Hum Cycles, Electric Motorcycle!

Damn... haven't had any updates since the beginning of May. Anyways, Hum Cycles.

The motogooglers arranged to have Forrest Deuth from Hum Cycles come to Google to show us their proof of concept electric motorcycle. Hum Cycles is a San Francisco start-up who are working on a premium electric motorcycle. The team at Hum comprise of folks with experience in battery management, vehicles (including the Tesla Roadster), manufacturing and robotics.

In addition to showing us their proof of concept bike and answering our questions, they offered a select group of us a chance to ride the bike. Luckily, I got a chance to ride the bike and here are my impressions. The proof of concept bike they had on campus was a totally gutted out Ducati supersport chassis (don't know which one?) with their drive train, electronics and batteries. Everything fit within the Ducati frame and bodywork. The chassis did have some modifications. Since there's no transmission, the gearing was unique. I believe Forrest said the counter sprocket was an 11t and the rear sprocket was a 70-something t. It made for one huge-looking sprocket.

The instrument panel consisted of the original Ducati speedo, a battery voltmeter in place of the tach and an add-on battery power gauge. Noticeably missing were the left side controls of the bike: clutch lever and shift lever. Starting the bike was a simple affair: put key in the ignition and turn to on position. No need to press a starter. Twist the throttle and there's a lot of available torque and the powerband is nice and linear throughout the twist of the throttle. When you left off the throttle abruptly, there's a noticeable compression braking. I took my test ride on a short hop on 101 to try and gauge it's top speed. Unfortunately, my test ride was right at the beginning of the evening rush hour so the best I could manage was 65mph before I had to slow down for traffic. Merging into traffic is NOT a problem with this bike. It just accelerates like a bat outta hell. The rest of my test ride was through the streets of Palo Alto and Mountain View. The bike handled pretty well for a sportbike, but then again, I don't have much riding on supersports only dirtbikes and dual sports. I thought the bike would be quiet, but it sounds like a louder electric RC car whine that gets progressively louder as you get on the throttle.

It charges in 6-8 hours on 120v and their targeted mileage is around 150+ miles. My memory sucks, but I think the weight was around 350-400lbs. They're final prototype will be using a chassis and body kit of their own design so I don't think they'll be offering conversion kits. If they get the weight down and get to their targeted mileage range of 150+ miles, I think they've got something.

Sorry, no pictures. They are trying to to stealth as they are still looking for investors