Anonymous (not verified)
Edited Date/Time
4/9/2018 7:13am
I wonder if an electric bike would have blown up, overheated, or fried a clutch tonight. Don't get me wrong, I love the drama that a bunch of spinning metal provides. I love overly complicated solutions, like someone setting up a series of unneeded events. Think dominoes falling into a maze, then a ball jumps out of nowhere and onto a sweet little crossbow that shoots it at a button to start a coffee maker. What could go wrong? Hopefully nothing, but it'd be fun to tinker with until it did work, just like an engine is. Smoking, revving without moving, spectacular breakdowns where something shoots out the cases and the like are awesome to see and even to experience if you aren't generally hot-headed. But....none of that crap would have happened on an Alta, right? Does this make Alta, notwithstanding the range issue, a better logical choice for the nastiest conditions? Is it, dare I say, a better DIRT bike since it doesn't have a crapload of mechanical things that render it useless when pushed hard?
The Shop
All the e start bikes already carry a battery as is. Now those might need a jump box in order to start the engine but a jump box won’t do shit for a battery powered bike.
Is Feld or the AMA providing special instructions for the e start bikes to the safety crew or flaggers?
Up to now, I never had considered that potential advantage in those conditions, but wow.
Pit Row
I have a feeling in the next 50 to 100 years civilization will judge us as idiotic for relying so heavily on such a harmful and inefficient power source.
Of course they're idiotic contraptions. Isn't it obvious? Nothing wrong with that. Some problems are worth having. Not in a race though.
Even sans breakdown, not needing to shift would have been huge last night.
Saying this is going to get old, even if it is so applicable....
Lighten up francis.....
It was a freaking joke
As for Electric Shocks in water / liquids with E Bikes - look to the vast amount of Electronics / E Motors that are submerged. Do it right, and you're OK - do it wrong and, you're not.
Anyone who has owned an alta long term will tell you they previously were very prone to heat issues.
A hard pro at a fast track that takes power (in prime conditions no mud) could overheat them in 3-4 laps and it would slow dramatically.
Almost ALL POWER usage by people is heat conversion. We take stored energy and convert it to useful work, and in the process it produces heat
So the alta... Would be prone to its own heat related failures
Ill never forget the day I set a top dollar electric rc car on fire just by driving it around for 20 minutes. Was an expensive moment that in a larger scale incident could have been deadly.
That car was problem free most its life and so are all of them on the market... Just wasnt its day
If we had 20 altas on the track, ill bet money at least 1 would have broken in some form or fashion
batteries dont have the power density even remotely close to that of gasoline and other fuels, and as such until they do, hydro carbons will still be used.
Cant fly planes long distance on a battery
Drone owners know this... And the market for drone generators using combustion engine is growing
Very soon electric will on par for avg guys. But it will have all its own issues.
Harris has the best argument against electric so far. Suss all this crap out!
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