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Well, kids, it’s happening. For realz. This September we’re re-booting the Mt. Washington Auto Road’s legendary “Alternative Energy Regatta”, and we’re bringing everything to the table. Not only the crazy, brilliant, one-off creations in the spirit of the original Regatta, but we’re focusing on what’s now mainstream, current, and available. Look for everything from the big automakers to vendors showing parts and pieces of EV systems, home and industrial renewable energy systems to the latest developments from labs, garages and shops all over New England. Look also for some key “Roundtable” discussions about some important questions, hosted by people with experience and resources to bring good answers to the table.
The Mount Washington Auto Road ALT-Energy Summit of 2013 will be on Sept. 14/15, and will include demonstrations, test drives, and even the “Regatta Parade” where you can see and cheer on your favorite vehicle. The Regatta will be run, and awards will be given for the most interesting and ingenius solutions. We’ll meet owners’ clubs of some of the most innovative vehicles on the road – Tesla, Nissan, Chevy – and we can hear directly from them about their EV and Hybrid ownership experience. It’s going to really be a “summit”, and a keystone event for all of New England’s renewable energy.
Here’s a download of the official press release: Alt Energy Summit 2013 6.12.13
If you’re a builder, well, start building! If you’re a dealer, vendor or enthusiast, we want you there… check back for details or shoot me an email here, and I’ll update you as we tighten up the information. Here, in the meantime, is the link to the Mount Washington Auto Road post about the weekend.
For some of the background on the Alternative Energy Regatta, check these links: Category: Mount Washington
Yeah, OK… I’ll dish. I am, in fact, the Director of this esteemed event. I wanted “Grand Poo-Bah“. Better hat. And if you don’t believe it, here’s me doing the Directorial thing with the Granite State Clean Cities Coalition yesterday, planning and plotting… (I’m the one with the sexy shirt.)
Well yeah. I’m into motorcycles. Not so much cars. But I’m also into hillclimbs it’s becoming quite apparent. And of course, electric stuff. So the Pikes Peak run is this weekend, right? And this is what Mitsubishi is gonna run:
Absolute hotness.
Here’s a demonstration of the swappable car packs in the SRI EV1:
..granted, you need a small crane/lift. But still. Car. Swappable packs. Awesomeness.
As The Electric Chronicles nears 800 posts and nearly 200,000 views, a lot has changed since my first posts. Building electric motorcycle conversions is a little easier, and even a bit more common than when I started with my first posts and couldn’t find information, help, or parts (even from suppliers). There are now bikes you can buy “off the shelf”, and the number grows.
I’ve kept The Electric Chronicles up for one main reason – to provide a fast, easy way to find good information, help, and answers about the principles, parts, supplies, help available and even some of the news and events of what can now be called a sport. Go to the Search bar and put in what you’re looking for… you should find more than a few posts, with good links, to help you out. I try to find reliable sources, but also post what I feel is the most helpful information – personal experience – because we all know about the difference between theory and practice.
I had no idea this would last this long. When I started it seemed like kind of an interesting little obsession, and I may or may not actually build a bike, but I figured it wouldn’t go much further than that. Every morning I get on, read some stuff, and if I see something that I need to refer back to or find interesting I’ll post it. (If you want to see the early years, check out this post “a long, strange trip and my first blog from 2006: “. t h e . e v M C . p r o j e c t .“ here.).
Seven years and 765 posts later we have what I hope is a good reference, a compendium of sorts of EV and electric motorcycle information. It’s lasted through a few “day jobs”, resulted in what I’ve been told is a helpful little book, and, now, after more than a decade of working outside jobs I’ve made the leap back to what I know, love, and did for over 25 years – running my own business… or to be more precise, businesses. As I look at all the things I do that I love, feel are worthwhile, and want to continue, The Electric Chronicles is near the top of the list. …so I ask for your help.
If you’re one of the several hundred folks each day who log in to see what’s new, I’d like to ask you for a token of your support. Click the link below and make a donation. Any amount will help, and it all goes to show me that this has all been worth it…
Let the record show I think the fully faired “dustbin” style streamlining fairings are among the ugliest sights on God’s Green Earth. Hell. I don’t even much like full race fairings, and in spite of all the wisdom and numbers I can see about efficiency I doubt I’ll ever spring for one. I may… one day, in a fit of dementia, buy one of those classic, 1970s style race fairings that the TD3 used to run, but I’m not counting on it. So there.
That said, I’ve been curious about fairings and aerodynamics in general, and the difference between an unfaired bike, a race fairing and the full-on streamliner fairing. Well, I found this graphic on the Shultz Engineering site. He’s manic into electric motocycles anyway so it’s a great link, but here’s the graphic.
OK, that’s a surprise. The racing fairing, a “modern” one at that, has almost double the Coefficient of Drag as a full Front/Rear. That results in what looks like 25 – 30% more force on the bike at 50mph*. Um. yeah. OK. More than double the full Front/Rear and you get the unfaired bike, and that’s about 50% more than the race fairing. Damn.
*Don’t you dare give me crap about my maths. I guessed, from the pitcha. If you have exact numbers then post them graciously and I’ll take credit for them and act like I figured them out myself.
This is nuts.
First in my book is the Isle of Man TT Zero, where the Buckeye Electric Team is racing with Rob Barber. Our boy Kyle Ginaven is there, and it looks like the best place to follow this action is here, on ElMoto.net: TTZero 2013 This video is kind of awesome:
Ron and the Buckeye is second bike you see here… passing through Bray Hill.
Besides that, take a look at these times, from yesterday (6/3):
John McGuinness (3) 2013 MUGEN Shinden Ni 109.038
Michael Rutter (1) 2013 MotoCzysz E1pc 107.602
Mark Miller (2) 2013 MotoCzysz E1PC 105.806
Robert Barber (10) RW-2 Electric 91.768
McGuinness is set to kick MotoCzysz butt, or at least keep ‘em honest, and electric lap records are dropping like flies.
Next we have Terry Hershner riding his streamlined Zero across the country, from LA to FL, with all the drama of, well, a very dramatic drama. (…where’s that coffee?) He left LA with a band of electric ruffians as an escort to the state lines, or somewhere like that, and promptly ran into traffic jam after traffic jam. Hitting Texas, he eventually hit Hell. In Katy Texas his motor bearings blew, and he proceeded to replace the motor on a sidewalk. Follow his action here, on the Off The Grid Facebook page. He’s trying to be the first, and fastest, electric motorcycle to ride across the country. Follow his progress here, scroll down to the map.
To add drama to an already dramatic journey, check this out. Moto Electra started from Jacksonville FL yesterday to do the same thing, and they’re calling it the Electric Cannonball run. They have a support team with generator charging, to get around all that riding-around-looking-for-a-charging-station hassle, and are looking to set the record in a 3-day ride by none other than our buddy Thad Wolff. Read their press release here, and follow them here on their Facebook page. John Wild, team member, is posting their location here, also on Facebook. It looks like the best bet for following them is their Twitter feed here: Electric Cannonball. There’s also their Glypse page here.
Finally, of course, Mission Motors released the news on their production bike. The best story I’ve seen on that is in RideApart, here. Yeah. Badass. But no hot asian chicks. Here’s the video, complete with one wheelie.
Oh and the shot at the top? Shelina kickin’ a little GASbike BUTT at Thunderhill this weekend. Photos here on the Brammo FB page.
..have I forgotten anything?
Now that the R5eIII is in good shape, it’s time to take the Sawzall to the dirt bike, and start checking fit and layout.
This is the shot I’ll use to plan the motor mount:
.and rough blocking out for the components:
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