There was a nice little interview with a bloke from Michelin on the current development of The race rubber for the MotoE bikes.
All this sounds esoteric until you realize that you get the actual difference between ICE and Electric motive tyres amplified so you gain real insight as to what you need for optimizing Electric bike tyres.
Some points ( some you may already know , some new).
Electric motors deliver massive torque across the rev range ( pretty much from standstill). Ice motors developed for racing have stuff all torque at lower rpm as the engines are cammed for high rpm output ( a function of ICE motors "you can have torque here OR here". This has more than one effect on the way the rubber has to respond. When the tyre is cold it gets massive tearing before it heats up with a ICE designed motor . What's more the tyre will slide from very low rpm hot or cold when the throttle is applied ( and these guys ride on slide). At first they were making harder compounds to get the tyre to not tear itself apart, but found that using a compound that was soft allowed them to make it so didn't chunk but got a thin glue surface ( by the looks).
Interesting is that they found an ICE front is perfectly capable of doing the job perfectly when matched for weight/ speed. Because the MotoE bikes are heavier they just upped the casing strength to match the bike weight .
That translated directly to street motorcycles. Any tyre matched for mass and speed will do the job. Wear should be about the same for ICE and Electric. Nice to have that confirmed.
Rear tyres are still developing and have way to go especially for long term street use. Although E motors have massive torque from go they don't have the massive clutch transients , so take a little longer to warm up when pushing. This causes tearing. Maybe a transient reduction for the motor output until the tyres warm up, will help with safety at early part of a ride and increase longevity.
I still think that casings will have to be stiffer against windup, than ICE tyres to get the best out of them. Though not necessarily in deflection. I also suspect that performance tyres for emotorcycles are going to have a different profile ( yet to be developed).
I continue to watch this . Maybe someday I will find an emotorcycle that I consider worth buying ( probably get too old first)
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Topic: Michelin interview on MotoE tyre development. (Read 863 times)