Upgrade to enjoy this feature!
Vital MX fantasy is free to play, but Premium users receive great benefits. Premium benefits include:
- View and download rider stats
- Pick trends
- Create a private league
- And more!
Only $10 for all 2026 SX, MX, and SMX series.
I hope with the technology it opens up more places to ride. Noise and dust are two major complaints around this area.
I got to play around on one of these out at the desert the other day. Pretty damn cool and fun but pretty expensive. would be super cool in an urban area though.
to keep it brief, sounds like you believe wayyyy too much of what you read on the net... and I'm not saying that in a negative way or as a personal attack, just saying most of the things you state are not completely true... for example, "Lipo batteries are inherently dangerous".... 1. how many have you personally had that went into thermal runaway?... I've used thousands, and besides a few dozen venting internally, I've never had one go into thermal runaway without personally forcing it to do so.. Do you drive with gas in your car??? how many times has your gas tank randomly exploded? yet gas could be said to be "inherently dangerous" as well...
Also... what kind of batteries do you think come in most mobile electronics now days? a solid percentage are lithium polymer, but all are a variant of a lithium based cell... how can they be a dead end if they are inside everything?
The Shop
Luxon 4-Post Bar Mounts
$189.95 - $239.95
DeCal Works Huge Plastic Inventory of UFO and Polisport kits.
Pros
1. They are an American company and I support that.
2. I can see that it would be cool to be able to ride them in more areas that you couldn't get away with on a noisy bike with an engine. With that said, the tree hugggers will still find a reason to ban them, like erosion, or ruining the spotted owl habitat etc....
3. I'm ok with it, if we aren't "at some point" forced to buy and ride them by either not given a choice by the manufacturers, or govt intervention.
Cons
1. I just don't see them lasting a moto with a top pro on the throttle, BUT, I'll reserve that until I see some testing that proves otherwise.
2. I just don't see the general public showing up to electric bike races, there's something about the sounds and smells of bikes with engines that can't be replaced in my opinion.
3. The electricity that is required to charge them comes from power plants, which I'm sorry, but wind and hydroelectric plants can't come close to producing enough power for all the bikes and cars, if everyone started buying them, or were forced to do so. With that said, Coal fired plants and nuclear plants pick up the bulk of the load, so where is the net gain? Also, all the spent batteries are toxic waste that will pile up "somewhere"
Always, these are MY OPINIONS, it's sad that anything posted on a forum, has to have some sort of scientific data to back up anything that is said, but oh well...
Electric motors have so much torque...100% @ 0rpm and when battery tech increases and gets smaller theres a possibility of extremely light bikes, traction control, electronically controlled engine breaking...endless possibilities. With the amount of torque and how light these bikes could be you could see quads out of corners, insanely complex rythm sections, a total rethinking of track design.
I was at fenway tonight and baseball is about as quiet a sport there is. It was still loud from the crowd loudspeakers etc... I know I would personally hate to see them move away from engines, but if it happens I hope it was worth it with next gen performancce.
I own several "electric pedal assist" mountain bikes and they are simply amazing. The technology is so cool and it's advancing at an exponential rate, particularly battery and the control software which I'm pretty familiar with.
So I got an Alta. Here's my initial impression after two practice days at the track.
The bike feels very heavy rolling around and loading up. This sensation is made a bit worse buy the motor "cogging" affect due to the strong magnets in the motor (its always turning, no neutral). I definitely wouldn't want to push the bike for very long! However, as the reviews state, once in motion the feeling of heaviness for the most part goes away. Where I feel the weight most is flat landing jumps where the inertial advantages of the electric motor don't help. There's simply no way landing a 260lb bike is going to feel like a modern 250F (the claimed competition and my last bike). Also, if you get way out of shape you'll feel it as well.
Honestly, just about everywhere else I feel it has an advantage over my 250F. On the next to last most aggressive software map (map 3) it'll rip right along side any 250. I tried the most aggressive setting but frankly need time to adjust as some of my old riding habits got me scared a few times. For example, landing a typical 250F with the throttle on will most likely put you off the max torque curve but with the Alta landing with the throttle in the same fashion (map 4) results in the bike shooting forward with the front wheel headed for the sky. Definitely need time to adjust. Since the throttle is "fly by wire" the software controls the sensitivity to input. Right now Alta controls all the parameters in each map, but I suspect someone (if not Alta) will hack into the motor controller and allow the owner to adjust all the performance parameters themselves.
Where I found the most advantage was braking into and accelerating out of corners. With no way to stall the motor and with full (as programed) torque available at any motor speed you can literally crush the binders and even with the weight make your line. Alta did a good job with the motor control software as it's super easy to just roll on the throttle and go. No jerkiness, no hesitation, no standing up mid corner, just smooth acceleration. The more you twist the faster you go. It's that simple. Cornering wise I think it feels better than my 2015 YZF. I always practice figure 8s to get a feel for bike balance and the Alta was badass. You could back it in flat track style or use the front wheel for steer in and it's so easy to accelerate out without any gyrations, even on hardpack, With the lack of vibration and sound, I can feel/hear the traction between the ground and the tires better. Very cool.
Overall handing is very neutral, not too front end heavy/light and it tracked well. Suspension is always a personal preference and I'd say for me its was a bit soft and fast with the factory settings. I cranked in some comp and rebound but need to ride some more tracks before I can make a final judgment.
I think the bike sounds cool, and yes you can hear it just fine even next to a couple of other bikes. I'm not sure what to expect in a typical first turn condition, however.
I couldn't tell you if the battery will last 30+2 with a pro as all I care about is 15-20 minute motos at Vet speed which It'll surely do. However, charging between motos will be required based on my experience. I have a 220V generator that'll charge it from almost dead to full in about an 90 minutes. I suspect that after practice and one moto it'll still have about 20% charge left, so maybe 60 minutes on the generator would be required.
I haven't noticed any performance drop off as the battery approached 15-20% remaining. Again, faster riders may experience something else. From my knowledge, the system has several failsafe features which could cause loss of performance, one being motor temperature. I suppose if someone rode it hard enough and long enough (very low battery and high temps) the software would intervene. If I was a pro I wouldn't appreciate a sudden loss of power approaching a big double. Luckily, I don't need to worry about that!
I got issues with some of the engineering, manufacturing and production details of the bike, but nothing major.
Anyway, I was afraid I wouldn't like the bike but I'm pleasantly surprised and quite pleased so far. More time will tell.
It all depends on what you call dangerous. Are you going to argue that Lipo's are one of the most volatile and dangerous battery technologies there are? You may have 100 times more experience with them than me (other than in my cellphone etc, I only own a few for my RC cars) and never had any problems, but that only means that you know how to treat them right, not that they aren't dangerous.
The cellphone/computer argument gets brought up every time but IMO it's completely beside the point. Consumer electronics have built in microprocessors to regulate battery voltage, current drain, temperature etc plus the drain is steady and only a few Amps max. Take a look into the RC industry and you'll see what can happen even to guys that take the best care of their batteries. I can google you a few stories in about 5 minutes of houses being burnt down, track pits destroyed RC cars going up in flames because they flew in something, etc.
Don't get me wrong, lipo's are an awesome technology but I'm pretty sure it's no secret most of the electronics industry desperately wants to get away from them (ask Samsung, lol) and another quick google search shows that companies (and universities) are pumping billions of dollars into a new sustainable technology with a much higher enery density and a lot more safety.
Pit Row
Post a reply to: Blake Wharton on Alta Electric for Outdoors?