ElectricMotorcycleForum.com

Yes, it seems every new generation is becoming more aware of the mess the environment is in and of their impact on it because they will be dealing with the consequences more and more.  My father opted to get a V8 truck, not that he needs it for work but likes the power.  I choose to use my truck only when I need, use our 4 cyl. as much as possible and use my ICE bike when the weather is good.  yes I am buying an electric bike partly because of the way it rides but also to give another little contribution to the life of my daughter and one day my grand kids.  If this aspect means nothing to you then you are either don't believe in the mess of our environment or don't care.  Just keep in mind, it is the little contributions multiplied by the many that makes the significant difference.

I'm incredibly thankful I have the luxury of being able to make this small positive change as well.  For most people, they can't afford to radically change their behavior for the environment, and I don't expect them to.  I expect those with the means (cough cough companies cough) and those who make the rules (our government and leaders) to do their jobs and be responsible.

I wish to stay away from the saved doing a instead of b.  How many pounds of carbon dioxide are produced burning a 7 pound gallon of gasoline in  a modern 4 stroke mc?  It likely is more than 7 as oxygen is heavier than hydrogen.

It's not a scientific measurement, for sure, but a fun little way of playing "what if" scenarios in our heads.

On the other hand, perhaps flattetyre was just trying to be funny and making a point that riding an electric motorcycle doesn't really do all that much to save the environment when you have the guy down the street running around in a F350 diesel being used as a commute vehicle. To say nothing of the areas in the world where electric power is being generated by coal-fired plants.  If nothing else, his sarcastic comment resulted in a response regarding the issue, which I think is worth discussing, or at least thinking about - even if he did kick over a sandcastle or two. 

We all behave according to our own beliefs about how we ought to behave, so saying you'd change your own behavior to counteract someone else's isn't a discussion starter or a silly joke, it's a schoolyard taunt.  It's like saying "You decided to stop peeing in the pool so I'm going to pee in the pool twice as much".  I think a discussion on the actual environmental effects and benefits of Zeros would be awesome; when I started this thread I searched for CO2 and found no threads so I think it would be an interesting topic for this forum to cover.

I'd love for people to continue to post pictures of their Zero app in this thread but since it's been touched on, let's dive into the environmental impacts of riding a Zero compared to riding a gasoline-powered motorcycle, shall we? 

Environmental Considerations for Riding a Zero Motorcycle

Before we even begin, the best thing carbon-wise is for you not to build a new motorcycle of any type, period. Furthermore, if it's gasoline powered, don't ride it at all. So at least in the short term the best thing for you to do is to use whatever's already manufactured as the carbon costs are already sunk.  But let's assume you are guaranteed going to ride anyway. 

So with that in mind, let's do a thought experiment.  Imagine I own a Honda CBR600RR (which I did) and I wanted to sell that and switch to a Zero motorcycle (which I did).  At what mileage do I recoup the carbon cost of building a brand new motorcycle rather than using my existing one?  It's at this mileage that I can start to say I've made a positive impact at all.  This ignores the original carbon cost of manufacturing the CBR, and we will also assume the Zero is charged by a zero-emissions power source such as solar or wind, so this is best case scenario for the Zero, and gives the CBR a break as well.

The New Zero's Carbon Cost

The biggest source of carbon generation when manufacturing electric vehicles is the battery so first, let's figure out the carbon cost for making the Zero's battery.  I'm sure the figures vary wildly but Popular Mechanics has an article saying that manufacturing a 100kW Tesla battery produces 17.5 tons of CO2. That's .175 tons of CO2 per kW or for a 14.4kW Zero battery, 2.52 tons of CO2.

The Carbon Cost of Continuing to Ride the CBR

Lets figure out how many tons of CO2 per mile the CBR emits.  1 gallon of gasoline is 8.8kg(or ~20lbs) of CO2 out the tailpipe, and the CBR gets 45 mpg, so .44 lbs of CO2 per mile.

Now the easy part.  2.52 tons (or 5,040 lbs), which is the carbon cost of the Zero's battery, divided by .44 lbs of CO2 per mile of the CBR gets us 11,454 miles before the Zero has won back the carbon cost of its battery compared to riding the CBR.

Going Further

Since this is me we're talking about, let's figure out how much longer I need to ride in order to be in the green.  I got my Zero on March 16, or 38 days ago, and I've gone 1300 miles.  That's an average of 34 miles per day.  So in order to reach 11,454 miles and start saving on CO2 costs, it will take me 334 days of riding or about 11 months.  Good to know!

Things I glossed over:

• Zeros are not Teslas, we don't know how much carbon the manufacture of a Zero battery actually generates
• We didn't calculate any of the other parts of a Zero, which definitely are not carbon-neutral to manufacture
• I'm riding a lot now, but I might not keep up this pace so it will probably take longer to win back the carbon costs, especially considering the weather
• The EPA's estimates were for an average vehicle, motorcycles emit less carbon (but more of the other pollutants) per gallon of gasoline than a car
• I charge virtually entirely at home and purchase green credits from my power utility, so saying I ride emissions free is actually partially accurate

Sources are listed inline, but much of this post is inspired by about the carbon cost of electric vehicles.  He gets into real-world scenarios of electricity generation (interesting tidbit: EVs are worse for the environment in West Virginia than gasoline powered vehicles because WV is primarily powered by coal) so if you liked this post, his video is even better.

I'm not even at a half a tonne yet! Still got far to go.

The reset buttons must be under the grease. I will check it out, but still doesn't make sense that my bike only has one port. Is the unofficial manual not up to date?

Also, the link you provided is for the entire manual. Do you know what page that info is on? Thanks

The codes start on page 107.  I can't speak for the unofficial manual but it's definitely possible that they consolidated the ports and the manual is just a little out of date there.

My daughter just told me that her charger is working again.  She rode the bike to another town and ran the pack down to 66%.  After returning home, she plugged the charger in and it started charging. The display is currently showing 89% and climbing.  I don't get it as this weekend it wouldn't charge at all. 

Partially disassemble everything and look for corroded connections, frayed wires, or standing water maybe?

A rear paddock stand is all you really need.  Most of the stands come with adapters which fit under the swing arm and allow you to raise the rear wheel without the need for sliders.

This would work out just as well; my only thinking is a scissor lift lets you operate on the front or rear wheels whereas with a rear paddock stand you'll need either another tool or to devise some way to get the front wheel off the ground.  Neither way is wrong.

What you might want to try is to take out the pads and apply some silicone grease to all of the metal to metal contacts points, including the back of the brake pad where it contacts the piston.  Also lube the brake pad guide pin.  Be careful not to get any lube on the brake pad surface.

You could also try grinding a small chamfer on the edge of the brake pad surface.

This should get rid of the squeal.

Good ideas; I'm trying everything else before disassembling things but I'll try these next.

This weekend I tried bedding the brakes and it seemed to help quite a bit; the noise is less frequent and also when it does appear it's rather quiet (hard to differentiate between it and songbirds) so I'm gonna keep riding and use the rear brake a bit more heavily and see what happens.  Maybe it's just a part of breaking things in.  I didn't see anything about bedding the brakes or breaking them in on the Unofficial Manual (https://zeromanual.com/wiki/Common_Sounds#Brakes) but I might update it depending on how this goes.