that's made just for your shape. We're all accustomed to a clear price/performance relationship because piston engines are very well established now, but EVs haven't got there yet.

[Rockburner]

You either fit a generic off the shelf-ish motor and a small battery that's basically a cube, or you make a fully integrated motor/battery/frame solution which has loads of power.

Making a battery 'a bit bigger' but not making it custom fitted around all the frame is still quite hard. It's also worth remembering that battery size and battery power are intrinsically linked. Long range batteries also give you loads of power and there's no real advantage in make a large battery vehicle with a small motor. Really powerful electric motors are perfectly capable of runnning at high efficiency even when only doing 10% of their maximum, unlike a piston engine.

Imagine how weird ICEs would be if the size of the pipe coming out of the fuel tank was inseparably linked to how big the tank is.

I take the point about the physical facts - however there isn't really a mid-range 'priced' market either - eg, you either get poxy mopeds at around £3-4K, or super-dupers at £12k+ - there's virtually nothing in between for the 'normal' person.

[Rockburner]

Is it just me - or is there a certain emptiness in the e-bike market where 'mid-range' bikes are?

There doesn't seem to be a "300-500cc" equivalent - top speed around 75 (ie motorway capable), range of around 100 miles, but lighter-weight frame and modest running gear: the equivalent of a CB500 as it were.

It's seemingly dropped off the planet, but I had/have big hopes for this:

https://electrek.co/2021/04/09/exclusiv ... irst-look/

The NIU electric scooters aren't too bad for what they are and they have a good dealer network, so I wouldn't be too worried about buying one. I might not want to let it sleep outside, mind.

Yeah - the Nius look ok - not sure they do a 125 equivalent? (ie a 50-60mph capable bike)

[Rockburner]

This look interesting, but again - it's oodles of cash (if it even makes it to production)



very little info on the website: https://www.vergemotorcycles.com/ Which makes me think it's a startup looking for VC cash.

(personally, I'd like a touch more bodywork for my money - especially around the rear of the bike - first whiff of a damp road and you're going to have a muddy streak up your back. )