Our Best ET Ever!

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The KillaCycle team (me, Scotty Pollacheck, Steve Ciciora, Derek Barger, and Scot Colburn) just got back from the All Harley Drag Racing Association (AHDRA) event at Las Vegas. I believe that the KillaCycle was the very first non-Harley motorcycle ever to participate in the Las Vegas AHDRA event, ever. Quite an honor.
Burnout Action
The reception was warm, but the weather was a bit chilly at times. This made it difficult to get all 880 of the A123Systems lithium ion cells up to the toasty temperature where they deliver the most HP. During the course of the event, we progressively posted better times as we figured out ways of warming up the pack. On Saturday morning, we ran a restrained 10.19 @130 mph just to shake down the bike and cycle the pack. (900 pack amps, 374 volts.) Neither the fans or the tower announcer were expecting a nearly silent drag bike, so there were a lot of puzzled looks and “What the heck was THAT!” comments after the run.

This event is the AHDRA season finale, so there were a LOT of bikes running. (Great track prep by AHDRA, by the way.) We were very lucky to get three runs in all day. (10.19, 9.217 and 9.346) The runs were many hours apart, so we couldn’t get the A123 Systems pack temperature up to the desired 70 degrees Celsius for maximum power. (Other brands of Li-Ion cells would be ablaze at this temperature, by the way.) We knew we had to figure out a new strategy for Sunday.

By the end of Saturday, all the Harley fans knew who we were and were universally positive about the bike. We had a parade of tattooed bikers patting us on the back and telling us how much they liked the KillaCycle.

Scotty worked with the AHDRA officials and scheduled our Sunday exhibition runs for the afternoon. We ran the bike in the back lot several times and charged it up several times in the late morning to pre-heat the pack. We turned the Zilla up to 1350 amps, knowing the hot pack would be able to dish it out.

We ran a bit later than originally planned, so the pack was just a bit cooler than we would have liked for the first run. We set a new record on this run, however, of 9.035 @142.79 mph! (Our old record was 9.156) We quickly returned to the pits, recharged the bike, and the AHDRA folks let us run again just as soon as we were ready. The pack was up to temperature and we were able to back up our new record, making it official.

This last run was near the end of the event and it was quite dark by then. The crowd was all ready for us and cheered Scotty as he did a truly awesome burn-out. (We will post the video shortly on You-Tube.) He then rolled out of the water box and up to the staging lights, taking his time, letting the pack recover from the burn-out discharge. He launched hard and we all knew this run was going to be even better than the previous one. Just as Scotty crossed the finish line, the rear motor splashed plasma onto the track, creating an awesome fireworks display. (You MUST see the video.)

The scoreboard lit up showing: 8.760 @ 145.44 mph

Here’s the video:

32 thoughts on “Our Best ET Ever!”

  1. Hi folkz

    nice show!!!

    but with good brushless-engines you will go as fast as the topFUELer ;)

    keep on moving…
    wurpfel

  3. Glad you made so many new friends for electric bikes. Congratulations on an awesome record run!

  4. Any word on the video? Your description was eye-popping, but we live in a visual culture these days. :) Good work!

  6. Very impressive run !!

    Hope to see you run at our local drag strip Mission, BC, Canada some day!

    Quick 6 Racing

  7. WOW! Not much else to say other than…can I have one for the road…in black please.

    :D

    Tarrith

  9. Spectacular performance. My son and I fly electric model planes. Their performance has has far exceeded the fuel burners these days. I knew it was just a matter of time before lithiums were powering vehicles. Our motors are brushless and have almost double the power of brushed motors. The drawback is the cost of the speed controller for them. Great job gentlemen! Am looking forward to reading more about your work.

  10. HOLY KOW, I thought my 450hp 383 trike was bad. I love this thing, any one interested in a stainless steel trike?? It runs 108mph in the 1/8 spinning the full track. I want that ZIP without the BOOM of the engine!!!
    You guys have done a great job. I’ve been looking into EPV’s and this has put me over the top!!!

  11. Bill
    Not bad for an old Cranstonian. Keep it up. Good luck in the future.
    Regards
    JLD

  12. Wurpfel, the problem with a 3-phase induction motor ( a type of brushless motor) is that its speed is NOT proportional to the voltage applied to, but is to its line frequency and number of poles. Obviously you cannot change the number of poles in the motor, but you can change the frequency which is what a Variable frequency drive does to vary the speed of a 3-phase motor. The other problem is you must increase the voltage as well, NOT because it helps it go faster which is false, but because inductive reactance will increase if the frequency increases which for any who has taken AC electronics courses knows what I am talking about. So the voltage increase is to keep the same current flow so that the motor performance will be the same as it would be at lower frequency. This is a very complex controller that costs many times more than a simple PWM (pulse width modulation) controller for DC motors like the series wound motors used in these drag EV’s.

    Another note is a series-wound motor can take lots of PEAK horsepower that is many times beyond its continuous rating without damage which makes perfect sense for use as a drag motor as well as its torque being absolutely tremendous only being matched by a flux vector type compatible 3-phase motor.

  16. Wow. Great run! But does the shower of sparks mean a lot of reconstructive surgery before it runs again?

    You guys got any plans to go commercial? Obviously not with something as crazy as KillaCycle; but perhaps a normal-sized (say, a 600cc chassis) bike with a pretty good punch and more realistic range? The A123 cells probably wouldn’t be the right choice for such a thing, due to cost and energy-density concerns…but there’s a lot of batteries out there.

    Anyway, congratulations on your performance and warm reception from the Harley folks. Keep up the fast work!

    Hunter.

  17. I got to watch this bike run a 8.30 @ 150 mph
    at Firebird raceway March 31 at the AHDRA meet…….. want a awesome display ! I was very impressed ! even after watching the top fuel bikes. I am now a fan and will fequently viset this website for any updates and news.

  18. The vid would be a lot cooler if I didnt hear the bloddy petrol engine all the time.
    Must look cool to accelerate like that allmost silently.

  19. How much does it cost? If you don’t sell it,where I can buy something like that?And it’s not so important to be so quick.Thanks !Hello from Ukraine !!

  20. heck yes…….. Im a road racer and am routing for you…. We need advancements like this…. Congrats and best of luck.. !

  21. Great job !!

    I’m picking my jaw up off the ground at those stacks of A123′s !!!… my god man….

    How many cycles do you guys manage to get out of these cells with that type of abuse ?

  22. YAAA HOOOO! NICE RUN AT PIR IN PORTLAND OREGON! WHENS THE NEW VIDEO AND NEW RECORD GONNA BE READY FOR US SPEED DEMONS? GREAT TO VISIT WITH YA IN OREGON THE 14TH OF JULY!

  23. Yeah, you need to silence the noise of the piston engines surrounding it, if you want the video to be really impressive!

  26. Hi Guys – I held the NMRA/NHRA record in ’79 & 80 for “A” Stock with Honda CBX at 10.22/144.77. At the time it was the fastest and quickest stock bike. EV makes sense. Heck of a job! Congrats!

  28. De-tune it to the 10′s and I’ll drive it to work!

    No need to de-tune. It is very tame to drive on the throttle and is very efficient. It is very close to the ground, however, and it doesn’t turn normal corners, so you would have to build a completely different frame to drive it routinely on the street.

  30. Looks good.

    Reminds me of Eyeball Engineering’s Kawashocki electric dragbike. IIRC, the Rannberg’s had it in the 10′s or 11′s some 20 years ago. Nice to see someone continue the electric dragbike idea.

    I believe that they also ran the bike at the LACR Harley Drags a couple times as well and even got an article in a Harley mag, http://www.nedra.com/hotbike.html

    It was funny to see that “silent” bike go down the strip. And when bracket racing, you could really hear the competitor’s pedaling at the top end to try and not break out.

  31. Awesome stuff guys. I was there racing my GSXR600 August 5th at Portland International. Been trying to find videos of your runs there. Finally got one.

    I’m in the video of your day run (before the tire blew I think?). Blue and white gixxer in the background with me in the blue! I love it!

    That was awesome to watch! Had no idea you guys were going to be there that night.

    Thanks guys,

    Josh

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