ElectricMotorcycleForum.com

Makes And Models => Damon => Topic started by: JaimeC on October 02, 2025, 06:15:39 PM

Title: Visordown Article
Post by: JaimeC on October 02, 2025, 06:15:39 PM
If anybody REALLY looked at what they were promising to deliver WHEN they promised it and knew anything at all about the state of technology at the time they should've known they were selling unicorn hooves and fairy dust.
https://www.visordown.com/news/dark-times-damon-lawsuits-mount-and-workforce-shrinks
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Starpower on October 02, 2025, 09:58:25 PM
I was refunded my $100 deposit about a year ago.
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Specter on October 03, 2025, 01:24:08 AM
Maybe im being dense again but.
ok i have 1000 on order.
let me build 10, fufill those orders, with that money, i can pay my people who built them, and now have money to get parts to build 12 more.  lets build  12 more,fufill then i can do 15, lets do 15, now i can do 20 and hire a new guy to help, now i can do 30, now i can do 50 etc and walk your way up.   nobody starts at 200 percent capacity and instantly pumping out tons of product.  If you were truly serious you'd be doing what you could to at least begin pumping them out.  your determination would lead the company to success through hard work, or am i being old fashioned again?

I mean look at Energica, they got shredded, but even through that, the small what was left team, basically worked out of a garage, to keep the team and the dream alive. doing what little they were able to, with what little was given to them, to keep bikes going.  They made it happen.

just seems to me that if Damon really wanted bikes, there'd be bikes, not just a growing mountain of excuses.

Aaron
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Richard230 on October 03, 2025, 03:27:30 AM
Maybe im being dense again but.
ok i have 1000 on order.
let me build 10, fufill those orders, with that money, i can pay my people who built them, and now have money to get parts to build 12 more.  lets build  12 more,fufill then i can do 15, lets do 15, now i can do 20 and hire a new guy to help, now i can do 30, now i can do 50 etc and walk your way up.   nobody starts at 200 percent capacity and instantly pumping out tons of product.  If you were truly serious you'd be doing what you could to at least begin pumping them out.  your determination would lead the company to success through hard work, or am i being old fashioned again?

I mean look at Energica, they got shredded, but even through that, the small what was left team, basically worked out of a garage, to keep the team and the dream alive. doing what little they were able to, with what little was given to them, to keep bikes going.  They made it happen.

just seems to me that if Damon really wanted bikes, there'd be bikes, not just a growing mountain of excuses.

Aaron

Are you saying that it was a Ponzi scheme?  ;)
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: MVetter on October 03, 2025, 04:15:31 AM
(https://c.tenor.com/ihqN6a3iiYEAAAAd/tenor.gif)
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Specter on October 03, 2025, 07:12:51 AM
no what i am saying is start small work your way up.
you have orders, build what you can, use the money from those to continue to build.  no company has the capital to start out selling 10k  vehicles, they make that capital by selling a few vehicles, eventually being big enough to sell many vehicles...

a ponzi scheme has no income except new investors,   this is supposed to be a company with a viable product.

aaron
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: JaimeC on October 03, 2025, 11:00:58 PM
More from RideApart:
https://www.rideapart.com/news/774378/damon-motors-ev-motorcycles-jay-giraud-lawsuit/
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Richard230 on October 04, 2025, 12:03:14 AM
More from RideApart:
https://www.rideapart.com/news/774378/damon-motors-ev-motorcycles-jay-giraud-lawsuit/

What a mess!  :o I knew something was rotten at Damon based upon the wild claims for their bikes.  ::) A lot of those claims seemed too technically fantastic to me, especially for a production bike that would cost anything approaching what any consumer would pay. 

The whole thing sounds familiar, like a lot of other startups that were trying to sell amazing technology, perhaps to attract investor cash, and then melted down when the founders starting fighting each other and lost interest in actually marketing anything.   :(
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: MVetter on October 04, 2025, 10:53:42 AM
hahahahahahahhahahahhHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHHHHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHAAAAAAAAAAHAAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAH


deep breath


AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAHAHHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH. Jay was such an arrogant shit and I'm so happy I called him out at every opportunity. Here's one of many.
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Specter on October 04, 2025, 07:17:35 PM
Just to be fair, throw him a bone Morgan.  with cylindrical cells, he has pathways for the cooling fluids to flow thru to keep the cells cool.  With that incredible density it's gonna make some heat.   I hear they have some patented super secret Snubbed Founder Tear formula they are working on for the coolant.

Aaron
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: flynnstig82r on October 04, 2025, 10:45:41 PM
People who got swept into the hype didn’t understand how hard it is to design and build a high performance motorcycle. As soon as I saw that people with no serious manufacturing or racing experience were claiming to leapfrog Energica, who had been on the leading edge of e-moto performance for a decade and had accumulated a ton of institutional knowledge, I knew it was a scam. Even garage-built hypercars typically have a ton of pedigree from designers and engineers who were tired of the corporate shackles and wanted to do their own thing. It’s never just a bunch of shady tech and finance bros leapfrogging the whole industry on their first try. Even Tesla spent years and years poaching Lotus employees to build their early knowledge base.
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: MVetter on October 04, 2025, 10:55:12 PM
You have to remember that in their earliest days all they were trying to offer was the SHIFT technology and the safety sensors. That is to say the adjustable pegs and bars and then the cameras with corresponding warning LEDs that were designed to alert the rider to threats. They showcased in on a rolling Zero chassis and basically claimed that this would be the bike of the future. I do not think, at that time, they had any intentions of trying to design an actual electric motorcycle. But, and this is just what I *think* happened, someone offered them a Big Bag of Money and said, "do it!"

And they looked hungrily at the Big Bag of Money and then took the Big Bag of Money and spent the next few years being both arrogant and completely overwhelmed until the Big Bag of Money ran out.

edit- and probably also hookers and blow
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Specter on October 05, 2025, 06:12:23 PM
the hookers probably took that big bag of money, for their blow.  which i heard really pissed off the owner who was a blowhard.

aaron
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: NEW2elec on October 06, 2025, 05:23:54 AM
God it's a slow rainy day or I wouldn't bother.

Stig it's hard to make a race winning bike but all Damon's bike had to beat was the Ego.  A bike that at first had a range of maybe 60 miles.
It could hit about 150ish with a long enough road but it was laughably over weight at over 600lbs.
Damon's tested 6 phase bike motor was 248hp with bench power limited to 200hp from the battery pack.  Still 50hp more than the Ego's 150hp.
It went over 200mph on the dyno which isn't pushing air so much easier, but still pretty damn fast.

Guys are making 88mph Surrons and Stark hit the ground with the most powerful (stock) dirt bike in the world.  While KTM put out the Freeride which is like a kids toy.  Electric is just a whole new game.

Also Derik was from Alta which was beating some gas bikes in certain types of races so not some backyard dumb ass.

Morgan is almost half right in his post. 
Jay bought Skully, the tech heavy safety helmet that failed.  He figured out there was way too much tech needed to fit in a helmet and figured to spread out the sensors and cpu into the bike itself.

What better to power it than an electric bike.  Thus the Hypersport was born.
So it needs to be more powerful and lighter than Zero and Energica.  It needs a battery cell type that's more proven than pouch cells.  At the time 2170s were in the best auto EVs so they went with that.
Enclose all the parts in a sealed case so no salt and water gets in.  Oil cool the motor, but also liquid cool the battery and controller by using the battery case as a heat sink and cooling channels.  Newer Energicas that added kwhs but lost the center cooling channel can't ride and fast charge without overheating.  You see how you just need to pay attention and not make the same mistakes as the other guys and you take the lead.

Now I think they were going to have the controller serve as the AC charger thus getting a 6.8kw level 2 result, beating the Ego's 3kw and having a high enough voltage for CCS charging beating Zero. And of course saving weight with one unit.

The Shift modes came as a last minute add on, thinking older riders might balk at the sport bike riding position.

All anyone has to do is look at the electric Ducati's encased drive unit and see it's damn near the same design as Damon's

There was an Ex Quantumscape exec on Damon's board early on and I was hoping he would be able to get the early solid state cells for Damon but VW has first rights so Ducati gets them.
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: MVetter on October 06, 2025, 12:56:09 PM
There's not enough beer in the world for that pile of gibberish to make any kind of sense. What you have to remember is that NEW2elec is savagely INSANE. Here's one of many quotes from him that demonstrate his delightful perspective on reality: (https://i.ibb.co/DgMnccfW/damon-truth-emf.jpg) (https://ibb.co/Tq05jjM2)

This is a person who lives in a delusional world and probably needs to be treated with special needs because they can't understand the environment around them.

Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: princec on October 06, 2025, 03:02:25 PM
Here's 2p of engineering anecdotes as well ... batteries don't actually benefit from having the huge gaps all down their sides for cooling, because the main part of the battery does not in fact get very hot. It's the electrodes that get hot, right at the tip. That's the only bit that actually needs cooling.

Cas :)
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: NEW2elec on October 06, 2025, 06:59:32 PM
Well yes Princec you're right that is the "best" way to cool them.  Lucid has a video showing their cooling plate just on one end where both the + and - are connected in their pack.
But the first Teslas had liquid filled ribbons going around all the cells' sides in their packs because it's better than nothing.

The Energica overheating issue after riding and trying to fast charge over and over aka touring is well known.  The pouch cells packed in so tight made the issue unavoidable.  Just ask an owner.

Fun fact:  That's why Morgan kept his old SS9 so he could fast charge it more often. He knew the problem all along but didn't let that stop him from collecting commission checks by getting others to buy them and only disclosing that fact when he was outed.
What a little scamp he is.

Maybe the Singaporeans can fix that issue or they may just end up putting the Energica name on little scooters.  We'll see.
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: NEW2elec on October 06, 2025, 07:26:51 PM
Here's my post from Sept 14th 2025 about Jr Vetter

You can always tell when Morgan gets it wrong.  He's a gas lighter and tries to talk about anything other than what was posted.

I know you will keep proving me right.

Hey remember when I sent you that clip of Shane McMahon jumping off a steel cage through a table when Ideanomics first bought Energica and told you that was what he was going to do to the company?
 
That coming true so quickly still makes me laugh.

By the way why didn't the CRP Group buy back Energica at it's fire sale price?
Was it because it was a huge money pit, losing thousands on every bike they sold like Electric Terry pointed out?
The vision of green credits being auctioned off to the highest bidder didn't pan out I guess.

I await your next childish insult post with great anticipation. 
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: MVetter on October 06, 2025, 11:02:47 PM
I sold my SS9 and now have an SS9+ RS. I sold bikes for Energica and collected commission checks on them because they literally did not make the 13.4 models anymore and STILL the coast to coast record is held by a 21.5 Energica. There is no conspiracy, but by all means keep searching for one. It's nice to have a hobby.
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Specter on October 07, 2025, 03:10:28 AM
how about you two get a hotel room and just fuck each other already?
it's so obvious you both want each other, good god.
maybe after the 20 second romp is over you both can lay back smoke a cigarette and talk about electric bikes...

Aaron
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Grauteufel on October 07, 2025, 04:27:31 AM
While trying not to picture EMF members getting hot and steamy, it got me thinking about heat and that I recently did a full day in the saddle of an experia. Left home with 40% and fast charged three times, with the battery only going yellow briefly despite the 35c temperatures and constant speed north of the 100km/h. I reckon if there was sufficient charging infrastructure, the bike would outlast any rider, which leads me back to the correct topic, Damon's SHIFT would be brilliant for long rides and what I was interested in. Being able to significantly change the rider position periodically would stave off soreness and really would have been beneficial changing from the head up in traffic mode to head down carving.
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: NEW2elec on October 07, 2025, 06:07:23 AM
Yes the Experia improved on the over heating issue.

I think there were problems early on with the hand shake with some CCS stations but maybe a firmware update helped that.
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: princec on October 07, 2025, 03:16:47 PM
The more I think about it the more I realise that the only thing holding my Zero back from being excellent is DCFC.
If Zero don't pull that out of the bag within the next 12 months they're doomed.

Cas :)
Title: Re: Visordown Article
Post by: Specter on October 07, 2025, 04:47:48 PM
The one thing i noticed on my ego, which is a significant issue imo, is the black composite / plastic they use for the fairings, covers etc.  is basically an oven / heat trap.  Something about the composition of it, it traps ALL of the sun's IR and converts it directly to heat then keeps it up under there literally cooking the battery, inverter and whatever else under the gas tank area.  Seriously in the hot sun that thing can get up to 155 degrees, hot enough to burn your hand on.  I actually have contacted some other manufacturers of other electric items over this (ryobi) and they changed their composition a bit because of cooking the battery in this manner.  This of course was after many back and forth discussions with their engineers etc etc.  but anyways.  The black bike fairings, its like a solar oven, the sun heats it up, the batteries are inside this stuff, and if you are charging, there is no air movement, the batteries are literally going to bake in that oven, from the suns thermal load and the amp heat load.  no air means no cooling. means your current eventually gets limited.

my solutions were a, put some sort of air on it, a box fan blowing across the batteries helped tremendously, but you can't always take a box fan on a trip with you so B, toss a white sheet or t shirt or something over the black plastic parts and sides there.  Just that little bit of a gap, where the sun is beating down on the white sheet and reflecting back and NOT beating down on the black plastic oven sides of the bike, getting trapped / converted into heat and stewing the battery.

the battery is air cooled, you can't cool it down when the sun has the air under the plastic heated up to 135 degrees.  i know this sounds silly but give it a try.  it's getting later in the season but take an ir thermometer and meter bike temp sitting in the hot sun, then battery temp under that.  now try that next day with similar sun with a sheet ,or jacket, or piece of cardboard... it don't matter. just something blocking direct sunlight, and now see what the temp of the battery / air under fairings is.

as little as 3 or 4 C can mean throttling or not.   
remove the heat with airflow
keep the heat off / out with covering.

aaron