Italian Stallion

[Roland Stone]

Saw a Bloomberg video this morning on the Italian "Energica" electric which besides being a little too sleek looking for my taste and its 150 mph top speed capability (where are wings?), the most serious drawback, my opinion, is the lack of a gearbox, and then there's the price(!), - they want $34,000 for the 500+ pound behemoth.  Imagine getting that slightly off vertical, - it would take two old ladies to pull that off you.

Just getting comfortable with my new Empulse R, I'm finding one of its features I really enjoy is the 6-speed gear box/clutch setup, smoother than my Bonneville's and any Beemer I've owned(R60, R80, K100).  Had no idea how good the gearbox was to be, but it is a feature priority that drew me to the Brammo I now wouldn't do without in considering any electric motorbike.

Kudos to Brammo for an incredably imaginative, well thought out, and designed EV, - definitely a step into the future.  Credit to all those who had a hand in its developent.  That's my Bloomberg note for today........

[protomech]

Some parts of the Energica's styling still bother me, but it's grown on me some.

I think a large part of the weight is the battery chemistry they use. In the Asphalt & Rubber ride report, they state the battery chemistry is LiFePO4, which is not a very dense chemistry. That means the battery is very heavy and very big, which makes the rest of the bike big, which means you need even more motor to get it up to speed.

The Energica is a hard sell over the Brammo and Zero bikes. Even with a larger 11.7 kWh battery, it only has about as much range as the Empulse and about 20% less range than even the middle battery Zero SR .. and I think both the Brammo and Zero bikes will accelerate about as hard at legal speeds. The Energica should pull away at super-legal highway speeds, and probably on the racetrack too .. and maybe that's enough to convince some people to step up from $17-19k to $34k.

[flar]

The claim for the Ego is under 3 seconds 0-60.  They talked about having beat an Italian exotic in an acceleration shoot-out at the test rides.

Having ridden both the Ego and the Empulse, the Ego is very fast even at legal speeds and it never stops pulling.  It feels like the Empulse in first gear (or better) even at passing speeds.  I never got above about 65 on the test ride and was already noticing the incredible power in it.  But, off the line in a red-light situation the Empulse still holds its own there.

One really nice touch on the Ego was that they spent a lot of time getting a smooth "throttle" response, to the point where it may have masked the power at low speeds, but the linearity was just incredible.  The Empulse is very nice too, though it can sometimes be a little clunky when trying to coast, but the Ego went slightly beyond that to the sublime.  That, and the reverse gear/setting on the Ego - oh my!

[00049 (AKA SopFu)]

I got the Empulse over the Zero because of it, but my next eBike is definitely going to be a single speed. I think one of the main advantages to electric is the simplicity, and once power increases to the point where torque at the wheel is enough to give liter-bike acceleration up to passing speeds, there is no reason to have to shift. At the current technology level, the gearbox is nice to have, though.