Pikes Peak 2013

[triangleforge]

If there were ever a race that was ideally suited to a modern electric bike, it'd be Pikes Peak, with a short course & a steep climb that emphasizes torque, but still:

http://touch.latimes.com/#section/5/article/p2p-76306646/

[Speeddog]

Did they do the *whole* thing on one charge?

'Cause it has seperate times for the bottom half and top half of the course.

[triangleforge]

Did they do the *whole* thing on one charge?

'Cause it has seperate times for the bottom half and top half of the course.

I was wondering the same thing, and couldn't find out for sure - they give total times for Dunne's Multistrada record last year & the overall course record for Millen, but not for Dunne on the Lightning. In looking around on the Pikes Peak site, they do seem to split the times up into a whole lot of timing increments, so Bottom/Top might be a traditional way of reporting practice times... But I still don't know.

If it's separate charges - and if the bike can't do the full 12 miles without worrying about battery drain -- then you'd expect to see a whole lot more conservative riding throughout. But a short, steep course like this with a lot of accelerations out of super slow hairpin turns does play into an electric bikes strengths a whole lot more than other venues like Laguna Seca or Isle of Man.

[thought]

http://www.asphaltandrubber.com/racing/carlin-dunne-fastest-motorcycle-time-pikes-peak-international-hill-climb-tire-test/

evidently they did it in sections for the tire test.

[triangleforge]

Thanks for finding & sharing that! So I guess the question (to which we'll know an answer by the end of the month) is whether or not they've got enough juice on board to make the full run at full power, or if Dunne will have to meter out his effort to get to the finish with some speed as the electrics have to at IOM.

[thought]

Hmm... I think it'll be pretty viable to get that speed overall.  Reasoning is this... Laguna seca is about 2 miles per lap and the TTXGP runs 8 lap races there.  So that means the bikes can be pushed at race pace for at least 18 miles.  The PP course runs about 12 miles so they should have some power to spare.

The Mission Motorcycles Mission R they just released seems to be able to produce a 12/15/17 kwh pack that lists as 100/120/140 miles combined cycle riding... even if a race pace gives only 25% of the efficiency of combined cycle usage then they should easily make it up the mountain.  Unless of course Lightning is way less efficient than Mission.

[Speeddog]

Did some napkin calculations.

A 12kWh pack gives them ~11kWh to play with, as it takes ~1kWh just to lug the bike and rider up the altitude gain on the course in that ~ 9:36.

Leaves them about a constant 92 HP to use over that time.

To my surprise, they should be fine.

[thought]

I've been in contact with some electric motorcycle people recently and they've been telling me that PP is the easiest course for ebikes to be designed for due to the length and nature of the track.

On the other hand, the IOMTT is actually a very boring race to design for.  For ebikes, it's more of an endurance race rather than a speed race.  It's almost formulaic... you have so and so many kwh, you need to go so and so speed for so and so time.  So you then just hold the throttle at 30-40% the whole time just to maximize battery life.  It's more about efficiency calculations rather than how fast/powerful/smooth the engine/chassis/controller is.

[zooom]

http://www.asphaltandrubber.com/racing/ppihc-carlin-dunne-lightning-set-fastest-qualifying-time-motorcycle-pikes-peak/

on pace to beat his own record !!!

[Grampa]

even though Carlin is a bit of a dooooshe...he's one heck of a racer.

he just recently purchased DMF member Boog's cbr600 to ride in the IOM. (hopefully that happens next year)

[OT]

Am I the only one missing the 'dirt' roads on the climb?

[zooom]

Am I the only one missing the 'dirt' roads on the climb?

no...it is a completely different race now....still a cool race...but different.

[thought]

http://www.asphaltandrubber.com/racing/carlin-dunne-lightning-motorcycles-pikes-peak-race-results/#more-44784

pretty cool