The 2012 London show, at ExCel, provided any visitor with the chance to try an electric trail bike when Quantyas were used in the Moto Gymkhana ‘in and out of the cones’ competition within the main exhibition area. Good fun, fume-free and almost silent. Quantya also had a whole series of ‘Quantyaparks’ on the Continent, but in a strange deal they all got sold to Zero’s US rival Brammo and were renamed ‘Brammoparks’ before disappearing without trace. Brammo did produce a prototype electric trailie, the Engage, as a potential ‘stablemate’ for their Enertia and Empulse road bikes, but it was never put into production.
The pre-production Brammo Engage.
Brammo was bought by Polaris in January 2015; the Brammo Empulse was rebranded as a Victory and the Brammo-Victory racebike was ridden to second place in the 2016 TTZero by William Dunlop. Then Polaris axed the Victory brand altogether after purchasing Indian. Now that Harley have announced that they will definitely be putting an electric machine into production in 2019, let’s hope that Polaris follow suit with an electric Brammo-Indian!
William Dunlop & Brian Wismann at the 2016 TT.
By the time I returned to the Zero factory in January 2015, the firm had dropped their off-road only MX model in favour of the heavier but street legal FX machine, although it retained the MX’s ability to swap both batteries in seconds. While in the area I also got the chance to ride the heavily modified 2012 Zero on which Terry Hershner had done an ‘Iron Butt’, covering more than a thousand miles in under 23 hours (This astonishing feat was achieved with no back-up whatsoever, just a huge amount of determination plus a mixture of improved aerodynamics, courtesy of Craig Vetter, creator of the Windjammer, and lots of extra batteries).
Terry also rode his electric beast 3,000 miles coast-to-coast in a record-breaking 5 days, completely unsupported!
Terry Hershner and the Vetter-modified Zero on which he rode 1,000 miles in under 23 hours.
2015 also saw the long-awaited arrival of KTM’s FreerideE electric trail bike. I had the great pleasure of riding one at the UK launch, held, appropriately enough, at Stuart Rutter’s superb E-scape all-electric trail park in Cheshire, where he also keeps a fleet of Quantyas, OSETS and Kubergs, along with a striking prototype ‘Brutal Blau’ which he was involved with a few years ago.
Stuart Rutter poses with his 'Brutal Blau' prototype.
When launched, the FreerideE was lighter and more dirt-capable than the Zero FX, and available in both off-road only and street-legal versions, but had a smaller range. It has one big jerry-can-sized battery instead of the Zero’s pair of car battery sized ones, but it can also be swapped in well under a minute.
Stuart Rutter replaces a battery much quicker than he can decant petrol!
Blez jumping a KTM Freeride E-XC at the E-scape park in Cheshire.
2015 was also the year in which, for my sins, I got heavily involved with helping to prepare Carla McKenzie for her John O’Groats to Land’s End (JOGLE) trail ride and shared with her my knowledge and enthusiasm for electric PTWs of all kinds. Carla had her first taste of electric motorcycling riding a KTM on the ‘pop up’ trail park at that year’s Goodwood Festival of Speed, where we also met the astonishing Spencer Watt, a paraplegic who still competes in motocross despite losing the use of both legs in a motocross accident when he was only 15. For Spencer, the twist’n’go KTM was a doddle to ride compared to the hands-only controls to cover both brakes, clutch and throttle on his motocross racebike!
Spencer Watt in action on a KTM Freeride E-XC at Goodwood in 2015.
A few weeks later we went to the all-electric ‘High Volts’ day run by Stuart Rutter at Nantmawr Quarry, near Oswestry, where we both had our first ride on EM electric trials bikes. We also watched young kids on Kubergs, OSETs, Mecatecnos and electric mini-BSAs and bold men racing KTM FreerideEs. Little did I know what mad electric plans Carla would soon be hatching…