Crew Rides Across the U.S. in 3 Days — On an Electric Motorcycle

BY DAMON LAVRINC06.18.139:23 AM


Thad Wolff arrives at the Santa Monica Pier last Thursday. Photo: Moto-Electra
As night fell on the Moto-Electra team during the first day of its cross-country adventure, Thad Wolff realized the headlight on the home-built electric motorcycle was out of alignment. It was dark, it was raining and he really, really needed that light. So he pulled into a gas station, his support van not far behind, to make an emergency repair.

Brian Richardson, the man responsible for building the bike, whipped out a Dremel and went to work on the fairing to readjust the headlamp. With little to do but wait, Wolff, a former professional motorcycle racer, decided to enjoy some shut-eye and hope for the best.

“I’m lying on the ground, with my jacket as a pillow, trying to get some sleep,” Wolff recalled today, “and asking myself, ‘What the hell did I get into?’”

What he got into was a 2,500-mile blitz from Jacksonville, Florida to Santa Monica, California, on an electric motorcycle. It was an epic test for the bike, the team, and its riders, who covered that distance in 84.5 hours, arriving at the Santa Monica Pier last Thursday, making it the fastest cross-country trip ever made on an electric bike.

Richardson is nothing if not ridiculously ambitious. Before proving the viability of electric drivetrains with his cross-country run, he and the Moto-Electra crew competed in the TTXGP electric motorcycle racing series from 2010 to 2012 and finished second overall last year. Wolff was the man on the bike for every season, so when Richardson needed a pilot for his transcontinental adventure, Wolff was the only logical choice. And the electro-Norton was the only logical bike.

The bike, a 1966 Norton Featherbed frame with a motor and battery pack wrapped in a replica fairing from the John Player Special Norton grand prix bike, is by far the most gorgeous electric motorcycle ever. It’s a modified version of the machine that competed against purpose-built racers in the TTXGP.

Richardson — who’s neither an engineer or a fabricator yet built the bike himself in a shed in Virginia — doubled the capacity of the lithium-polymer batteries to about 22 kilowatt-hours, which is only slightly smaller than the pack in a Nissan Leaf. Most of the batteries were donated, including an auxiliary pack from a military vehicle of some kind. It isn’t the prettiest system, but the price was right.

“We had no budget,” Richardson says. That meant the team couldn’t swap battery packs along the way — something Richardson calls “cheating” — and instead squeezed every mile from the battery before stopping to recharge. The team took a conservative approach to both speed and charging.

“We just wanted to finish,” says Richardson.


The entire Moto-Electra team after a grueling three and a half-day journey. Photo: Moto-Electra
Wolff rode at a sedate 65 mph and went 100 to 120 miles between charges, plugging into a generator pulled behind the support van. The team followed Interstate 10 across the southern part of the country, and electrical outlets are few and far between through west Texas and the Mojave. “We’re trying to demonstrate the battery tech,” Richardson says. “Not the charging grid.”

While the batteries held up perfectly and the bike was nearly faultless, the ride was far from relaxing — or comfortable.

“Brian set up the bike as more of a cafe racer, with low handlebars and pegs,” Wolff says. “It wasn’t that comfortable and we added about 200 pounds worth of batteries, so it didn’t handle very well.”

Weather also presented trouble, which can be nerve-racking on an electric motorcycle (let alone a British electric motorcycle.). Wolff was on the radio with Will Hays, a sophomore at James Madison University who served as the team’s tech expert, when they hit a monsoon-level rainstorm outside of Florida. “He was talking to Will,” Richardson says, “and pretty much asked if he was going to be electrocuted.”

And on the other side of the spectrum was the heat.

“We got to San Antonio and we were on schedule to do it under three days,” says Wolff. “But the heat was so bad.” That lead to Wolff and Richardson taking turns riding the Moto-Electra through the hottest (and most boring) expanses of I-10.

Both Richardson and Wolff are quick to praise Hays and his expertise. “He was exceptional,” Richardson says. “With a laptop and other equipment, [Hays] captured data every second — things like wind speed/direction, volts, amps, temperature, GPS location/speed/elevation. If you wanted to start installing charging stations across the U.S., Will has the database.”

And if Moto-Electra wanted to do it again, Richardson is confident they could make the trip in less time, at a higher speed, and with fewer charges.

“We could’ve done 150 miles to a charge,” Richardson admits. “And bumped the amperage to reduce [charge times] to 30 minutes.” But for now, the team is confident in their standing.

“After we finished I told myself I’d never do it again,” says Wolff. “But never say never. We’ve achieved what we wanted in racing and with this cross-country tour, but what’s next… I don’t know.”