Harley E Bike

[scumdog]

It won´t take long for them to give better 1/4 mile times than geared ICE bikes. Instant max torque from the word go no timewasting gearshifts, direct 2WD. I love ICE and for me the extreme performance that electric bikes will be capable of in 20 years time could never make up for the sound of a Vtwin or V8.

A knight rider style "swooosh" sound I could live with though.

Lack of range will fuck th e'lectics up for a few years to come.
I doubt many could do 500lm in a day without a lenthy recharge.

Maybe service stations with pre-charged exchange power-packs might be the go?

[Woodman]

Lack of range will fuck th e'lectics up for a few years to come.
I doubt many could do 500lm in a day without a lenthy recharge.

Maybe service stations with pre-charged exchange power-packs might be the go?

Was reading in a motortrade mag at work about some japanese new battery that has been patented. No precious metals, just carbon based. Range has been almost doubled and about 12 minutes recharge time for a Nissan Leaf sized battery.

Intersting times.

[R650R]

Although my guess is that most of the online hater types haven't actually wound the throttle on - on a modern electric bike.

I used to work for a company that specialised in torque/speed control systems for electric motors, and that was years ago before the technology is what it is today.
The torque curves and rideability/traction properties of these machines could be awesome.
My beef with the whole electric/hybrid scene is we are being forced into it by the environmental lobbys and govt before the technology is properly sorted.
There's a lot of consumer goods out there now where the battery life (eg ipads/iphones) doesn't live up to manufacturer claims and its under less strain. Will be interesting to see how the electric machines would cope with being ridden hard in a kiwi summer, heat is the enemy of batteries.
Electricty infrastructure around the world is already stretched in most developed countries, where will all the extra power come from to recharge a nation of electric vehicles???
I think we're still a good decade away at least from surpassing the reliability of petrol/diesel as a stored energy source.

[scumdog]

, where will all the extra power come from to recharge a nation of electric vehicles???

Petrol powered generators??

[R650R]

Petrol powered generators??

Won't the pitlane be noisier than ever

Actually that reminds me of another dirty secret of the green movement when they harp on about renewable energy.
Hydro only makes up about 63% of NZ electric generation, the rest comes from BURNING COAL and NATURAL GAS...
Everytime some self righteous prick in Remuera plugs in their Prius a kitten dies in Huntly from breathing in all the coal smoke...

[HenryDorsetCase]

Everytime some self righteous prick in Remuera plugs in their Prius a kitten dies in Huntly from breathing in all the coal smoke...

LOLOLOL

you should run for Parliament. Or at least be writing speeches for Simon Bridges.

[HenryDorsetCase]

I think we're still a good decade away at least from surpassing the reliability of petrol/diesel as a stored energy source.

I read something about energy density once. The joules of energy stored in a litre of petrol vs the joules of energy stored in a litre of battery and there was no comparison.

Where I see electric vehicles being useful is if instead of me firing up my car for a pootle to work six k away, i use my electic car. or better yet my electric motorbike. short run, urban. It has benefits for air quality in the cities (and who really gives a fuck about Huntly? I mean I care about the kittens there but not so much the people) etc. blah.

I just want to ride one.

[HenryDorsetCase]

Lack of range will fuck th e'lectics up for a few years to come.
I doubt many could do 500lm in a day without a lenthy recharge.

Maybe service stations with pre-charged exchange power-packs might be the go?

or you have your behemoth Road King for 500k a day, and you ride something light, nippy and electric round town.

[george formby]

Was reading in a motortrade mag at work about some japanese new battery that has been patented. No precious metals, just carbon based. Range has been almost doubled and about 12 minutes recharge time for a Nissan Leaf sized battery.

Intersting times.

I read about that on Gizmag. Interesting indeed.

[Big Dave]

Will be interesting to see how the electric machines would cope with being ridden hard in a kiwi summer, heat is the enemy of batteries.

Should be fine. Somewhere warm could be an issue :-?

[FJRider]

How is it going to make the farting sound?

It won't matter ... most Harleys spend most of their lives parked up ... near at pub or cafe ...

Will They try to patent the sound of silence too ... ???

[FJRider]

I doubt many could do 500lm in a day without a lengthy recharge.

I would think the same of many Harley riders ...

Maybe service stations with pre-charged exchange power-packs might be the go?

Probably ... available at "Approved" Harley Davidson Dealerships" ...


Maybe ..



Ikamatua service Center has declined to stock them ...

[jonbuoy]

Won't the pitlane be noisier than ever

Actually that reminds me of another dirty secret of the green movement when they harp on about renewable energy.
Hydro only makes up about 63% of NZ electric generation, the rest comes from BURNING COAL and NATURAL GAS...
Everytime some self righteous prick in Remuera plugs in their Prius a kitten dies in Huntly from breathing in all the coal smoke...

Only 63%?? That's pretty high by worldwide standards. Not sure what electric cars do about airconditioning- not a big problem in NZ but for a lot of countries AC is needed for the majority of the year.

[Urano]

Lack of range will fuck th e'lectics up for a few years to come.

i'm firmly convinced that the range by itself is the wrong side to look at the problem.
i can totally accept a range of 100-150 km IF the time to recharge completely is not longer than 2 minutes.
the real issue is that nowadays you need 6 hours to top up.
that's what turns everything down.
new high voltage recharger can shot it down to one hour but they're bulky heavy and expensive.
they can make thing better with cars though. the current ( ) smart electric drive has 110-120 kms of "real world" range, and can be equipped with a quick charger to fill it up in an hour.
it's clear that it's not unlikely to pass 1 hour to a someplace you go, so this thing can actually double you're range. despite this it's still too slow to have effects on "long shot trips".

i believe that this level of performance will be hardly passed if we don't switch from a chem to a physical technology for the batteries...

[Urano]

Hydro only makes up about 63% of NZ electric generation, the rest comes from BURNING COAL and NATURAL GAS...

Only 63%?? That's pretty high by worldwide standards.

true.
63% is unbelievably high.
i'm dubious about it actually.