CSC Motorcycles – Page 5 – The ExhaustNotes Blog

Why a 250?

This is a blog I wrote for CSC Motorcycles a little more than 4 years ago (time sure flies when you’re having fun). The topic was as timely then as it is today. I like big bikes, but I like small bikes more, and I’m convinced that a small bike makes way more sense than a big bike for real world adventure touring. I thought I would post the blog again, as we are having way too much fun with CSC, BMW, Janus, and other companies who have seen the light. Here’s the blog from back in September 2014…

A 250cc bike seems too small to many riders. Is it?

The motorcycle craze in the US really started in the mid-1960s. I know motorcycling goes back way before that, but motorcycling was essentially a fringe endeavor until Honda came on the scene. We met the nicest people on Hondas, if you remember, and that ad tagline was a winner (so is “Don’t Miss The Boat,” by the way). (Note: “Don’t Miss The Boat” was CSC’s tagline for the US RX3 introduction, and those who didn’t miss the boat participated in one of the best deals in the history of motorcycling.)

Honda’s sales model was a good one. They pulled us in with small bikes and then convinced us we needed larger and larger bikes. Many of us started with a Honda Cub (the 50cc step-through), we progressed to the Super 90 (that was my jump in), then the 160cc baby Super Hawk, then the 305cc Super Hawk, and at that point in about 1967 that was it for Honda. They didn’t have anything bigger (yet). After the 305cc Super Hawk, the next step for most folks was either a Harley or a Triumph.

Yours Truly, on a Honda Super 90 in the mid-’60s.

You know, back in those days, a 650cc motorcycle was a BIG motorcycle. And it was.

But Honda kept on trucking…they offered a 450 that sort of flopped, and then in 1969 they delivered the CB-750. That bike was so far out in front of everyone else it killed the British motorcycle industry and (with a lot of self-inflicted wounds) it almost killed Harley.

The Japanese manufacturers piled on. Kawasaki one-upped Honda with a 900. (Another note…it’s one of those early Kawi 900s that Gobi Gresh is restoring in the Zed’s Not Dead series.) Honda came back with a 1000cc Gold Wing (which subsequently grew to 1100cc, then 1500cc, and is now an 1800cc). Triumph has a 2300cc road bike. Harley gave up on cubic centimeters and now describes their bikes with cubic inches. And on and on it went. It seems to keep on going. The bikes keep on getting bigger. And bigger. And bigger. And taller. And heavier. And bigger. In a society where everything was being supersized (burgers, bikes, and unfortunately, our beltlines), bigger bikes have ruled the roost for a long time. Too long, in my opinion.

LBMC06-0 — Is this where it’s going? (Note: I shot this photo at the Long Beach International Motorcycle Show about 15 years ago.)

Weirdly, today many folks think of a 750 as a small bike. It’s a world gone nuts. But I digress…

I’ve done a lot of riding. Real riding. My bikes get used. A lot. I don’t much care for the idea of bikes as driveway jewelry, and on a lot of my rides in the US, Mexico, and Canada, I kind of realized that this “bigger is better” mentality is just flat wrong. It worked as a motorcycle marketing strategy for a while, but when you’re wrestling with a 700-lb bike in the soft stuff, you realize it doesn’t make any sense.

I’ve had some killer big bikes. A Triumph Daytona 1200. A Harley Softail. A TL1000S Suzuki. A Triumph Speed Triple (often called the Speed Cripple, which in my case sort of turned out to be true). All the while I was riding these monsters, I’d see guys on Gold Wings and other 2-liter leviathans and wonder…what are these folks thinking?

I’d always wanted a KLR-650 for a lot of reasons. The biggest reasons were the bikes were inexpensive back then and they were lighter than the armored vehicles I had been riding. I liked the idea of a bike I could travel on, take off road, and lift by myself if I dropped it. To make a long story short, I bought the KLR and I liked it. I still have it. But it’s tall, and it’s heavy (well over 500 lbs fully fueled). But it was a better deal than the bigger bikes for real world riding. Nobody buys a KLR to be a poser, nobody chromes out a KLR, and nobody buys leather fringe for a KLR, but if that’s what you want in a motorcycle, hey, more power to you.

More background…if you’ve been on this blog for more than 10 minutes you know I love riding in Baja. I talk about it all the time. My friends tell me I should be on the Baja Tourism Board. Whatever. It is some of the best riding in the world. I’ll get down there the first week I take delivery on my CSC Cyclone, and if you want to ride with me, you’re more than welcome. (Note: And I did. We did a lot of CSC Baja tours, and CSC introduced a lot of folks to riding and to Baja. That one innocent little sentence became a cornerstone of CSC’s marketing strategy.)

I was talking up Baja one day at the First Church of Bob (the BMW dealership where me and some of my buddies hang out on Saturday mornings). There I was, talking about the road to San Felipe through Tecate, when my good buddy Bob said “let’s do it.” Baja it was…the other guys were on their Harleys and uber-Beemers, and I was on my “small bore” KLR. The next weekend we pointed the bars south, wicked it up, and rode to San Felipe.

DSC_1629-650 — The Boys…bound for San Felipe with my KLR leading the pack

That was a fun trip. I took a lot of ribbing about the KLR, but the funny thing was I had no problem keeping up with the monster motos. In fact, most of the time, I was in the lead. And Bob? Well, he just kept studying the KLR. On Saturday night, he opened up a bit. Bob is the real deal…he rode the length of Baja before there was a road. That’s why he was enjoying this trip so much, and it’s why he was so interested in my smaller bike. In fact, he announced his intent to buy a smaller bike, which surprised everybody at the table.

Holding court on the Sea of Cortez. That’s Bob on the right.

Bob told us about a months-long moto trip he made to Alaska decades ago, and his dream about someday riding to Tierra del Fuego. That’s the southernmost tip of South America. He’d been to the Arctic Circle, and he wanted to be able to say that he’d been all the way south, too.

I thought all of this was incredibly interesting. Bob is usually a very quiet guy. He’s the best rider I’ve ever known, and I’ve watched him smoke Ricky Racers on the Angeles Crest Highway with what appeared to be no effort whatsoever. Sometimes he’d do it on a BMW trade-in police bike standing straight up on the pegs passing youngsters on Gixxers and Ducksters. Those kids had bikes with twice the horsepower and two-thirds the weight of Bob’s bike, and he could still out ride them. Awesome stuff. Anyway, Bob usually doesn’t talk much, but during dinner that night on the Sea of Cortez he was opening up about some of his epic rides. It was good stuff.

Finally, I asked: Bob, what bike would you use for a trip through South America?

Bob’s answer was immediate: A 250.

That surprised me, but only for an instant. I asked why and he told me, but I kind of knew the answer already. Bob’s take on why a 250: It’s light, it’s fast enough, it’s small enough that you can pick it up when it falls, you can change tires on it easily, you can take it off road, you can get across streams, and it gets good gas mileage.

Bob’s answer about a 250 really stuck in my mind. This guy knows more about motorcycles than I ever will, he is the best rider I’ve ever known, and he didn’t blink an eye before immediately answering that a 250 is the best bike for serious world travel.

It all made a lot of sense to me. I had ridden my liter-sized Triumph Tiger in Mexico, but when I took it off road the thing was terrifying. The bike weighed north of 600 lbs, it was way too tall, and I had nearly dropped it several times in soft sand. It was not fun. I remembered another ride with my friend Dave when he dropped his FJR in an ocean-sized puddle. It took three of us to get the thing upright, and we dropped it a couple of more times in our attempt to do so. John and I had taken my Harley and his Virago on some fun trips, but folks, those bikes made no sense at all for the kind of riding we did.

Upright in this photo, but it was like wrestling a pig in mud a few minutes earlier.

You might be wondering…what about the other so-called adventure bikes, like the BMW GS series, the Yamaha Tenere, or the Triumph Tiger? Good bikes, to be sure, but truth be told, they’re really street bikes dressed up like dirt bikes. Big street bikes dressed up like dirt bikes. Two things to keep in mind…seat height and weight. I can’t touch the ground when I get on a BMW GS, and as you’ve heard me say before, my days of spending $20K or $30K on a motorcycle are over. Nice bikes and super nice for freeway travel, but for around town or off road or long trips into unknown territory, these bikes are just too big, too heavy, and too tall.

There’s one other benefit to a small bike. Remember that stuff above about Honda’s 1960s marketing strategy? You know, starting on smaller bikes? Call me crazy, but when I get on bikes this size, I feel like a kid again. It’s fun.

I’ve thought about this long and hard. For my kind of riding, a 250 makes perfect sense. My invitation to you is to do the same kind of thinking.

So there you have it. That was the blog that helped to get the RX3 rolling, and CSC sold a lot of RX3 motorcycles. Back in the day, CSC was way out in front of everybody on the Internet publicizing the Zongshen 250cc ADV bikes, and other countries took notice. Colombia ordered several thousand RX3s based on what they CSC doing, other countries followed, and things just kept getting better and better. The central premise is still there, and it still makes sense. A 250 may well be the perfect motorcycle.

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RX3 to RX4 Comparisons: Part 4

The RX3-to-RX4 comparison continues. We’ll pick up several more areas in this blog. Note that we’ve added an RX4 page to the ExhaustNotes website, too. More on that in a bit; for now, on to the comparo!

Starting at the back of both bikes, the RX4 has a subfender behind the rear wheel. The RX3 does not. Take a look…

The RX3 rear wheel. Note that there’s no subfender.

The RX4 subfender. This was something CSC could have added to the RX3, but chose not to (wisely, in my opinion)..

When CSC specified what they wanted on the RX3 a few years ago, they opted to leave the subfender off. I didn’t like the subfender, I thought it was ugly, and I didn’t see a need for it. I thought leaving it off was a good move.

You might think the RX3 subfender could have been added as an aftermarket accessory. It can, but it’s not easy. On the RX3, adding the subfender actually requires a different swingarm, so if you wanted to add a subfender you would have to replace the entire swingarm. That’s because the swingarm mounting points for the subfender are built into the swingarm (you can see that on the RX4 subfender photo, too). When CSC was defining the RX3 configuration, the question became why not just specify the swingarm that can accept the subfender, and offer the subfender later as an accessory? The reason is that because without the subfender, the swingarm looks goofy. It’s got this big mounting bracket at the rear on the right side, hanging out in space with nothing mounted on it.

Personally, I could do without the subfender on either bike. It just adds weight and I don’t care for the look. But that’s my preference. Your mileage may vary.

Moving back to the front of the bikes, the RX4 incorporates a radiator bottle fill port on the bodywork to the right of the fuel tank. It’s easily accessible (far more so than the radiator bottle fill port on the RX3, which is tucked under the fairing). This was a good way to go on the RX4. You know that if you have ever needed to add fluid on the RX3 it’s not easy to get the radiator bottle. Score one for the RX4. I like the RX4 approach better.

The RX4 radiator bottle fill port. It makes it a lot easier to add coolant.

The sidestands (or kickstands) on the two bikes are similar…and in the two photos below, you can see that the two bikes use the same footpegs. These are good footpegs, I think, because you can remove the rubber inserts if you wish. I never have done that, but I suppose there are guys out there who think they need to do that.

The RX3 kickstand. I found it easier to reach than the kickstand on the RX4.

The RX4 kickstand. Note the “wing” to make extension easier.

I find it very easy to reach the kickstand on my RX3; on the RX4 it was not as easy for me. That could just be me being used to the RX3.

Neither the RX3 nor the RX4 have a centerstand as standard equipment. It’s an option on the RX3 and I imagine it will become an option on the RX4, although it will be little harder for CSC to add a centerstand to the RX4. On the rear suspension linkage photos (they’re coming up next), you’ll notice that the RX3 has two mounting points that CSC uses for the bike’s optional centerstand. When I first saw those underframe mounting points on the RX3 in China, I assumed Zongshen added them because they anticipated adding a centerstand, but that wasn’t the reason. Zongshen uses the below-the-frame mounting points as an assembly aid during RX3 production as the bike is traveling down the assembly line.

Zongshen also has temporary centerstands (it takes two of these to lift the bike’s rear wheel off the ground) for use if you need to fix a flat tire, and I think CSC sells them if you want to buy a pair. I have a couple I carry around in my RX3, but (knock wood) I have never used them. I got a flat on the ride across China, though, and one of the RX3 clubmen we rode with in Beijing had the accessory maintenance centerstands with him. They work well, and that guy had my flat fixed in no time flat (pardon the pun).

That said, let’s move on to the rear suspension comparison. Here’s the rear suspension linkage on the RX3. Note that the RX3 linkage is constructed of stamped metal pieces. This is the setup that CSC changes when you buy an RX3 lowering kit.

The RX3 rear suspension linkage. Note the stamped metal parts, the rear damping adjustment point, and the centerstand mounting points below the bike.

The RX4 rear suspension linkage is substantially beefier, and it uses cast metal bits instead of stampings. It’s one of the reasons why the RX4 is heavier than the RX3.

The RX4 rear suspension linkage. I don’t think the RX4’s rear damping adjuster is as easily accessible as is the RX3’s.

The shift levers and the rear brake levers are different on the two bikes. The RX3 uses cast parts; the RX4 uses what appear to be stamped weldments. The photos below show the shift and brake levers on the RX3. Note that they are cast bits, they are painted silver, and they have a nice look to them.

The RX3 rear brake lever. It’s a nicely-finished casting.

The RX3 shift lever, another nicely-finished casting.

On the RX4, the shift and brake levers appear to be stamped weldments painted black to match the frame. In my opinion, they are not as nice looking as the ones on the RX3, but I suppose you could make the argument that if you bend the RX4 parts in a spill, the levers on the RX4 will be easier to fix than would be the RX3’s castings.

The RX4 rear brake lever. It’s fabricated from a stamped weldment.

The RX4 I’ve been riding has two ignition keys. One looks like a regular ignition key, and it fits the ignition lock, the standard luggage, the gas cap, and the rear seat release (just like the RX3). The other key that comes with the RX4 has a smaller black plastic handle. I don’t know why the two RX4 keys are different. I had a similar two-key arrangement when I owned a 1997 Suzuki TL1000S. The regular key (with the larger black plastic handle) was for normal use, and the one with the smaller black handle was in case the bike had an electrical issue and the fuel injection didn’t work correctly. It was designed to put the TL into a “limp home” mode. I never had to use it. I don’t think that’s what’s going on here, but I don’t know for sure. It’s one of those things I’ll have to ask the wizards at Zongshen about.

The black plastic handle on the RX4 key is larger than is the one on the RX3 key. Here’s a photo showing the RX4 key and the RX3 key…

The RX4 (on the left) and RX3 (on the right) ignition keys.

The rear brake master cylinders on the two motorcycles are also different. Here’s what they look like…

I like the rear master cylinder on the RX4 much more than the one on the RX3. You can just unscrew the RX4 cap to get to the reservoir, while on the RX3 rear master cylinder you need a Phillips head screwdriver and you have to remove two screws. The more-complicated RX3 design has a story behind it. Originally, the RX3 rear master cylinder was a much smaller affair. One of the CSC consultants advised that it was too small for its location near the exhaust pipe (the concern was that the master cylinder would be heated by the exhaust pipe and this could adversely affect brake performance). It never was an issue when riding the preproduction RX3 motorcycles or the RX3s we rode across China (both had the original design master cylinder), but I guess if you pay consultants you take their advice. On the RX3 I would have just gone with a conventional master cylinder like the one on the RX4 (which is similar to master cylinders on just about every other motorcycle on the planet). But Zongshen wanted to design a custom rear master cylinder for the RX3, and that’s how that strange-looking tapered affair on the RX3 came to be. In my opinion, the one on the RX4 is a better approach.

That’s enough for this blog, folks. Again, CSC asked me to mention that they are taking deposits now on the RX4, and if you want to get on board, here’s the link to do so.

Okay, okay….just two more things.

I’ve got a couple more blogs coming up on the RX4, including one I’m polishing now comparing the CSC RX4 to the Kawasaki KLR 650 (as my good buddy Chris suggested; it’s one that will probably draw lots of comments). You’ll want to keep an eye on the ExNotes site for the latest tech info on the RX4. And as promised, here’s the ExhaustNotes RX4 index page! Click on it and you’ll find an easy way to get to all of our RX4 articles.

And as mentioned before, please consider adding your email address for an auto-notify every time we post a blog (there’s a place do to that near the top of this page on the right). Do that and you’ll be eligible for our newest contest. On a quarterly basis, provided we get at least another 200 folks sign up each quarter, we’ll give away a copy of either Moto Colombia, Riding China, or 5000 Miles at 8000 RPM to a name drawn at random from our email database. The first winner will be announced sometime around Christmas this year. Please encourage your friends to sign up, too. If you’re already on the list, you’re eligible for the first drawing. We don’t give or sell our email list to anyone, so your address is safe with us.

Baja, 150cc at time: Part V

The trek south on our 150cc California Scooter Mustang replicas continues. On the off chance you haven’t followed this ride, here are the first four installments of this grand adventure. I almost called it a mini-adventure, but only the bikes were “mini.” Everything else about this ride was a full-bore adventure. So, to bring you up to speed…

Part I: Baja, 150cc at a time…

Part II: Baja, 150cc at a time…

Part III: Baja, 150cc at a time…

Part IV: Baja, 150cc at a time…

And with that, we’re back on the road, with our little 150cc Mustang CG clones, built by CSC Motorcycles, thumping their way south yet again…

Here’s a shot of our bikes parked in front of the Las Casitas Hotel in Mulege (it’s pronounced Mool-a-hay). The Tropic of Cancer was just a few miles down the road.

After a great stay at the Las Casitas Hotel in Mulege (one of my favorite places in Baja), we were on the road again, headed south to Ciudad Constitucion, our stop for the next evening. The regions we passed through were amazing, but the riding was beyond brutal. September is one of the hottest months of the year in Baja, and we were riding in 100-degree weather.

We soaked our clothes several times that day. J had a bunch of water in 5-gallon jerry cans on his big Dodge Power Wagon, and we used a trick I learned in the Army a long time ago…we soaked ourselves and then put our jackets on. The jacket keeps the water from evaporating too quickly, and in this kind of weather, you can stay cool for about an hour before you need another soaking. It really works.

My riding gear. Joe Rocket gloves. They work. Don’t ask me how I know. My new Bell helmet. Lightweight, comfortable, and very, very cool. Everybody loved it. My Olympia riding jacket. Visible, and I’m still wearing it.

After Mulege, we continued south out of Mulege, and we soon found ourselves along what I believe to be the most beautiful part of Baja…and that would be Bahia Concepcion. I’ll let the photos do my talking here.

John’s California Scooter parked in front of Bahia de Concepcion on the Sea of Cortez.

The Sea of Cortez along the Transpeninsular Highway. The water really is that color.

South of Bahia Concepcion, we stopped in Loreto. It’s a nice town but it is a touristy spot. John and J got nailed for a couple of traffic infracciones, paid their fines, and we bolted.

We stayed the night in Ciudad Constitucion on the way down and on the way back. It’s a pretty interesting town, but it is not a tourist spot (which is why I find it interesting).

This local motor officer on a 250cc Suzuki stopped us as soon as he saw our bikes. He knew they were new and different. I tossed him my keys and asked for the keys to his police motor. We both had a good laugh about that!

Ciudad Constitucion was celebrating the Mexican Bicentennial, as Santa Rosalia had been the day before, and they had an awesome fireworks display. It was impressive.

We had dinner at a sidewalk restaurant in Ciudad Constitucion, and we ate at a plastic table with plastic chairs right on the sidewalk. It was a cool evening, the town was festive, and it was great. The green things in the photo are nopales, or boiled cactus (very tasty). The tacos were delicious, too.

Yours truly flirting with the waitresses. Dos senoritas.

We were up early the next morning, and we continued our southward quest. We knew the next major town was La Paz, but we didn’t want to get into it. La Paz meant heavy traffic and more heat.

You might be wondering…what were these little 150cc Mustang replicas, and what were the original Mustangs? Hey, if you want to know more about that, you can read that story right here…

Original Mustang motorcycles. Click on the image to get to the story!

CSC Motorcycles no longer manufactures new Mustangs, but more often than not they’ll have a nearly new trade-in on the showroom floor. If you have an interest in these born-again Mustangs, here’s a link to the CSC website.

To be continued…

Want to learn more about riding in Baja? Check out the ExhaustNotes Baja page!

High end, high class small bikes…

On its face, it seemed like a weak market to target…folks who want very high end, small displacement, expensive custom motorcycles. But it worked.

When CSC revived the Mustang motorcycle concept 10 years ago, the company didn’t really have a grand plan, a handle on the market, or even a clearly defined name. CSC was originally California Scooter Company, and the original plan was to re-introduce a concept pioneered by the Mustang Motor Company in the postwar 1940s.

Original vintage Mustangs. Both of these bikes, along with more than a dozen others, are in Steve Seidner’s personal Mustang collection (the largest vintage Mustang collection in the world).

The idea was to spin off of Pro-One Performance Manufacturing’s line of very high billet and other accessories (and complete large V-twin custom motorcycles), and apply it to a small, modern version of the Mustang. Pro-One, CSC’s sister company, was founded by Steve Seidner (the same guy who started CSC). And boy oh boy, did those little bikes sell. They were beautiful little creations. Jewels, actually. Hand made, and built to extremely high standards. Mirror-like paint. Billet. Chrome. Little choppers. Expensive little jewels you could actually ride.

Ah, but that name…the California Scooter Company. It created confusion. People would see the new California Scooter modern Mustang and ask: Is it a scooter or a motorcycle? They didn’t get that the name was old school. Back in the day, antiques (folks like yours truly) called any bike a scooter. A Harley was a scooter and so was a Triumph…as in “I’m going to ride down to Cabo on my Scooter.”

Me? I wanted to tell anybody who asked that question (is it a motorcycle or a scooter?) that they were too dumb to ride either, but I couldn’t do that. Then one day, the boss hit on the idea of just calling the company CSC Motorcycles. You know, go with the tradition of other world-class marques with three-letter names: BMW, BSA, AJS, KTM, and more. And that worked. The dumbass scooter or motorcycle questions stopped, and the bikes continued to sell.

Back to the modern Mustangs…the initial thought was that the bikes would sell for $4,995, and they’d be a hit with young folks.

The modern California Scooter Greaser in the San Gabriel Mountains. Folks loved this bike and it was one of the best-selling paint themes.

Ah, what we didn’t know. The market will tell you what it is. Plans and fancy marketing studies mean nothing. A hit with young folks? The problem with young folks is that they don’t have any money and they don’t buy motorcycles. Hell, a lot of them don’t even want driver’s licenses. Just, like, you know, call an Uber.

Good buddy Walter B, back in the day, on his Knucklehead Harley-Davidson.

What we found out at CSC 10 years ago was that our modern Mustang market squarely centered on older folks (who often have a lot of money). Specifically, older folks who wanted a Mustang back in the day, but Dad said no. Or folks who rode big bikes way back when and who still wanted to ride, but they didn’t want to wrestle with 800-lb monsters. Fast forward 60 years, Dad’s no longer around, an Advil a day is just the ticket, and what do you know, I can buy that Mustang I always wanted and still ride. And they did. In droves.

A near-standard CSC Mustang on the right, and two custom versions on the left. Nearly all California Scooters were extensively optioned with additional chrome, billet, and custom paint.

Almost no one bought the standard, no-accessories, $4,995 CSC 150. They could have (that bike featured a slew of custom high end stuff, like billet and chrome all over the place and a world class finish). But those old guys who were denied an opportunity to scratch that Mustang itch as teenagers wanted more. A lot more. They would call on the phone (“I don’t do the Internet”), option the little California Scooters up to over $10,000 with lots more bling (custom wheels, custom paint, and more), and then put it all on a credit card. They wouldn’t attempt to negotiate price. California Scooter buyers wanted to spend more. Negotiate a lower price? Nope, that would demean the purchasing experience. It was full boat, full freight, and here’s my security code number…

A custom California Scooter. This was the “Bobber” variant. Note the gangster whitewalls, chrome wire wheels, and other custom touches.

Steve Seidner built a personal aviation-themed custom California Scooter he called the P-51 (get it?…the P-51 Mustang). Steve intended to keep the bike, but I put this photo on the CSC blog and it sold within an hour. Someone called with a godfather offer (a deal Steve couldn’t refuse).

Those little bikes were awesome. I owned one of the very first ones, and I found I was having more fun on 150cc than I had on bikes with ten times the displacement. I rode mine all the way to Cabo San Lucas and back, but that’s a story for another blog. The Baja trip did a lot for CSC, too. The 150cc bikes had Honda CG clone engines manufactured in Asia, and the Baja trips showed the bikes were supremely reliable. We invited famous people to ride with us in Mexico and that was a force multiplier. The press coverage was off the charts.

Simon Gandolfi, British novelist and world traveler, on the road in Baja with a California Scooter. He cuts a commanding figure, doesn’t he?

Simon, suspenders flying, at speed on my CSC 150, just north of Cabo San Lucas.

Arlene Battishill, CEO of Go Go Gear, on the Sea of Cortez with her custom California Scooter. Arlene later appeared on the TV show, Shark Tank, with this motorcycle.

One of the things that sticks in my mind is the uninformed and the ignorant occasionally posting somewhere on an Internet forum that you could get a used Sportster for the kind of money people were happily spending on California Scooters. These keyboard commandos just didn’t get it. You could actually get a new Sportster for that kind of money, but that wasn’t the point. California Scooter buyers didn’t want a Sportster. They wanted, and were happy to pay top dollar for, a custom-crafted bit of motorcycle jewelry that could be both admired and ridden. A current classic.

There’s a market for such a thing. I know. I was there.

Phase III: Climbing Mt. Baldy

Slick, taking a breather at the Mt. Baldy Lodge. My apologies for the mediocre image quality; all I had with me was my iPhone.

Phase III (pardon the electrical pun) of our City Slicker testing involved riding Slick from my home up to Mt. Baldy Village. It’s a 2,500-foot climb over 9.2 miles, and it’s rough. It’s a challenging climb on a small IC-engined motorcycle, and it’s really, really rough on a bicycle (as I know from personal experience). I knew power consumption would be higher based on our Phase I and II testing (see those results here and here), but the earlier tests did not include steep climbs. Phase III was a fairly steep uphill climb all the way, and then a steep descent all the way down. Here’s the route I took, up and down…

A satellite map of the test route…north Upland to Mt. Baldy village.

I didn’t know how Slick would do, and I didn’t want to run the bike down more than 50% (you know, to make sure I had the juice to get home). I decided in advance that if the bike hit the 50% energy remaining mark on the way up, I’d turn around and head back.

I need not have worried, though. I sailed up to the Mt. Baldy Lodge (that first photo you see above) with 56% power remaining on the charge indicator. I stopped to take a picture, and then I turned around and rode home. Here’s what it looks like on a miles versus battery charge plot…

Miles versus Battery Charge, up and down Mt. Baldy Road. The bike started with a 99% charge and was at 56% remaining after climbing from 1700 ft above sea level to 4193 ft above sea level. On the way down, power consumption was dramatically lower; I covered the same distance using only 10% of the battery’s charge.

As you can see from the above chart, energy consumption on the way down was near zero. I used 43% of the battery’s energy (from 99% to 56%) to make the 9.2-mile, 2500-ft-elevation climb, and then I used only 10% of the battery’s energy (from 56% to 46%) to cover the same distance riding downhill. Cool.

I ran this test in the Eco mode, mostly because I didn’t want to use too much energy on the climb. In the Eco mode on flat ground, the bike tops out at an indicated 37 mph (don’t forget that the speedometer is about 8-10% fast, so actual speed is lower). On the climb, Slick slowed to an indicated 33 to 34 mph on the steepest hills, which is about what my 150cc CSC Mustang could manage.

On the way down the mountain, Slick ran 43-44 mph (still in the Eco mode), and the throttle became meaningless. The bike coasted downhill faster than the motor could drive it. It reminded me of my bicycle down this same stretch. On my bicycle, I topped out at the same speed and pedaling was useless because my Bianchi was already going faster than I could pedal.

Watching Slick’s regeneration function on the dash was cool. The red regen plug (to the left of the battery charge indicator) stayed red for most of the run downhill. I previously wondered if the bike only regenerated at lower speeds; I now know it regens at all speeds when Slick is going faster than the motor is driving it. Just like before, though, I never saw the charge percentage indicator go up (say, from 48% to 49%). It just stayed at a given percentage for a much longer time. I asked the wizards at Zongshen about this, and they confirmed it’s what they would expect.

The knee in the x-y plot at the 56% charge level is where I turned around (at the Mt. Baldy Lodge). It shows that Slick uses way less energy going downhill than it does going uphill. Like they say…duh. The slight changes in the slope of each line (for the uphill section, and then for the downhill section) are due to changes in the grade on Mt. Baldy Road. There were undulations in the road, and that’s why there are minor variances in the slope of the line on both the uphill and downhill portions of the graph.

Once I was home, I put Slick back on the charger for the ride back to CSC. I’m headed out on a road trip next week, and I wanted to return the bike to Steve.

I did the climb up to Mt. Baldy with the lights off. My bike is a preproduction sample, and it’s not wired to keep the lights on. The production City Slickers will have the LED marker lights on all the time(that’s a US requirement). The LEDs will consume a little energy, so the range will be somewhat less for the US bikes than what I’ve been reporting.

To get a feel for what the impact of having the lights on might be, when I returned the bike to CSC I rode there with the headlight and taillight on. This is a more severe test than would be running the bike with only the LED lights (the headlight and taillight consumes more energy than the LEDs). Previously, without the lights on the 16.4-mile ride to CSC from my home took 35% of the battery’s charge. Running the same route today with the headlight and taillight on, I used 42% of the battery’s energy. Note that this is more energy than would be consumed with just the LEDs (but it is representative of energy consumption when riding the bike at night). And, I was hotfooting it a bit. I wanted to stay at around 34-35 mph, but Slick was smelling the barn and I frequently ran faster than that.

So there you have it. Eco mode, Power mode, and a steep climb and descent on the CSC City Slicker. Stay tuned; there’s more coming on this fascinating new electric motorcycle. You’ll see it here first.

Getting my kicks, on Route 66…

This is Phase II of our CSC City Slicker range testing. Phase I examined how the bike performed in the Eco mode. In this phase, today I tested the bike’s range in the Power mode.

Bottom line first: The bike went further then Zongshen said it would. Zongshen claimed the bike would go 37 miles at 37 mph. I managed to go 40.7 miles when starting with a 100%-charged battery. I attribute that to the fact that part of the course I ran today had a gradual downhill slope.

The next big thing…the newest bike in America on the grandest road in America: The CSC City Slicker on Route 66!

There’s a lot more to this test than what I did in the Eco mode testing. I should start out by telling you that this was not a test run on a perfectly flat, uninterrupted test track (I’m pretty sure if I did that I would have managed to get even a few more miles out of Slick). Nope, this was real world testing on American roads. In fact, I’d say it was real world testing on what is arguably the most famous road in America: Route 66. (Cue in the theme music from the ‘60s TV show, Route 66). It was that cool. Call me Todd. Arjiu can be Buzz. All we’d need is the Corvette. But I digress…back to the main attraction.

Power mode, Amigo! It’s like kicking in the afterburners!

So, I live a little over 16 miles east of CSC at the base of the San Gabriel Mountains. My home is at 1700 feet above sea level. CSC, from my home, is headed toward the ocean, and that means a gentle downhill slope all the way. CSC sits about 610 feet above sea level. You might wonder why all the topological details, and here’s the reason: I found during my Eco mode testing that Slick uses less energy going downhill than it does going uphill. The bike covered about a mile for each 1% of battery charge going downhill, and about 0.4 miles for each 1% of battery charge going uphill. One of the things I wanted to find out in today’s Power mode testing is how the bike would perform from an energy consumption perspective in the Power mode, going downhill and then uphill.

I guess I ought to point out that I had a difficult time staying at 37 mph during this test, which is the speed for which Zongshen provided the range statistic. Every time I wasn’t really paying attention, I found myself going 42 or 43 mph (and those higher speeds use more energy). It was a challenge watching the road, watching the battery charge indicator, watching the mileage, and recording the data on my high-tech data logging system.

The ExhaustNotes.us high-tech data logger…

The bottom line here is I probably penalized the bike a little because I spent more time than I thought I would above 37 mph.

Oh, and in case you’re wondering what’s magical about 37 mph, I’m only hanging on that number because that’s the data point Zongshen gave us for range and speed in the Power mode: 37 miles at 37 mph. And in case you’re wondering why Zongshen picked the number 37, they really weren’t being cute about it. Zongshen’s real magic number was 60. 37 miles at 37 mph is 60 km at 60 kph. They’re on the metric system.

To cut the chase, here are the results…

Lots of good info. The top line with the yellow dots was the ride out. The bottom line with the green dots was the ride home.

I know that’s a complicated chart, but hey, I’m an engineer, and there’s a lot going on here. Let me explain it a bit.

I only recorded the data with each 5% decrease in battery charge for this test. I was moving a lot faster than I was in the Eco mode test, and I didn’t want to try to capture data points with every 1% decrease in battery charge.

The top line (the one with the yellow data points) was my ride out to CSC and beyond. It was downhill for the first 16.4 miles (from my home to the CSC plant). Starting with a 100% battery charge, my ride to the CSC plant took me down to 65% charge remaining. Stated differently, I used 35% of the battery charge to get from my place to CSC. I was impressed. If I was still a working stiff this would be a cool commuter bike.

I wanted to run the battery all the way down until the bike quit, and that meant I kept riding back and forth between Azusa, through Duarte, and into Monrovia. Those are the yellow data points on the upper line after reaching the CSC plant. I kept doing that until the battery hit 30% charge remaining (at which point the red plug to the left of the charge indicator started flashing, just as it had in the Eco mode test).

The dashboard battery charge indicator. The red plug lights when the bike is being charged by the external charger. It will start flashing when the charge level gets down to 30% while you are riding the motorcycle. It also lights up during regenerative braking.

When I got down to 15%, the bike went into its “limp home” mode again, just as it had in the Eco mode. When this happens, it accelerates much more gradually (that’s a gentle way of saying Slick is getting tired), and the bike tops out at about 20 mph.

I kept going in the CSC parking lot, riding in circles until the bike hit 6% charge remaining. I rode for another 0.4 miles at 6% charge when Slick called it a day. I watched to see if it would indicate 5% just before giving up the ghost, but I didn’t see that on the dash. I think when the bike drops from 6% to 5%, you don’t get to see it indicate 5%, but that’s where it quits.

To my surprise, I blew right through Zongshen’s claimed 37 mile range. I made it to 40.7 miles. And, as I mentioned in the Eco mode test, the odometer is about 5% pessimistic, so the indicated 40.7 miles is actually 42.7 miles. This is good, folks. Again, though, the fact that I went more than 37 miles is at least partly due to the fact that this leg of the test was slightly downhill.

I mentioned in the specs that the bike has regenerative braking. When that occurs, the red plug to the left of the battery charge bar illuminates. I never actually got it to cause the indicated charge percentage to increase, though. If it was at, say, 67% and it went into a regenerative braking mode, there wasn’t enough regeneration going on to bump it back up to 68%. The bike is obviously consuming less energy and it is charging, but not enough to register on the numerical percentage indicator. You do see the charge bar go up sharply (it swings to the right) while the red charging plug flickers on during deceleration. It’s cool. You feel like you’re giving something back.

The other thing I could not discern is how the algorithm operates the regeneration function. It seemed to me that the regeneration light came on while I was decelerating as my speeds dropped below about 10 mph and I was braking. I don’t know if that’s because there’s a lag between when the regeneration actually starts and when it is displayed on the dash, or if Zongshen has programmed something into the bike to prevent too much regeneration. I’m emailing them to find out, and I’ll let you know.

My big disappointment today? There was only one: When I got to CSC, all the burritos were gone. Saturday is burrito day at CSC. But I’m still young, and I’ve been working on handling disappointment.

Steve had a freshly charged battery waiting for me, and I wanted to do a video of the battery removal. One of the guys following the ExhaustNotes blog asked for that, so here you go…

Guys, when you see the video, be gentle. I’m not Cecil B. DeMille. I know that. You need to know that I know that. If you want to be a video critic, start a blog or something.

With a new battery in place, it was time for my ride home. I was very curious to see how this would go, because now instead of descending from 1700 feet to 610 feet, I’d be climbing that same 16.4-mile grade. I’ll post the graph here again so it’s easier to put the words and the music together…

The bottom line with the green dots was the ride home.

The bottom data line (the one with the green data points) shows energy consumption as a function of miles on the uphill ride home. You can see that the bike uses more energy going uphill than it does going downhill (again, duh, but the data shown in the above graph makes it clear). Some folks are confused by x-y plots (hell, some folks are confused by, well…never mind). Don’t look at this graph and think that the shorter lower line with the green dots means the bike will only go 16.4 miles. I still had 50% of the battery charge left at that point. I was home. I parked the bike, went inside, and opened a can of Tecate (which I’m nursing as I write this blog).

So, here’s the take-away from today’s testing:

The bike goes further in the Power mode than Zongshen said it would. This is good, but temper my results with the course I rode (part of it was slightly downhill).
I used 35% of the battery’s energy going from my home to CSC (a gradual descent) and I used 50% of the battery’s energy going from CSC to my home (a gradual climb).
This motorcycle is a lot of fun and it gets a ton of attention. Every time somebody stopped alongside me at a light, the questions and compliments started. I don’t mind admitting I enjoyed that.
I think these guys (that is, CSC) aren’t charging enough for the bike, but hey, what do I know?

And there you have it. Slick’s on the charger now. I’m going to the rifle range tomorrow to send some lead downrange. On Monday or maybe a little later in the week, me and Slick are going to do some climbing up in the San Gabriels to see how the steeper grades affect range. As always, if you have questions, post them in the Comments section, and I’ll do my best to get answers for you.

Slick specs…

I’ve been helping CSC in the last few days compile specifications for the new City Slicker electric motorcycle, and the bike is looking better and better the more I learn about it. Here’s what’s going up on the CSC site in the near future…

Any questions? Post them in the comments section, and I’ll see if I can get answers.

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