rev up your engines, today I'm gonna talk about electric motorcycles and they're
not just some concept these things have been around for 10 years, now granted
it's not a new idea but it didn't go like this thing does, we're talking
high-tech speed machine and as you can see everything here of course is
computerized, now the company zero manufactures them in California they
make all kinds of different electric motorcycles, off-road trail ones, but of
course I'm looking at their speed demon that's what I'd be interested in and
yeah I'm not making this up there's a charger for it right there, there's no gas
in the gas tank, there's no gas tank it's got big lithium batteries and a giant
electric motor right here, plus it's got a low maintenance rubber belt it doesn't
have a chain that you have to mess around with, this being their speed demon
it's got big tires in the back and serious double discs on the front but
since it's an electric motorcycle it's got regenerative braking too, they
actually go much further in a city than they do on a highway, it can go 161 miles
in the city stopping and going, of course when you're sitting those stoplights an
electric motor doesn't use any power then and you'll notice that it's
different from any other motorcycle, it's got a throttle but there's no clutch and
there's no gear shifter, this side is totally barem and since I've been
driving motorcycles since I was a teenager boy and it takes some getting used to
for me, I'm grabbing for the clutch I look for where to shift, these you just
twist and go that's all there is to it, now this particular bike is geared for
super speed taking off, it doesn't have top-end speed, the top-end speed is
like 110 miles an hour, I mean who needs to go faster than that anyways, but it's
set up to get from zero to 110 miles an hour extremely quickly, now if someone
wanted to they could set it up to go any speed they wanted, but you would lose
acceleration on it, like I said there's no gears it's just an electric motor
that drives it directly so you can set it up to have super acceleration or you
could set it up to have super high speed if you really wanted, but people buy
these because they're quick and they want to zip around, this isn't a drag racer you don't
take this to the drag races, because it can gonna only go 110 miles an hour
the batteries are still heavy but nothing like in a Tesla, so they will recharge
somewhat faster if you're just plugging them into your
house it's gonna take a while, if it's fully discharged about 8 hours or
so, but they have a fast charger setup that you can get they can charge it up
and maybe for hours, and the battery packs they have a pretty long life
they claim that it doesn't get below 80 percent on some of these till you've
gone one hundred and eighty two hundred thousand miles, so you're not really
gonna have to worry about the battery going bad for quite some time, the only
problem is the range, this is not a touring bike, if on the highway you can go
fifty five miles you're not gonna be touring for very long
now one aspect of electric motors make some people really happy and it makes
some people really sad, the downside is it's an electric motorcycle it doesn't
make any noise so your neighbors will love you, you'll have the quietest
motorcycle on the planet, but if you drive in traffic nobody's gonna hear it
now I know Harley's working on an electric motorcycle they say they're
gonna have speakers on it they're gonna make noise so it sounds like a
motorcycle so people can hear you and won't say, what gee I didn't hear that
motorcycle it was going 90 miles an hour and I knocked it over, and the other aspect
that I find somewhat strange is that since it's an electric motorcycle a lot
of guys buy motorcycles they like modifying them, well there's really
nothing you need to modify it's an electric motor with a huge battery, you
don't have to tinker with them, I mean I grew up on triumphs and Norton's and
BSA's and we're always adjusting carburetors adjusting the valves, fixing oil
leaks, on the other hand a lot of guys like mess around with stuff like that
and they don't want something that just goes and doesn't have any problems, and
of course being an electric motorcycle they have 100% of their power as soon as
you turn them on, so it's not like a gasoline motor second we got a rather
the engine up either the clutch and pop off as soon as you twist that grip, you
got power to the wheel and it goes, this particular one has a hundred and forty
pound foot of torque, it's got a lot of torque going to the rear wheel and since
it has an electric motor there's no power loss, there's no gears there's just
a motor that runs a belt that turns the rear wheels, and being on
electric it's about abs brakes various modes you can put it on power
traction street, torque, you can race it any way you want to drive it, their not giving
this away, this particular one is about twenty thousand dollars, now me
like motorcycles that still make a lotta noise
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