jonescg's NEW electric racebike BUILD thread!

Our bike actually has a disadvantage on corner exits. The others have a larger tyre with more compound options and can get a lot more drive out of corners than I can.

Would you believe even Ripperton has a larger and softer compound tyre than we ran all year providing him with more grip and faster corner exits. both bikes actually pull away from me out of a corner no matter what I do, power means nothing if it's not able to be used, it's why I take a slightly different line to maximise the amount of drive I can get out of the corners. It simply will not put power down as well at lean due to tyre (and setup which is getting better). It's the next thing we will work on. You are also correct the bikes are geared for the tracks to maximise the drive out of corners, we beat them on takeoff and top speed but I find I have no or very little acceleration advantage over Varley between about 100-200kph where we spend most of the time on track.

Last year we were dismal under braking and mid corner speed, it's what we focused on this year, if you watch the live stream especially into the downhill hairpin (t8) I can brake even with Jason now and feel I can match or better his mid corner speed, in the last lap he ran wide trying to keep up. Rippertons lighter bike is still faster here though.

Trackside footage:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VbE2JW5w7U&feature=em-subs_digest

Cool, sounds like you guys have made all the right decisions to make the most of what you have 8)
It'll be interesting to see what the other guys have up their sleeve once you get the new swing arm/rear wheel options sorted.

Danny is a much bigger, heavier guy so it makes sense for him to step back to make Ripperton as competitive as possible. If the bike is already lighter I guess switching out the rider is a free power:weight ratio upgrade. Do you know if he had his new magnets for this last race ? When I last saw you guys at eastern creek he mentioned all the dramas he'd had trying to get the right replacements.

Yeah he did have the magnets he was chasing and something about controller tuning that he mentioned was giving him a bit more power than he previously had. Chris didn't he put it on the dyno at smsp? I seem to remember him being pleased with what it put out.

He's pulled 110 rwhp on a couple of occasions - he might chime in and share the numbers. The new magnets didn't make as much of a difference as he'd hoped. There were also some settings on the Kellys he could tweak that gave him some more power too.

***

I guess what some folks might be saying is - "imagine if the Ripperton bike had just 20 more horsepower". The outcome of the race would have been quite different. But those 20 more hp would probably add about 15 more kg, based on the available motor/controller technology out there. So would it be as quick through the twists? Designing a fast motorcycle is hard. Designing a fast electric motorcycle is harder still.

I quite deliberately chose a stupidly powerful powertrain. I know that improving the handling of the bike is going to be easier than 'adding more power'. Because you simply can't add more power. You need an entirely new powertrain, which has a different shape, mass and centre of gravity. This changes the whole package completely, creating as many problems as it solves. Really, I'm glad we've all moved past the DC/AC motor, LiFePO4/LiPo issues and settled on a package that just works.

Voltron was designed with enough room to grow into it's boots. And it's doing pretty well I say.

Well done Chris, great effort for it's first year, my cousin Robin with the Tesla caught Danny smokin it at the speedfest over the weekend

[youtube]UASYid_MFq8[/youtube]

I think the icer got peeved

My apologies for the "armchair" (wheelchair in my case) critisism...

I meant it to be constructive (finetuning riding style/technique) and have no doubt Pottz is a much better and faster rider than I ever was. See my user name... :wink:
From the video's (armchair remember) it just looks like a lot can be gained by using more of the track. I.e. cutting closer to the apexes and running wider to the edges. But he/you all won and the "don't bin it" clause is still honoured. :lol:

Well done and keep up the good work it's very enjoyable to watch!

Designing a fast race bike really is witchcraft.
The most fascinating thing about Voltron and Ripperton is when Voltron passes another bike its throttle is wide open
but when Ripperton passes another bike its throttle is wide SHUT. Its known as a bomber (Mark Barnett)
goes into, through and out of corners faster than others. Listen to Brads throttle in this video.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M0v1yQ8HUfI
Brad is about 32kg lighter than me and during the 6 laps that he raced the bike, he went 5 seconds a lap faster than me (1m42.9).
Then he said there was 38's in it. New tires, a few damping adjustments and no traffic but mostly more seat time would see a new eFXC lap record
at a track that is predominantly Voltron. So Pottz is right, big horsepower means nothing. btw, the Ripperton dyno'd at 110hp.
The Rippertons big advantage is it talks the talk. A racer can get on it initially thinking, this is gonna be weird but then finds it just wants to GO.
Within 2 turns they are racing it because It handles like their ICER and as Russel Holland said "its usable" meaning it still had its original R1 ridability
in spite of all the surgery .
I did get new magnets in it for the first round but it still didn't go faster (95hp) then Kelly controls admitted their micro processor wasn't reading the thermistors correctly
and pre-emptively ramping down power so I had to turn the overtemp setting up to max 170C and while I was in there turned everything else up to max too.
What SlowCo said about using all the track doesn't always work. In the above video at 4m8s Pottz uses the traditional line exiting T3 but Brad goes up the inside
on the exit of the turn straight up the middle of the track.
Next year will be quite interesting INDEED

We gave Leigh and Tim Boujos (some local legends over here) a ride on Voltron today at Barbs.

They said exactly the same thing - "Holy frock this thing is fast!!!" followed by "It handles really well, but maybe tweak this or that". So, I think Pottz has got Voltron handling pretty well too. We should have the new swingarm with a bigger tyre by March, so next year will be very interesting

Very nice!

Is there a swingarm design & material chosen yet?

Yeah Chromolly and billet aluminium axle carriers. Should look a little bit like the Samco bike.
http://www.samco-mc.com/about/

Can't wait

Sweet! I can see it will be a great aesthetic match as well as meeting your goals of wider tyre & allowing more tyre choices.

That Samco is one expensive Buell :lol:

jonescg said:

Yeah Chromolly and billet aluminium axle carriers. Should look a little bit like the Samco bike.
http://www.samco-mc.com/about/

Can't wait

Click to expand...

Love the look of that.

Tim Boujos:
"Had the pleasure of riding a 230rwhp electric superbike today!! Wow! Is all i can say! Wheelie up out the basin, wheelies over the hill, then wheelies again down the hill! Thing was a rocket ship! If thats the future then the future is looking good!! Thanks to Mike O'Hanlon Chris Jones and Danny Pottage for the opportunity to do some laps. Even after only 5 laps got down to 63sec braking 30m early into every turn. True engineering at its best!
Cheers guys!"
and
"Yep I could feel the engine braking as if I was down shifting 3 gears without the noise or jerking. It was cool just being able (to) just brake and not worry about anything else"

Leigh Boujos:
"It accelerates like a Moto GP bike with a seamless gearbox as there's uninterrupted power delivery I was careful of pushing the front end as its heavier than a superbike but I think with some setup dialling in there is a 59sec lap in it . It's a credit to the 3 guys involved that it rides so close to a conventional bike and they stared from scratch without a budget of like Mugen (Honda)"

Pottz I reckon we got the bike handling pretty good when these guys straight up say it handles well

Some well-earned praise - good work guys

While we wait for the swing arm to arrive I thought I might share some updates.

I have a new job!

I start on the 11th of January here in Perth for a few weeks, but I will be moving to Albany on February 1st. My wife and I will assess the job for another month or two before she commits to quitting her job. Albany is a beautiful city of about 30,000 people, and is always about 10 degrees cooler than Perth. It's about 400 km away, which means trips to Perth will be infrequent, but not impossible.

Best of all, the job pays as good as my job at the University, so things are looking up!

So the big improvements for 2016 are the new swing arm which means a 6" GSXR1000 rear wheel will slot right in. This gives us so many more tyre options than the current one. We can pick soft compounds which stick to the corner on exit, rather than leave big black lines everywhere. It also means we can source some magnesium or carbon wheels to shed at least 10 kg off the bat. While the swing arm is off the bike we can take the motor plates off and machine some weight out of them. I reckon some kind of maze pattern to help shed heat would be good, but in any case there's nearly 5 kg worth of meat to be removed.

Finally, the Cycle Analyst died It lasted two seasons but finally gave the backlit screen of desolation. I thought at first the isolating DC/DC converter was the source of the problem, but it turned out it was fine. As it happened, we were running the CA on 24 V - I was using the wrong outputs on the converter I tried running it on 12 V but no dice. So it's now time to start designing that new dash.

A cheap and cheerful digital panel meter from Altronics meant I could remove the decimal place and using the right voltage divider, get it to display 700 for a fully charged pack. It does mean I need to change the voltage divider inside the battery pack to give 7.00 V when fully charged, as opposed to the 5.00 V it gives now.

Fortunately the same can be done for battery amps using the shunt output too. So while I wont have a Coulomb counter, I will have the two most critical ones covered.

Hopefully they start the 2016 series at Wakefield Park as the first round of FX Superbikes is at Eastern Creek in March, which is a bit too soon for our liking. I need some time to save a bit of money!

Will post pics soon.

Cheerio!

Chris, Mike & Pottz

Some updates to the bike:

Since the Cycle Analyst died, I have been trying to get some kind of battery diagnostics up ion the dash. I used these Altronics digital panel meters which have a working range of -200.0 mV to +200.0 mV. They get you to install a divider in front of it to scale whatever it is you're measuring. I used some G10FR4 and some vero board to make the dividers.

View attachment 2

So I pulled the battery out and replaced the R2 of the main pack divider with a 13k resistor, giving me 7.00 V at full charge. Then I built this little instrument cluster with two essential stats -volts and amps.

View attachment 3

So now that this is working, I thought I would inspect the cells and install some air cooling.

Yeah, we've had some epically hot days here in WA. One of the worst bushfires in recent history destroyed a whole town and the heat was so intense it formed it's own pyrocumulonimbus clouds. We had the bike at the track last weekend, and while the battery was good for most of the day, on the second last session it sounded the alarm. So we prettymuch couldn't ride it or charge it for the remainder of the day.

But I also didn't want to compromise the water-proof seal on the pack either, should we have to race in the rain. The solution was to put some air entry holes at the bottom of the pack, with a hole spacing such that a quick application of gaffa tape would seal it up.



The fans are 60 mm diameter computer fans, so I needed to drill 2828 mm2 of holes at the bottom - or about 24 x 12 mm dia holes per side.



It won't do much during discharge, but when charging, they will help keep the temperature a bit lower for a bit longer. They are powered from the same supply as the quarter pack contactors - the ones which close during a charge and for discharge.

The conductors are roughly in the path of the airflow, so removing the boundary layer of hot air will help draw the heat out of the cells via the busbars. We've never really had heat issues, but if this allows us to get 5 or 6 sessions instead of 4 or 5, it might be worth it.

The swingarm billets are made, just got to wait for the FC boys to TIG up some bent chromo

We put ASBK champion Thyron Van Vuuren (Taz) on Voltron for a quick session. Fair to say he was pretty comfortable with it
Check out Taz backing it into T1, and pulling some proper wheelies at the end:

[youtube]AFaQF-Uj894[/youtube]

Wait till you see the video of Jeremy McWilliams (yes, that Jeremy McWilliams) on Voltron!

The amazing thing about McWilliams wasn't so much the lap times, we are pretty confident the bike will go sub 60 at barbs with the right rider and some seat time. Lap time wasn't the objective, just a couple laps, a bit of fun and a little feedback on setup is what we wanted. What absolutely blew me away was the consistency he was riding at after only lap 3. He was 2 seconds a lap faster than Taz who is a great rider but the way McWilliams did it was just so smooth and effortless, the video was almost an anti-climax after watching Taz slide and wheelie everywhere. McWilliams was so smooth, consistent and fast.

Check the lap times and top speeds. Remember the bike has no noise, no gears, no display at all on the dash to gauge speed yet the top speeds were bang on the same lap after lap. All he has to rely on is his own sense of speed.



Also have a look at the GPS plot. Lap 3 and 4 may as well be the same line.



Anyway Keep that in mind while watching a GP rider do his thing.....
[youtube]2o7B2vqDI6s[/youtube]


The only sad thing is we pulled him in a lap or two early and he didn't get time for another session or three.
After lots of laughing and jokes he said he enjoyed the bike, it was very weird but so easy to ride. I was happy to hear him say the setup was generally pretty good. The throttle control and braking was a bit strange with no 'snatch' when closing and opening the throttle but nothing he wouldn't get used to. He discussed the regen braking a little and mentioned he had to use the rear brake a lot. Turn in he felt was ok, mid corner not bad. He gave feedback on the swingarm and corner exits that we had an idea we needed to fix anyway. Overall he said Chris built a great bike. To hear that from him was fantastic and a credit to the work that has been done.

I suppose it's time for an update!

Kat and I have moved to Albany, Western Australia! Where's that? Pretty much the exact opposite side of the planet as New York. It's a beautiful seaside town and the first permanent settlement on the west coast (Boxing Day 1826). It does remind us of Vancouver or Victoria in many ways. A deep natural port, lots of water and beautiful scenery all around. You'll have to come and visit some time. Most importantly the new job has been really interesting and I work with some fine folks. Best of all, I now have a means to pay for cool shit like Voltron Evo

Now, that swingarm. Randy and Karsten (http://www.framecrafters.net) started work on these bimetallic swingers late last year, but in the case of Voltron we had to replicate the Ducati swingarm to a large degree. The dimensions were kept identical except the axle carriers were made to suit the 2011 GSXR1000 rear wheel. Bigger wheel means more tyre options, and more rubber on the track. Karsten welded up a swing arm, but after the last weld, it had twisted a millimetre out of whack. Barely noticeable, but no doubt difficult to fit from the other side of the world. Cause these guys are awesome and take enormous pride in their work, they set about building another one.





It ships tomorrow Looking forward to getting this puppy painted in Kangaroo Paw red and have it sport a fat old Gixxer rear wheel. First chance to get it trackside will be March 26th which will no doubt be a bit soon. We'll see.

Also, Pottz is hanging up the leathers this year. I'll let him chime in, but we have a new rider lined up. Another Sandgroper of course!

Hey Jones

You've got bloody big Cahoonas to ride that thing mate, :lol:

I was looking I think at your old battery pack in Newcastle last week while checking out Bretts lastest project very impressive box

Nice work

Cheers Kiwi

Haha, and I just ride it. Pottz races it!

I know Brett was working on a hybrid Nissan GTR or something and needed a convenient, ready-made 700 V pack. We happened to have one

How's it coming along? I've not heard much from him.

Meanwhile the swingarm has arrived and is being painted. Fits like a glove on the bike too. That's why I stuck with Framecrafters - these guys know their craft.

Should be on track in Adelaide (Mallala Raceway) on the 27th of May. With a 200/60 tyre this time

jonescg said:

Haha, and I just ride it. Pottz races it!

I know Brett was working on a hybrid Nissan GTR or something and needed a convenient, ready-made 700 V pack. We happened to have one

How's it coming along? I've not heard much from him.

Click to expand...

Well you know Brett likes to keep his cards close to his chest :lol:

He has had the GTR out heaps of improved top end he is just playing with Diff ratios to get more low down.

Cheers Kiwi

Some ChroMo-Powdercoated pr0n for you.

That does look "proper" !!!