Not as quick as the bikes, but still...

[Phone]

Steve,

 

Never seen one but 990 power tool batteries alone would make it weigh - what? - a couple thousand pounds.

 

Phone

[Steve Walker]

I have a vision of a massive hole in a hedge at the end of the first long straight!

[corydoras]

Steve,

 

Never seen one but 990 power tool batteries alone would make it weigh - what? - a couple thousand pounds.

 

Phone

The whole bike weighs 281kgs.

 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KillaCycle

[Manxman]

In 2010 a new race at the Isle of Man TT was started for electric powered bikes. These bikes have got faster every year, with John McGuinness breaking the lap record for this class during the race. his average speed for the lap being 117.366 mph, I didn't hear what his top speed was through the speed trap on the fastest part of the course was, but it would probably be 170-180 mph with that average speed.

 

https://www.google.com/webhp?complete=0&gws_rd=ssl#complete=0&q=tt+zero

 

As for an F1 car doing a lap, would it have the ground clearance? The roads are pretty bumpy and uneven believe me, with adverse cambers etc. Add to that Ballaugh Bridge and the other places where you get airborne. Although the course looks wide enough it's quite narrow in many places some of which can only be appreciated after you have driven around the course yourself.

 

Mark Higgins lap this year in the Subaru was at an average of 117.51 mph, which is fractionally faster than John McGuinness on the electric bike.

Edited July 3, 2014 by Manxman

[Steve Walker]

An F1 car would probably not be ideal because the aero is predicated on a very low ride height (although there is some footage of one being driven on part of the course). Hillclimb cars are designed to deal with narrow, bumpy tracks. They're mostly based on formula cars, but modified to produce lots of downforce without relying so much on ground effect that they can't run enough ground clearance to deal with the bumps.

 

I wouldn't like to say what you would need to challenge the outright record - there aren't, as far as I know, any tracks where both bikes and cars run and the bike record is quicker. I think you'd struggle more finding someone mad enough to do it. I would say that the Subaru is a 1500kg family car with a little over 300bhp, and while I don't think they could challenge the bike record, there are a lot of road cars faster than that. A McLaren P1, for instance.

[Phone]

Cory,

 

Is that the bike weight with the battery pack installed? I would think those batteries weigh more than a pound apiece (from memory, more like two pounds each)? The "990" may be a stock number or something - may not be the number of batteries required to operate the bike (?).

 

Phone

[corydoras]

Cory,

 

Is that the bike weight with the battery pack installed? I would think those batteries weigh more than a pound apiece (from memory, more like two pounds each)? The "990" may be a stock number or something - may not be the number of batteries required to operate the bike (?).

 

Phone

Yes that's the weight of the bike, ready to go. The reason that it so light is that it does not use traditional Li-Ion batteries instead it uses Lithium Iron Phosphate batteries.

 

It only uses 7 cents worth of electricity to do a standing quarter, that's what I call efficient.