Miceli assembled electric bike called the Ion for research of requirement task of graduation at Appalachian State University, Boone, North Carolina, United States. Students majoring in industrial design was required to work on projects to create something reflecting all the learned knowledges.
Initially he chose a simple project on which it is not too racked for his brains. "I want to create environmentally friendly something, but it is not sacrificing performance," said Miceli.Based on the experience of riding a dirt bike for a few years, Miceli disarmed a Kawasaki Ninja ZX6 1996 to stay the frame and began to explore. As a result, an electric motorcycle assembly itself was capable of racing at speeds over 112 kilometers per hour and travel a distance of 96.5 kilometers.
By the time restricted, only one semester, Miceli directly designed his dream motorcycle. He combined the ideas, sketches, and CAD models, as well as taking inspiration from some of his favorite motorcycle, including the KTM RC8. Miceli wanted an almost futuristic look and modern, but it was still within the range of interest bikers today. When the electric motorcycle design was complete, Miceli've only got two months before the deadline ran out.
He unpacked his Ninja to the frame and wheels. A battery box containing two dozen of the lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4) 40Ah used to replace the 600 cc engine. A pack of batteries was estimated to have a total output of about 3 kilowatts per hour (kWh). engineering of energy supply was at 6.75 inches and an AC motor was to produce power 43 horsepower and torque of 13 meters-kilograms, a figure exceeded the S Zero electric motorcycle on the market today. While the weight and center of gravity, electric motorcycle was not much different from the original motorcycle.
The box could fully recharge in six hours from a standard 110-volt outlet. Miceli estimated electric motorcycle travelling a distance of 96.5 kilometers and it reached a top speed of about 112 kilometers per hour. Unfortunately, in terms of acceleration, ions was being left behind, at least for now.
Although he has already graduated, so far Miceli continued to reorganize and refine his new motorcycle. He was replacing the batteries 60Ah and 40Ah with two-speed custom-made transmission system in which it was still secret. With many extra's, Miceli hoped that Ion could penetrate 80 kilometers per hour and it accelerated to over 160 kilometers per hour in seconds.
To create electric motorcycle, it was not only environmentally friendly, but it was also worth calculated on the highway, Miceli got "a little" help from his father, an electrical engineer. He has a clear problem about "cable" by which it was complicated. As a result, electrical systems were recently very efficient ion, such as lighting systems using LED lights in which it required electrical power was no more than 1 ampere.
However, Miceli said that the hardest part of the project was to make the motorcycle body because it required a lot of energy. Even to create a body, Miceli also had to sacrifice "green" electric motorcycle. Funding limitations and the natural form of the bike made, Miceli was forced to use polystyrene foam to form the body of a motorcycle. Even so, Miceli was very satisfied because it had the appearance of a motorcycle as he wanted.
Ion production cost was U.S. $ 12 thousand, half of whom were used to make batteries and drive train or drive systems. To realize the project, Miceli received a grant from the local community on campus. For projects accomplished, he received an ' A' of his final study. "I did not make the bike simply looking for value of subject," he said. "I made it because it was what I wanted to do, once the gate to gain employment in the field I want."
Actually Ion was not the fastest electric motors available today. Several automotive companies were also vying to create electric vehicles because of depletion of world oil reserves, plus the issue of environmental pollution and global warming in which it makes people begin to look for cleaner and other fuel.
Beginning last September, the Mission Motors, an American automotive company, tried to prove that their homemade electric motorcycle was capable of driving 241.4 kilometers per hour as they claimed so far. In the process of testing at the Bonneville salt field in Utah.
Jeremy Cleland, product manager at Mission Motors, gave a new unofficial record for electric motorcycles. He spurred the bike to reach speeds of 241.5 kilometers per hour, two times faster than the Ion.
Edward West, founder and president of a company based in San Francisco, said that the record was achieved very bad in field conditions salt and the wind was very strong. "This historic moment for the electric vehicle and proof reveal that the era of electric motorcycles have been started," he said.
