Wednesday, June 17, 2009

Welcome to the next generation of e-bikes

Say hello to the ELMOTO. Built by a small German company sitting in Stuttgart this newly presented e-bike is quite impressive. It's primarily the design that creates a wow effect. The thing sort of looks like a combination of bicycle and motocycle design ideas. You register this thing as a light motocycle. However "light" is sort of not the appropriate word here, as the Elmoto weighs 180 kg, which is a lot! It runs 45 km/h and this for up to 70 km in a mixed driving cycle. Not bad. It stores quite a lot of energy in its batteries. It's certainly good/fast enough for city traffic, but you won't win the TT at the Isle of Man with it. I would personally prefer to have a lighter version with maybe limited reach (like 40-50 km), this might also help to reduce the probably very high price. But clearly, the Elmoto is a toy that could motivate the cool people (has George Clooney already ordered one?) to go for e-bikes.

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