ElectricMotorcycleForum.com
General Category => Electric Motorcycle News => Topic started by: Richard230 on October 16, 2018, 08:25:37 PM
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This article has a lot of interesting history regarding Zero's technical advancements over the years, along with many of bits of information that I didn't know. In particular, I found this statement interesting: "Farasis recently opened a new office in Stuttgart Germany, in preparation for building a new advanced battery pack factory. The Zero battery pack design team was headed-up by CTO Keith Kepler. Other engineers involved in the Farasis cell success are Jackson Edwards (“Farfleâ€), Chase Nachtmann, and Zero battery specialist Luke Workman (“Live For Physicsâ€)."
Here is a link to the long article written by "Ron" and published by ElectricMotorcycle.com:
http://electricmotorcycle.com/zero-motorcycles-tech/
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Hi, I'm Ron. Thanks for posting the link. I have a thick skin, so anyone who reads this, feel free to scream at me for blatant mistakes. I will definitely take any suggestions under consideration. I hope everyone believes me when I say that my heart is in the right place. I still have several credits that I have to add...
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Hi, and thanks for posting the link. I have a thick skin, so anyone who reads this, feel free to scream at me for blatant mistakes. I will definitely take any suggestions under consideration. I hope everyone believes me when I say that my heart is in the right place. I still have several credits that I have to add...
Very informative article! I was surprised to see the Letko dealership in the pictures, I live just down the street from them and one of their demo days got me hooked on the Zeros. I read somewhere on endless sphere how someone helped make a carbon fiber band to hold the core together in the new IPM motor; It was a quick interesting read, I'll see if I can find it.
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Fantastic effort man , well done !
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Farasis is not Zero. What are Zero's advances?
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Farasis is not Zero. What are Zero's advances?
Motor design and BMS/MMB firmware updates? ;)
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Farasis made new cells to Zero's requested specs. In this way, Zero played a key role in The success of Farasis. Luke Workman was the senior battery design engineer at Zero for over four years, and it was during the time that Zero and Jackson Edwards from Farasis worked together to design the pack that Zero now uses.
Farasis had great engineers and quality products, but they didn't make these particular cells until Zero asked them to, and also partially funded the development, with a commitment to purchase a Minimum Order Quantity (MOQ). It would be a mistake to assume that Farasis was making these battery packs, and nobody was buying them until Zero came along.
Also, having a simple drive system may not seem like an advance, but Brammo had a six speed transmission, Zero has none. I forget which electric motorcycle is working on a 2-speed transmission, but Zero has fantastic performance with none. Less complexity, less weight, lower price.
Zero's motors ran cool enough in 2013, but later they changed to an IPM design in 2017 that ran even cooler. It may not seem like an "advance", but it reinforces their decision to use an air-cooled motor, instead of liquid-cooling. There's no reason that this motor can't last 300,000 miles, and then you'd only need to replace two bearings and a gasket.
Maybe there's nothing about Zero that is truly an "advance", but...it's a great design and I don't see anyone else who is copying their design principles. Alta makes a better-performing off-road electric motorcycles, but they are more complex, and more expensive.
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Thanks for this article.
I think that there is a little typo. You wrote this legend for one of the pictures: "A 2017 Zero FXS, parked in front of Letko Cycles in Olathe, Kansas…near Kansas City". But it is a FX, not a FXS.
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Great article and definitely helps narrow my purchase