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[eou_edu]

I've been reading this forum for a while thinking about my first purchase of a zero fx.  I have been looking into the possibility of a snowbike set up.  For those that don't know a snow bike is a kit that replaces the back wheel with basically a snowmobile track and the front wheel with a large snowmobile ski.  It is becoming very popular and taking a huge dent into the snowmobile market share.  Is anybody already doing this with a zero FX? 

Advantages:
-No gears to shift.  The biggest complaint of snowbike is loosing momentum from shifting gears. 
-ability to remove the battery if you get stuck for less weight to lift it out. 
-high torque motor which is important considering what you are turning compared to a wheel.
-silent operation, floating through cloud like powder at 30 mph.

Disadvantages:
-cold, will the cold kill the batteries?  I don't plan to ride below 20 degrees.  would this be a disadvantage if I keep the battery in a warm place until I ride then running it hard should generate heat?  Or surround the battery with small hand warmers?
-Might be too hard to on the motor
-nobody makes a "fit kit" for it as of yet.  Yeti said they would work with me if that's the direction I want to go.  Timbersled's motto used to be "we build a fit kit for anything."  Polaris bought them out, I asked them a few weeks ago if they would make a fit kit and they said, "no because it probably wouldn't be very good." 
-range (of course)  a gas snowbike gets about 1/2 the mpg at similar riding speed than a motorcycle.   I could see not loosing momentum by shifting gears as a way to save fuel but lost again when you account for the cold weather operation.

Anybody have a guess on anticipated range?  With a yeti snowbike 120" snowbike kit the bike ends up weighing about 30 lbs more than it would as a normal motorcycle.  The combine range on a zero fx is 62 miles.  Would 31 miles be a reasonable expectation? 

[Shadow]

Amazing, have dreamed about this when I see timbersled kits at the Polaris dealership, next to the Zero Motorcycles lineup in the same shop. Do it!

Some pointers for cold weather operation, you can add a neoprene wrap around the battery which helps a lot. Practically any current draw will warm up the battery for better performance, once you have insulation to retain the heat it will get up to temperature quickly.

I would doubt the FX to have enough battery capacity to make a snowbike worthwhile, but don't let that stop you! I would love to hear about progress on this project :-)

[42Cliffside]

Snow hawk track on a zero.

Drool. (it would be a lot quieter!)



Man that would be So fun!! I love watching people play around on those.

[Doctorbass]

I have converted a Snowhawk directly for Adboivin using a Zero 2015 powertrain 2 years ago.

Doc

[42Cliffside]

Sweet! Pics? vids?

[BrianTRice@gmail.com]

Put a heating blanket or cozy around the battery so you don't lose range while riding.

Aerostitch has an example:
https://rideapart.com/articles/zero-below-zero-zero-preparation-reposted

[acacia1731]

Assuming the track and snow resistance will create constant/frequent high loads, OVERHEATING may be even more of an issue than the cold.  The FX reaches thermal cutbacks pretty quickly if run under repeated high-torque acceleration cycles, especially pre-IPM.