Racing an alta mx in UK enduro series

[C5tor]

The sur-rons are pretty easy to hop up with bigger batteries and hotter controllers. But in stock form, the Alta should have better range than a stock Sur-Ron Light Bee. Not a lot we can do currently to extend the range on the Alta - it is what it is currently (electricity pun intended).

The Alta is heavier, but if you ride conservatively, I think you can get an hour easy. I haven't ridden in racing conditions because I'm a crotchety, old, wimpy geezer, but I ride around on trails for 3-4 hours at a time, and usually have more than 50% battery left. That is hauling my fat ass around, and I'm not exactly a small guy. I'm 200+ lbs without gear, but 270 with gear. (Okay, maybe the "without gear" weight is a little understated, but that's what my drivers license says, so it must be true. And COVID hasn't been kind to my waste-line... But the 270 lbs with gear is sadly accurate. )

Anyway, the point I was making before I went off into the overweight tangent was that mileage might be a little better indication than ride time in some cases. You can ride 10 miles quickly in 10 minutes, or you can ride 10 miles slowly in an hour, and theoretically take about the same energy to get there. You can make it a full hour, you just won't be riding quite as fast. I'd definitely recommend staying in map 1, though. Map 1 isn't necessarily slow, it is just not as quick to get up to speed. It is great for traction, though, and less wheelspin equals more energy to move forward.

 

[lambo]

I was offered support from a company in UK that make batteries and supply controllers (bac 8000) I was offered with 72v battery to ride a modded suron with everything from brakes to wheels to suspension upgraded but even at cost it would owe me nearly £9k about 13k in dollars they were going to up or down power to suit track etc but I didn't take the offer.. So far drill will be my scoot if I don't buy the alta.. Again I have support and cost price bike from importer. The alta I'm buying at twice the price and whereas the drill I can use locally as it looks like a mountain bike to ride trails the alta would nt fit that role and I have a new ktm 350 I race in conventional events so I'd only be buying alta for the series so it has to be right for the job or I've wasted a lot of money.. I'd still prefer it but it seems you can't run it at a fast pace without making battery run short of the hour shame really as it would be first choice if I was sure I could get the hour.. I did have a guy who can make batteries suggest if enough people wanted one he would look to develop a plug in battery to extend life

 

[lambo]

I really am in two minds just wish I knew someone in UK I could take out for a ride to see what we could achieve

 

[Jayfox911]

There are a few guys on here that have bikes in the uk. Make a new post “UK wanted to test ride an atla” or something so they know where you are.

or just fly to the states and test ride a bike. I live in San Diego area. See you in a few days

 

[lambo]

If only there was no quarenteen

 

[effinsiok]

I'd only be buying alta for the series so it has to be right for the job or I've wasted a lot of money.

As long as you get a reasonable deal you could always sell it if you don’t like it, they hold their value well. I also have a KTM 300 xc, but really prefer riding my Alta if I don’t need as much range. I can do about 30 miles on the Alta if I’m trail riding for fun.

 

[Matt]

How “fast” are you and how much do you weigh?

I have an mxr and exr for my wife. I race in intermediate/expert and the mxr on a fast jumpy track in map 4 will last around 40 minutes before the warning battery low light comes on. I weigh ~200lbs. I charge with a 220v generator at the track so I am normally almost fully charge when doing 15-20 motos with a 20-30 min break between to charge.

However my wife will ride for an hour or all day at the track in map 2 or 3 and use 1/4 battery on a flat slower trails or track, she is a beginner. She weighs ~120lbs.

I do not think the mx vs mxr is noticeable in maps 1-3. I have owned a mx and our friend bought it from us. Main difference to me is in map 4 and suspension. However if you get the suspension revalved for you then it would be only map 4, and only “fast” people “need” map 4. I personally would prefer a map 3.5 haha. I like map 3 for low to mid but need the power of map 4 for the bigger jumps and long fast straights.

also I believe that If a Surron can make it, then an Alta can. Just don’t use map 4 and don’t go full throttle often for your first race. Wide open on the e bikes uses a lot of battery.

long story short, if you are very fast and weigh over 200lbs the Alta probably will not last an hour of racing, I believe.

Have you tried a different rear sprocket to get a "map 3.5" the guy I bought my mxr from had a smaller sprocket on the rear and it took some of the edge of of 4th to make it more of a 3.5. I ended up changing it back to the stock sprocket set up because I wanted map 1 to be be snappier for hair scramble style racing and I like the hard pull of map 4 for track riding but it was still pretty torque with the smaller sprocket on it but was definitely more smoothed out.

 

[Jayfox911]

Have you tried a different rear sprocket to get a "map 3.5" the guy I bought my mxr from had a smaller sprocket on the rear and it took some of the edge of of 4th to make it more of a 3.5. I ended up changing it back to the stock sprocket set up because I wanted map 1 to be be snappier for hair scramble style racing and I like the hard pull of map 4 for track riding but it was still pretty torque with the smaller sprocket on it but was definitely more smoothed out.

Yeah, I actually run 13/52. I like it much better than 12/53. It does take hit off the bottom and moves it towards mid to top. The track in SoCal don’t have many jumps out of corners but they have a few large high speed jumps.

 

[Matt]

Yeah, I actually run 13/52. I like it much better than 12/53. It does take hit off the bottom and moves it towards mid to top. The track in SoCal don’t have many jumps out of corners but they have a few large high speed jumps.

Yeah that is what I was running for a while. I find it took too much off map one for me. There is a lot of loam where I ride and it helps to have the torque coming out of ruts. I feel similarly though that I would prefer to ride map three most of the time but it isn't enough for the big jumps out here. I had a bad crash this past summer trying to do a big fast triple in map three. The power tapered off too much by the time I hit it and I got bucked far forward. Map 1 is good for woods and hair scrambles around here at least and form the sounds of OPs landscape it would be similar to where I ride.

 

[lambo]

So will map 1 and 2 do the hour or is that again dependent on how throttle happy you ride? I take it rather than opening it wide you open it as little as poss to get revs to build.. I can imagine how I'd need to ride it really just need to get on one. At the equivalent of 18.5k dollars it's a lot of money to have tied up if its not working for me and I cant resell that's my worry if I was a wealthier man I'd buy without hesitation

 

[Oded]

Very dependent on speed. I am from NY and do a lot of tight woods with wet and muddy conditions. I can get about an hour and a half if I leave it in map one at race pace most of the time. I did an enduro late fall last year, it was very muddy on a fast track and I was changing between maps for straight aways but most of the time it was in map 1 or 2 for the woods. It was about dead at the end of an hour and 5 minutes. It is very dependent on conditions and how fast the track is. I have found the ideal case is a mid to slower type course that you can flow through the woods on. Really fast stuff kills the battery quickly and really slow stuff isn't aweful but the stop and go ends up chewing up the battery a bit more. If you use map one and ride smooth I would guess you would be fine.

This is exactly my experience.
Bike will last quite a while in hard enduro conditions.
For faster, more flowy enduro tracks, range will decrease.

I Don't see how map 4 can be used for enduro races. It's more intended for Motocross tracks, in my opinion.

KTM Freeride-e is even worse (range wise), so I don't think that's an option.

 

[C5tor]

Clearly, "Your mileage may vary" is a phrase to live by on these. But if you haven't already, you should check out a few of the YouTube postings about hare scrambles. Just search for "Alta Hare Scramble."

For instance, here's a good series of vids from Billy Beer that might be helpful. He also includes very precise info on his battery time: 89 minutes and 6 seconds in map 1 (and 20.3 miles via GPS).

He also had this useful comment:
Well used up a quarter of battery within in the first lap riding it like I would my tx300. So I slowed down adding over two minutes to my lap times and purposely stop using the rear brake to let the regenerative breaking takeover. And honestly it didn't make any difference on battery life I was still burning right at a quarter of battery per lap. Now there are people out there claiming 4 hours of runtime and I know that's a lie. I didn't even get half that. But what I have discovered people and me have tried to measure the battery life by time. And what I have found out for myself it isn't about time it's about distance. So what i'm saying is it doesn't matter if your a pro and do the 20 miles in 30 minutes or if your a beginner do the 20 miles in 3 hours that is what you're going to get. But depending on the Terrain it may vary about 3 miles difference and this was all tested with GPS. So don't go buy one of these bikes thinking you're going to get four hours out of it because your will be very pissed off. But I feel they will have this figure it out in the next year or so.

 

[Oded]

Clearly, "Your mileage may vary" is a phrase to live by on these. But if you haven't already, you should check out a few of the YouTube postings about hare scrambles. Just search for "Alta Hare Scramble."

For instance, here's a good series of vids from Billy Beer that might be helpful. He also includes very precise info on his battery time: 89 minutes and 6 seconds in map 1.

He also had this useful comment:
Well used up a quarter of battery within in the first lap riding it like I would my tx300. So I slowed down adding over two minutes to my lap times and purposely stop using the rear brake to let the regenerative breaking takeover. And honestly it didn't make any difference on battery life I was still burning right at a quarter of battery per lap. Now there are people out there claiming 4 hours of runtime and I know that's a lie. I didn't even get half that. But what I have discovered people and me have tried to measure the battery life by time. And what I have found out for myself it isn't about time it's about distance. So what i'm saying is it doesn't matter if your a pro and do the 20 miles in 30 minutes or if your a beginner do the 20 miles in 3 hours that is what you're going to get. But depending on the Terrain it may vary about 3 miles difference and this was all tested with GPS. So don't go buy one of these bikes thinking you're going to get four hours out of it because your will be very pissed off. But I feel they will have this figure it out in the next year or so.

We mostly ride very technical terrain, rocks and some trial type obstacles.
Riding last few hours easily. This is how off road guys get such long periods of time on their Altas.
Racing will definately chew up the battery much faster.

 

[enjoythesilenc]

Its telling that 4 years into the Alta era there is not a concrete answer to lambo's question. Too many variables and too close to the limit.

Is this a brand new series? Does the organizer know if any other people will or have tried ALtas? Is david knight going to ride his storm bee? How is the winner determined? Going twice as fast for more than 30 minutes goes furthest...

I'm still thinking that a stock Alta will go farther than a stock light bee, storm bee, cake, drill or freeride. If 1 hour is too long, you need a rig with a battery swap, LB, SB or freeride. how much for the ktm with 2 batteries?

 

[Motophyllic]

I would say high speed kills the battery more than distance or anything else. It seems to like 30-40 mph, but 75 mph, forget it, it sucks the battery way too fast.

 

[lambo]

I've had more information and it's decided 1hr is too long for most so likely going to be 2 x 40 min races with charging time in between now its starting to look like it might be a viable option

 

[lambo]

Its telling that 4 years into the Alta era there is not a concrete answer to lambo's question. Too many variables and too close to the limit.

Is this a brand new series? Does the organizer know if any other people will or have tried ALtas? Is david knight going to ride his storm bee? How is the winner determined? Going twice as fast for more than 30 minutes goes furthest...

I'm still thinking that a stock Alta will go farther than a stock light bee, storm bee, cake, drill or freeride. If 1 hour is too long, you need a rig with a battery swap, LB, SB or freeride. how much for the ktm with 2 batteries?

The freeride is over 8k close to 12 in dollars that's without a battery a battery is about 2k or a little less than 3k in dollars