[Rovi]

Hello,
my name is Andre (Rovi). I am 49 years old had different bikes but retired by driving street legal.
Had some little experience with 1/4 mile and came to the decision to build my own motorcycle.
I started 2016 with an electrical bicycle with 6/10 kW and run it @118 kph in 16,884 seconds

One year later I swapped a gear defect GSXR 1000 K2 also to an electrical vehicle (14/34 kW @ 156 kph within 14,468 seconds

2018 I changed again the Design a little bit and put a more powerful controller to the bike

12,278 seconds @ 170 kph

Now I made my last conversation for the track

I also change now from hubmotor to mid drive.

Motor: 90/200kW with 640 Nm
Controller: 300kW+

And now I got my dream fairing from Plan B motorcycles (Italy)

Additional I started now with the first test on an airplane landing field

I know, not everybody’s darling cause of electrical stuff but actually the design I like!

 

[Mattson]

Damn that looks rad! No doubt a lot of thought and fabrication went into that which is appreciated here no matter the method of power delivery

 

[Smoker]

Cool projects, for sure.

Please post photos and descriptions of your fabrication.

Thanks!

 

[CK 187]

Cool projects, for sure.

Please post photos and descriptions of your fabrication.

Thanks!

This ^

 

[Bandit1052]

As already mentioned in the other forum: an impressive project and motorcycle

Greetings Andy

 

[ToadofToadHall]

Realy cool build. Clearly a lot of work behind the scenes to bring it to this stage. Is a race bike ever truly finished ? 😁 love to hear more about the electric drive train, battery system and motor control. My next build might well be something electric just for the fun of doing something totally different

 

[Mattson]

Realy cool build. Clearly a lot of work behind the scenes to bring it to this stage. Is a race bike ever truly finished ? 😁 love to hear more about the electric drive train, battery system and motor control. My next build might well be something electric just for the fun of doing something totally different

I WOULD HAVE wanted to convert my GTS to electric BUT to get me the range I would have wanted I basically would have had to fill the panniers with batteries and the total cost would have been north of 10Ke and I`m not made of money...

 

[MikeGyver]

Welcome aboard! Awesome bikes!

 

[R.LoganDesign]

Bad-fucking-ass. You gotta show us some of the build dude lol

 

[Rovi]

Hey guys, thanks first for the welcome. I found this board only through Andy (post #5). To be honest to convert a combustion motorcycle to an electrical one will cost a lot of money also regarding experience costs of failures. But let’s start from the beginning!
2004 I bought a normal GSXR 750 SRAD (96, GR7DB) which I drove for around 3 years. Then I decided to update the motor (K3 988ccm). In 2010 I got TÜV on it (I am from Germany) by using a trick. I took an GSXR 1000 K2 frame, the K3 Engine and the rest of the SRAD. And the whole time I was a little bit fixed of drag racing because I liked the design of such motorcycle’s. Up to 2016 I updated this bike before I retired 2018 and sold it to my brother who has his hands on it. Here you will find a short clip:

But already in 2012/2013 during a 1/4 mile event there comes the dream to get an electrical bike for the track which should be very simple in handling, don’t fight with clutch and gears which cost time on this short distance and also the torque of an electrical motor is still there from the beginning of zero rotation.
Btw. the effectivof an electrical motor and the controller is over 90%. The bottleneck will be the power from the batteries.

Therefore to convert a normal motorcycle to an electrical one make only sense if you will make compromises of handling regarding acceleration, distance, topspeed! As you already mentioned here time for charging take also a big issue in comparison to a combustion motorcycle! But let’s start now …

In 2015 my brother told me that he bought a cruiser and first I thought he bought a Harley Davidson, his fourth motorcycle but it was a bicycle called cruiser or Tretharley (German word and also board/forum for beach cruisers). I checked the market and decided to build my own design by starting with a simple sketch.

I do not have the space for machines at home and also be experience in welding so I looked for a manufacturer who can help by doing this. I think the bicycle project took me around one year to finish it by finding a person who assist me with his experience of rc stuff ( His father has a lot of machines in his cellar) and I paid him for this job.
On half of finishing I decided to to make it electrical. Therefore I bought a 6/10 kW Cromotor V2, put him into a 21” motorcycle rim, which was to huge but have the same dimensions as the 28” bicycle rim. Found some electrical stuff in China and using rc batteries from Turnigy (LiPo). So I put them in series (175V) to get max. turns from the motor.
Btw. the current will define the acceleration and the voltage will be responsible for the topspeed! There are different motor types (DC wound motors as used by True Cousins, electrical World Record holder on 1/4 mile in topspeed and time 6,619 seconds @ 206 mph, synchron/asynchronous motors and bldc motors)
True Cousins wanted also to sell me stuff from them but the costs where much higher and let’s say behind them is standing a company. I am a little privat person 😉, seeing it as Hobby not to create world records!)

So I made my first experience with the bicycle on drag track. I was the first and only one on such a little German event in Alkersleben (Thüringen, GER).
So with the first run I destroyed my 200A fuse. So Wolfswankel helped me to design a new fuse holder by flex. to get two 200A fuses in parallel 😉 which worked

At the end I destroyed 2 controllers and the motor by overheating the windings of the motor (short circuit) The motor itself could handle 150A and I put 400A peak on it!
To be continued …

 

[Rovi]

In the meanwhile on that 1/4 mile event I found information on endless sphere (electrical world wide board) that Chinese manufacturer bring out a more powerful hubmotor incl. 17“ rim, which I ordered first because normally the make silver rims and I wanted to have black one and the used my version as picture on there hompage. So I though to create another bicycle with a 14/34kW hubmotor! I found a manufacturer called KKK (Kamilo kustom Kreations, Poland). I found different parts on his HP and create another style of bike.

I paid already the whole money for frame, fork and seat but after half a year of waiting I changed my decision by using the gear defect GSXR 1000 from my brother because I wanted to continue with the project by having the continuing with higher power later on in mind. So the build up of the motorcycle was ready in beginning of 2017 and in parallel, after 14 months of waiting I got the promised bicycle frame which I directly sold!

So I took part on next event where I fighted with power offs of the controller. One event later (1month) I run the 156 kph at 14,468 seconds by using a trick. I do not fully accellerate by one time, I did it in short steps which costs some time!

so I discussed the problem with Cinese Company and regarding the recommendation of using the controller they offered me they gave me another different one for free but it has also a little bit less of power but he worked completely right from the beginning!
I set an unofficial record as fastest ev who is using a hubmotor. I break the 200 kph of top speed with 200,49 kph (GPS measured) during tests on the same airport landing field I test now!

To be continued …

 

[Rovi]

By autumn 2017 I decided to change the design and also the controller again on this motorcycle!
So I got a used Carbon front fairing. Had a bicycle accident where a car crossed me and from the money I got I order the Carbon rear tail 🤣. And I changed from 35kW controller to around 100kW controller (120V 800Arms with water cooling).

Here you can find a short clip, where I explain the bike a little bit

with this version I make a new unofficial record on quater mile with 12,278 seconds and I won first time against a brand new Yamaha R6 by also having problems at the end of the track. I rolled over the finish line with only 140-144 kph!
But let’s say the race was a little bit unfair because my personal weight was half of the Yamaha driver’s and it seems that he has not so much experience! He got me before the finish line with 177 kph topspeed but I had the better reaction at the beginning which safe ed me for the win!
Well I had 6 runs at this weekend by charging the batteries again and again which costs me around 1,5 hours including disconnecting/connecting them.

The last picture looked very funny but I had to shorten the wheel base because of spinning wheel during startup!

To be continued …

 

[Rovi]

Now the last phase of converting began because I also killed this hubmotor by making 3 runs directly without cooling down the air cooled hubmotor …

But for sure I already knowed that this project will be a long time one!

i got in contact with a Belgium Start up motor company (coming from a University).
A complete new design of an axial flux motor (light weight, around 500HP and 500Nm of torque with 8000 turns.
That sounds absolutely awesome and got new technology I wanna go with … not old stuff with brushes! So no maintenance!
To shorten it … I waiste my time by over 100 mails over 1,5 years by getting the answer at the end (mid 2020, that if I want to finish my project I should go with another motor company! Until now the haven’t forwarded their motor for sale!
The other point was already that I decided me for a special controller from New Zealand (Scott Drive SD300) http://scottdrive.co.nz/Scottdrive300.html

So I have to find another motor company which offer
Butaxial flux motors with high torque and power …
There are also many manufacturers on the market like Emrax, YASA but I decided me for a Switzerland company called Phi Power AG. So I called them, told them something about my project and made the decision to got a special version of motor type with higher
So the official data sheet told 640Nm, 600 turns and 200kW for up to 20 seconds @ 750V DC, which is converted to AC. It’s also an axial flux motor (PMSM, permanent magnetic synchron motor).
Regarding this new motor and the big controller I had to find now a new way to get this stuff into the GSXR frame. The older version with Magnax motor which is 10cm smaller in diameter it looked like this

But with the bigger motor now I came to the decision to extend the main frame. So we cut it and extend it about 10” (25cm).

To be continued …

 

[Rovi]

Then we had to think about the motor adapter plates. Therefore we used 8mm stainless steel to minimize the force of this frame type. As you already know the combustion engine will do this in normal case!

To be continued …

 

[Rovi]

To get now the same design on “fuel tank” I made different sketches like this

But at the end we decided to use the same one as already used for the rear tail (1” aluminum tubes).

But at the end we decided to use the same one as already used for the rear tail (1” aluminum tubes).

 

[Rovi]

After this I made the electrical part add a smal package of batteries and drove the first time

Then another year began and we started to design the battery boxes. I decided to get the full power out of 10Ah. So I used simple 6S batteries as I did in the past who has a high C-rate. Turnigy Heavy Duty 5000mAh (60C/120C) means 60x 5A= 300A continue power if the reached empty status or 120x 5A=600A for 2 seconds!
So I will get 600A with 2x 5Ah in parallel. Each battery has 25,2V if it’s charged. The controller can handle 400kVA by 90%=360kW max output power and the manufacturer has tested it on a bench with 320kW.
So 800V DC is the recommended voltage and 900V is max!
The battery boxes are designed for 35 batteries each which I have to connect first in series and the in parallel.
But I make a concept to reduce failure which can happen in between by connecting them! I used up to 5 main circuit breakers to devide the voltage sections into 5x 175V DC which I will switch later on to max of 872V DC. Important at so high voltage is that I will not use regeneration because the back emf will destroy the link components inside the controller!

after that the painting job continued …

I have to interrupt here because I am on vacation (Italy Gardasee) and we want to go to the aqua park now 😀

 

[Rovi]

Next Wednesday I will do the next test run with a little bit higher voltage and amps.

 

[Rovi]

Started already with re-parameterisation of the controller:

• motor phase current: 500A (of 600A)
• field weakening: 20% (100A), to get a higher topspeed
• lower the pressure on rear wheel: 0,75 bar

Weather forecast: cloudy, 28 degree, 0 liter rain

Hopefully the GPS will work!

Edit: First side is fully charged

 

[Rovi]

Yesterday I made 6 little test runs!
5 test runs I did with slowly turns on throttle switch and one with 0-1 turn where I got a controller switch off! But at all test runs the front of the motorcycle lifted up a little bit that I got respect!
Could be that I destroyed my rear wheel on the sharp little edges of the landing field structure by burnout.

As you maybe remember with 200V the topspeed was around 89kph.

Now on 350 VDC I reached:

So I am very happy now with this result!

That’s my setup now for the L8-Night event (Lausitzring) in beginning of July to get my first official test result on 1/4 mile track with this bike (hopefully).

 

[Rovi]

Here you will find the little video clip: