• There has been a recent cluster of spammers accessing BARFer accounts and posting spam. To safeguard your account, please consider changing your password. It would be even better to take the additional step of enabling 2 Factor Authentication (2FA) on your BARF account. Read more here.

Congratulations, Alta Motors--SF's own E-Moto Manufacturer

Gabe

Gabe

COVID-fefe
Joined
Oct 26, 2002
Location
Where's Cleveland Heights?
Moto(s)
FZ-07 farkled-by-Amazon Edition
Name
Gabe
BARF perks
AMA #: 1006675
Delivering its first bike to an actual customer! Sweet!

A much-participating BARFer is the CEO (he may or may not want to speak up) and a good guy. Kudos to him and his team for having a vision, following through and actually selling a bike--not just making vaporware like some other companies I could name but won't.

Hoping to get to ride one soon!

http://blog.motorcycle.com/2015/12/...otors-delivers-first-motorcycle-to-customers/

efdb25a8-0419-4fe2-9d47-c296a12fdcfb-copy_feature-633x388.jpg
 
Congratulations. Lots of good people at Alta doing good things for motorcycling. And the bikes are beautiful.
 
Awesome. My next Moto purchase will be electric. Glad to see another player making these things viable and awesome - especially with local know how and ingenuity.:thumbup
 
Wow, I'm surprised that I never heard of them since I follow a lot of EV stuff.

I wonder how it compares to a Zero? It will be interesting to see there road going stuff when they get to that. Dirt is a good place to start since it is so simple.

One thing that you notice on the industrial design of EVs is traditional design features that are from gas vehicles that carry over for no reason on EVs. Look at the fairing that would scoop air into a radiator, but Alta does not have a radiator. Zero has a similar fairing. The Tesla Model S has a 'nose cone' that looks like a grill, but it does not do anything. These designs will die off over time.
 
Last edited:
Killroy1999 said:
Wow, I'm surprised that I never heard of them since I follow a lot of EV stuff.

I wonder how it compares to a Zero? It will be interesting to see there road going stuff when they get to that. Dirt is a good place to start since it is so simple.
Click to expand...

You may remember the name Redshift/BRD.

Very different motorcycle for a different market compared to the Zero. The Redshift is a competition/track (dirt or supermoto) machine you can commute on for short distances. The Zero is primarily for commuting.
 
Makes you wonder why KTM never brought their e-dirtbike here in the US. Would love to own an electric free ride.
 
Gabe said:
You may remember the name Redshift/BRD.

Very different motorcycle for a different market compared to the Zero. The Redshift is a competition/track (dirt or supermoto) machine you can commute on for short distances. The Zero is primarily for commuting.
Click to expand...


The Redshift is more racy, but the Zero is not that far off.

Zero FXS ZF 6.5 Redshift MX
City Miles 90 ?
Highway 37 ?
Combined 52 ?
Power HP 44 40
0-60 Sec 3.8 ?
Suspension in ~8 12
Weight lb 293 260
MSRP $ 11000 15000
 
Killroy1999 said:
The Redshift is more racy, but the Zero is not that far off.

Zero FXS ZF 6.5 Redshift MX
City Miles 90 ?
Highway 37 ?
Combined 52 ?
Power HP 44 40
0-60 Sec 3.8 ?
Suspension in ~8 12
Weight lb 293 260
MSRP $ 11000 15000
Click to expand...

Yeah, and a lot cheaper as well. Plus Zero is building an SM version this year. The Alta's battery is 80% the size of the Zero's, so I'd expect it to have a combined range of about 40 miles.
 
The stats don't tell you everything. The suspension components on the Alta are significantly better than those on the Zero, for instance. They are very different machines, with very different intended purposes. Both are damned cool, though.
 
Gabe said:
Plus Zero is building an SM version this year.
Click to expand...

Probably just putting some S/SR 17" wheels on the FX.
It was "tried/done" while I was working there... last year.
 
Sorry I was a little slow to this thread... been recovering from surgery this week.

Gabe said:
Hopefully, you've forgiven me for crashing your protoype.

:ride
Click to expand...

Ha, of course. Prototypes are made to be tested... and at some point that means crashing. Especially on sumos and MXers. Thanks for the kind words above. It has taken a lot more blood, cash, and time than we thought it would to get it right, but we're finally there (well, at the real beginning) and it feels fucking amazing.

Killroy1999 said:
Look at the fairing that would scoop air into a radiator, but Alta does not have a radiator.
Click to expand...

I agree that you do often see inauthentic design cues on electrics, but that's not the case here. There is nothing extraneous on the RedShift. The air scoop is functional. That whole forged front subframe IS our radiator.
 
Last edited:
Killroy1999 said:
The Redshift is more racy, but the Zero is not that far off.

Zero FXS ZF 6.5 Redshift MX
City Miles 90 ?
Highway 37 ?
Combined 52 ?
Power HP 44 40
0-60 Sec 3.8 ?
Suspension in ~8 12
Weight lb 293 260
MSRP $ 11000 15000
Click to expand...

I'll leave comparisons to customers and magazines. We view the 250 and 350 MXers as our competition, not other electrics. But I can fill in the blanks on the spec sheet. The FX has the same battery capacity - 5.7kWh nominal to our 5.8, so under equal use they'll have nearly identical range performance. We consider the combined cycle (~50mi) the most accurate, so that's the one we try to publish whenever possible, but it will of course depend on the user. Our 0-60 is 3.3.

If you're in the market for a motocrosser or a supermoto, I suggest you try one - there'll be a SM demo at BMW MC of SF probably late February. We haven't had anyone throw a leg over one that didn't love it.
 
Last edited:
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top