perfect commuter bike!

[reiobard]

ok, so someone out in CA or OR NEEDS to go test ride one of these things! 100% electric, 60 MPH and 42 mile average range. If you are near one of the test ride locations (Select Best Buy's?) can you ride it and give an impression, and ask about extended run batteries? it might be worth it to have a next to nothing commuting cost for 9 months out of the year.

I would need to squeeze about 80 miles out of the bike to make it to and from work. (I might be able to convince my work to let me plug it in, but with a 39 mile commute, i would want more than a 3 mile average range buffer...)

BRAMMO Enertia powercycle : 100% Electric Motorcycle : Home

 

[zigzagg321]

that looks cool!

 

[Coopdman]

Very cool! :thumbup: Saw this when Popular Science covered it. Just wish it could do more than 20+ miles on the highway, then it'd become my daily commuter.

 

[Gilo-FZ6]

its the future of commuting ..then get the MX for the weekends

 

[dean owens]

i don't know that it's the future of commuting or even that much of a money saver. if you think about it....

$7000.00 to buy the bike.

i drive ~40 miles round trip

gas prices right now are about $2.70 per gallon

at 40 mpg i go through ~$14.00 a week in commuter gas

so $7000.00/$14.00 = 500 weeks of commuting

i probably commute less than 40 weeks a year but we'll go with 40

500/40 = 12.5 years before the bike pays for itself.

sure that doesn't deal with tires, but you have them on there as well. and it doesn't factor in oil changes and maintenance, but you're going to have some maintenance on it as well. and then insurance for another vehicle. let's say that rather than 12.5 years it starts paying for itself after 7 years... will you have it that long? will it last that long?

i like the idea of another toy, but the technology isn't there yet to make this a money saver for me.

 

[Gilo-FZ6]

i agree..for now its probably gonna be a "statment" accesory for celebs and such but as with anything, as time goes on prices will drop or the government might even offer a "green subsidy" (yeah right)

 

[CHEMIKER]

The San Carlos Best Buy is 18 minutes from work for me. Might be worth the trip during lunch one day next week to check it out...

EDIT: Did you notice the range? It's opposite of gas powered bikes - the faster you go the less range you have. High speed commuting (which is what I do) only gives 20+ miles That won't even get me to work. Electric bikes might be a technology worth exploring, but for me it's not there yet.

 

[Gilo-FZ6]

Electric bikes might be a technology worth exploring, but for me it's not there yet.

I'll garrantee it is there ,but oil corporations/motoring manufacturers wont want it hitting the high street just yet. (no im not a conspiracy theorist :BLAA: )

 

[BusyWeb]

Hi, Mr. Dean.
You're absolutely right for individuals.
I have never thought about that long periode to pay-off.. ha ha ha

One more thought, if all (not all then Many) of us are participated in this calculation,
it might go huge add up for final statistic results. ??

 

[reiobard]

well, my payoff is a bit different than yours, i commute 80 miles/day so using the same numbers, it would be closer to 5 years to pay for itself

but i agree, i need more miles per charge. I am on mostly back roads, mostly 40 MPH, some areas are 30 MPH and some are 50 MPH, so if i could get it to do that and lets say 150-200 miles/charge, then i would be all over this thing. not that i would get rid of my "Real" motorcycle, but it would be a perfect commuter.

Let's hope the technology gets better soon!

 

[Ridgeback]

Our Government taxes the crap out of us under Enviromental pretexts
then soon as something 'Green' comes along,they tax that to hell under some bs excuse

I could see what would happen here,you,d get tax breaks for buying it,then they'd ramp the price through the roof at charging stations

 

[dean owens]

well, my payoff is a bit different than yours, i commute 80 miles/day so using the same numbers, it would be closer to 5 years to pay for itself

but i agree, i need more miles per charge. I am on mostly back roads, mostly 40 MPH, some areas are 30 MPH and some are 50 MPH, so if i could get it to do that and lets say 150-200 miles/charge, then i would be all over this thing. not that i would get rid of my "Real" motorcycle, but it would be a perfect commuter.

Let's hope the technology gets better soon!

and there in lies another issue with the technology. it would pay for itself quicker for you, but there's no way i'd attempt a 38 mile ride on something that has a max range of 42 miles. something like 100 miles would be good.

maybe some day it'll get there. but right now there's just nothing that competes with gas. and even if it does you're going to have disposal issues as well as everything used to make the batteries and ship them.

i ain't gonna lie though, i'd like to have one. everything i've read and heard says that electric motors are very torquie. i'm sure it's a blast to ride.

 

[bd43]

I saw this video on Jay Leno's Garasge a while back and thought about it for a while.

Brammo Enertia Powercycle - Electric - Jay Leno's Garage

Would be cool to have one and a blast to ride.

 

[vinpub]

I see two issues: Range and replacement cost of the battery (battery life?).
Range: At this range (40-45 miles top) it is more of an accessory vehicle, because you still have to have another vehicle for longer trips. That means its added cost ($7995 vs savings on short trip commute) as someone calculated earlier. May be it will be different for anyone who uses bike exclusively for commute today and never for longer trips (and that is not too long, that's 45 miles top).
May be for city use/college students? But then a scooter which is about half the price and >70 mpg is lot more versatile on speed and especially range. And in that case, if your travel is limited to short range (like around college campus or city) the miles per month could be low enough that the payoff from savings on gas (calculate with scooters 70 mpg) for the price diff of $3-3500 is going to take a long time. Even if you use ~200 m/week (that's a lot) and use 70mpg the payoff will be > 400 weeks ~ 8 years. And lower the travel miles the payoff is even longer.
Battery life and replacement cost: I didn't find any data on expected battery life or replacement cost. Electric car batteries I gather could last up to 50-70K miles but replacement is > $10,000 (I may be wrong). Current generation bike engines can last easily 70-80K or even 100K miles. Will need more data for the life of the battery and replacement cost comparison.
So as i see, usability and the economics are still in doubt. Unless the range gets to be close to 100 miles/charge at 50-60 mph for the same price range or the price comes down below $4500, this will be hard to justify, especially against the current generation of scooters.
P.S. No, I don't work for a scooter company/dealership nor do I work for an oil company - just a regular consumer with college age kids, who looked at it as a practical alternative in our situation. Wouldn't work for us...

 

[deeptekkie]

well, my payoff is a bit different than yours, i commute 80 miles/day so using the same numbers, it would be closer to 5 years to pay for itself

but i agree, i need more miles per charge. I am on mostly back roads, mostly 40 MPH, some areas are 30 MPH and some are 50 MPH, so if i could get it to do that and lets say 150-200 miles/charge, then i would be all over this thing. not that i would get rid of my "Real" motorcycle, but it would be a perfect commuter.

Let's hope the technology gets better soon!

What you said: We need range, (more miles per charge). I am certain that battery technology is going to explode with new ideas soon, but for now what you and so many others have pointed out is that range seems to be the problem.
One other thing too is battery life. Doesn't range decrease with age and from what I've read, these batteries are good for what, around five years, tops? It has to be very expensive to replace them too.
I suppose currently, a potetial buyer would just have to ask themselves: How green do I want to be?

 

[deeptekkie]

I saw this video on Jay Leno's Garasge a while back and thought about it for a while.

Brammo Enertia Powercycle - Electric - Jay Leno's Garage

Would be cool to have one and a blast to ride.

Thanks for the link, as well as the info about the bike. I was very impressed with Leno's evaluation of the bike. (Better than most that I have read in biker's magazines!) I think the low-end torque, as well as the "quiet factor" are big selling points.