Racer-X: Testing the limits of electric motorcycle design

Electric motorcycles tend to look strangely conventional. Even the oddball $60,000 Curtiss Zeus has a ‘tank’ and a seat where you’d expect them to be. So although the powertrains are revolutionary, the designs tend to be evolutionary. And we’ve often wondered why. Perhaps motorcyclists are just too conservative? Mark Atkinson, the bike builder and machinist who built the incredible BMW ‘Alpha’ Landspeeder, has pondered this question too. And he’s just created this extreme e-bike to find out where the limits of design are. It’s not practical and it’s no good as a commuter bike, but it’s one of the wildest...