When you ride an electric bike, questions are always about the numbers. How long does the battery last? What’s the range? How many hours does it take to recharge? All understandable considering electric bikes like the Zero SR are still relatively new. And there’s a lot of misinformation floating around. So I recently downloaded the smartphone app for the Zero SR. It not only allows me to alter the bike’s speed, torque and regeneration settings through the Custom mode, it also uses the phone to display dynamic information beyond the simple ‘battery percentage remaining’ icon on the dash.
My daily commute to the office is 75km each way comprising 20km of freeway, 20km of multilane highway and 35km of city traffic. The 20km of freeway is the big battery killer. Sitting on 110km/h for just 11 minutes requires 22 per cent of the battery power. That’s in Sport mode; running the bike in Eco mode does use slightly less, however, the trade-off is a lack of roll-on power. The 20km of highway, at an average of 70km/h, uses around 13 per cent in Sport mode.
Thirty-five kays of city traffic, with plenty of lane filtering and blasting away from lights in Custom mode with full power and zero regen, uses a further
17 per cent.
The bike recharges from a standard socket at around 10 per cent per hour so it’s back to full charge well before I leave work to head home. I could easily make the return trip on one charge, a distance of 150km. Take the freeway out of the equation and those numbers become more attractive.
Petrol station? Never heard of him.
