ElectricMotorcycleForum.com

I rode in to work this morning in the dark in 7C ambient temperature and my hands were plenty cold upon arrival after a one hour ride. Also wondered about heated grips or how to hook up a heated vest. Have no idea where I could install leads to power such a device, and also how it would affect battery life. In my iMiev electric car, the cabin heater makes a huge difference to range (instant 30% drop).

blake

Luckily my local dealer up here in Oakville Canada invested in the machine needed to do the software upgrade (said it cost him $1300). He's been great. I'll be bringing in the bike tomorrow to have them address this issue. He said the DS he sold the same week I bought mine developed the same problem. I'll let you know how it goes.

I also agree there needs to be a revised testing model. The number of potential customers asking about "real-world" range attests to that, if nothing else.

As for going 100+ miles, I'm too afraid of getting stranded to try it Maybe one day if I'm really close to home.

Agreed. I've been looking into buying a Mitsubishi i-MiEV electric car and I can't get anyone to tell me a worst case range (cold day, cabin heater on, highway speeds followed by traffic jam) that would reassure me that my wife can get to work and back safely in it.

hey folks.

Thought I would relay a short story of what happened to me earlier this week in case it helps anyone else avoid the same fate.

I had what I thought was a good bag strapped onto the rear of the bike. It was a commercial bag made for such a purpose and it seemed to work well. But this particular day I had a bit too much in it perhaps. At any rate, on account of the odd shape of the back of the Zero (why they make a hump back there is beyond me), the bag rotated to around and got jammed in the rear wheel. It got shredded and spewed all my stuff across 3 lanes of traffic. Luckily I was not going too fast, and it rotated to the left rather than to the right (where it would have got caught in the belt drive where it would probably have locked up the rear wheel), and luckily it happened just before I got on the highway (rather than after, at much higher speed).  I lost a new disc lock and several other items, but escaped unharmed and luckily the bike doesn't seem to have been damaged either. So don't dink around with chintzy aftermarket bags that are not secure, even if they claim to be official tail-packs for motorcycles! The rear end of the Zero is much rounder and narrower than the back end/back seat of conventional motorcycles. Would hate to see this or worse happen to anyone else.

blake
2012 Zero S-9
Ontario, Canada

My objective is to take the bike on a 83 mile (one way!) trip, approximately 70 of which is on state highways.. average speed around 50 mph, some 500+ foot elevation gains. I figure it will be very tight .. I may well stop and charge halfway for an hour or so, get lunch etc, just to be safe.

Good luck with that - I look forward to reading about the results here!

hey. welcome to the club, so to speak...

I didn't know about the need to drop the battery down to 25%, though that's what i ended up doing anyway. There's no mention of that in the manual that I could find.

blake

very cool!