ElectricMotorcycleForum.com

I'm selling my 2015 Zero SR.  I bought it new and it has 5555 miles on it now. Original tires and brakes. Has had the onboard charger replaced.  Other than a fan less led headlight and tidy tail it is pretty much stock.  Comes with the Zero off-board quick charger and new Zero leather jacket. It is wrapped in Avery satin cool teal but I will remove that if you wish.  The wrap job is not bad but it was my first wrap job so does have issues.  It was dropped on a shop floor on the right side.  The only indication is the rear brake lever is bent slightly inward.  The bike functions perfectly.  I am open to reasonable offers.  I am located in St Louis area.

I have been toying around with the idea of converting my xmark walk behind to electric.  I think I found a suitable motor but now I am working out the battery configuration in my head and I don't see it being feasible.  The motor is a 48v 200amp continuous brushed dc motor.  I have loads of old laptop batteries that I have been recovering 18650 cells from.  According to my calculations I would need 11 18650's in series and 45 of those in parallel.  This is assuming the cells are rated at 2c which I cannot seem to find the specs on any of the brands I have.  When I look up the pdf on them the manufacturers don't have a c rating, rather a discharge chart at different c ratings.  Have I done my math correct? Do I really need 500 cells to make this work?  Most of these batteries are rated at 2200-2500mah.

So I have seen enough youtube videos to get me interested in building a battery pack out of 18650 cells from old laptop batteries.  It got me interested enough to try to build a battery pack for my first EV project (still unsure what it's going to be).  I measure all the cell voltages and as long as they are at 1v or higher I attempt to charge them with my hobby charger.  I charge them on nimh at .1A until 3v which is ususally less than 5 min. Then I switch over to the lipo setting and charge them at 2A which slowly drops until full.  The real question I have is if the battery reaches full is it considered good?  Do I need to do resistance tests?  Also some batteries get pretty hot during the lipo charge and I am not sure if this is because they were just over discharged or is it because they are bad.  On the ones that get hot (I am guessing 120 degrees), I cancel the charge process until the battery cools then I resume and the battery finishes charging at approx room temp (maybe elevated 5 to 10 degrees).  I realize these batteries are going to have some loss of capacity but instead of paying $6 per cell I think this is worth it.

So my tesla is opti coated and I love it.  It's very hard to scratch and makes the surface glossier.  From what I've read the opti coat chemically bonds with the clear coat.  Since the Zeros aren't clear coated I am guessing this wouldn’t work but then again maybe that's all bull.  Has anyone done this to their zero plastics?  I would love to cut down on the scratches and swirl marks and add some gloss.

I have one that is brand new.  Make me a reasonable offer.

I know Zero is doing the best they can to make a great bike at a somewhat affordable price while growing the company but I think we would all like to see some things changed.  Here are my top 5.

1: More range - I would like to see a 200 mile highway range on these bikes.  I don't think it's impossible for them in the near future with cheaper battery costs and newer technology.  I am sure the price would have to go up some but this would make the bike much more desirable to people.

2: Cheaper cost - I realize this contradicts the first one but if they don't increase the range I would like to see the costs continually drop slowly.

3: Quick charge option - I think I could live with the slow 1.3kwh on board charger but I would really like to see them partner with Tesla supercharger network or work something out with Chademo to get a fast DC charge solution.  This combined with a 200 mile range would make touring trips on this bike easy.

4: Better cooling - If I am doing some spirited riding in 70 degree temps I can get it to 212 easily.  I know this isn't the overheat limit but it is where the warning comes on.  I hate to have to think about it overheating while doing fun back-roads or commuting in 90 degree weather.  I would be awesome if they could accomplish this without going to liquid cooling.

5: Larger rear tire - I know this one sounds silly and I am sure the smaller width rear tire makes for a more efficient bike but it also makes the bike look like a 250.  I would love to see a larger rear tire on there to give the bike a more powerful and aggressive look.

I am sure everyone has different things they would like to see changed.

I cannot get Zero to respond to me regarding exchanging a medium leather jacket for a small (yes I know smalls are out of stock at this time).  So I guess the only thing to do is sell the jacket.  It's a very nice jacket but it's way too big for me.  It's brand new.  Price is $250 and that includes shipping to the lower 48.

I am a Zero SR rider myself but I am always excited to see EV's of any kind proving to the masses how amazing they can be.  Tesla has done it with the fastest sedan, Lightning has done it with the fastest land speed record and pikes peak win and now victory places 3rd in the epic isle of man tt race.

http://www.cycleworld.com/2015/06/10/iomtt-victory-motorcycles-ses-tt-zero-race-report/