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Latest revision as of 03:18, 31 March 2020

Zero has some decent marketing for a company its size, but if you want to know what owners generally think, we'll try to summarize it here.

See our Manufacturer Comparison article for comparisons between Zero and other electric motorcycle manufacturers. This page looks at Zero in isolation.

Qualities

Owner Interviews

References

• Zero Owners Talk about Their Bikes and Owner Stories: "The Best Bike I've Ever Had" from Zero's 2016 gathering for their 10-year anniversary.

  Naturally, the owners in these videos are mostly long-time community members.

  This is a contrast from most Youtube-published review videos by magazine writers or gas-bike riders.

• NewZeroland vlog 03: Why I Went Electric and NewZeroland vlog 04: What Would It Take? (for you to buy an electric motorcycle) by MistaSam.

Riding Differences

How does riding a Zero compared to the majority of combustion-powered motorcycles?

Qualitative Differences

Difference	Reason	Pros	Cons
No heat emitted from the motor	The motor wastes very little energy	Hot weather isn't made uncomfortable Any dirt or debris on the motor won't "bake" No range wasted	No built-in warmth during cold weather
No vibration	The motor has no real moving parts	Less fatigue Lower wear on parts	No "rumble" aesthetic
Stealth	Only the bearing and belt make a sound.	Doesn't wake/irritate the neighbors or bicyclists. Sneak by people/cops/etc. Completely silent at stops.	Can startle pedestrians, bicyclists, and drivers. Little noises from brakes, suspension, and even turn signals stand out.
Always-On Torque	The motor's torque curve is not flat but extremely broad and shallow.	Escape agility is always available. Merge into traffic very smoothly, fine-tuning at the throttle. No maneuverability interruption from shifting.	Take care pulling away from a stop! Eco mode in slick surface conditions reduces risk of traction loss
No Lean Resistance	Electric motors don't resist leaning into a turn the way moving cylinders do.	Easier turning into and pulling out of a corner and changing line within a corner.	Steering and suspension tuning can seem very sensitive.
Better Awareness	Lack of distractions from noise, shifting, and vibration	You can scan traffic more thoroughly, which makes negotiating traffic much easier.

Via this forum thread: Unexpected advantages of an electric bike

Models

"Sport" vs "Dual Sport"

The S/SR and DS/DSR are marketed as sport and dual sport configurations, but they use the same frame, and have the same geometry up to the suspension and wheels.

They are standard bikes with specializations like suspension, handlebars, footpegs, front fork geometry, wheels, and tires.

"Offroad" vs "Supermoto"

The FX and FXS have a similar basis, sharing the same frame while using different suspension and wheels to differentiate handling.

Cost

The sticker price is the most visible hurdle to buying a Zero (or any electric motorcycle); understanding how a Zero's cost structure works helps with an ownership decision.

List Price

A Zero's price to features ratio "on paper" doesn't compare with traditional gasoline-powered motorcycles. Some generally understood factors contribute:

Battery Cost

The most important thing to understand is that the batteries cost one third to one half of the list price.

By reading the list price for the FX or FXS, a little math shows that:

• Each battery brick costs $2250 and the price for a FX/FXS without any batteries is $6500.
• The S/DS/SR/DSR line's batteries likely represents an even higher fraction of the motorcycle cost; given the 3-brick vs 4-brick list price, it seems like if the "brick price" were $2200 the base battery-less price would be $4800 (this is bogus but illustrative).

Battery Warranty

The warrantee and lifetime of the battery is longer than and separate from that for the motorcycle.

The battery is guaranteed to last a lot longer than most motorcycles.

Presumably, Zero batteries once outdated will be suitable for recycling, trade-in, or some kind of technology re-use like residential power storage.

Low Scale

There are a few factors that come with being a small manufacturer:

• Mainly, the factory overhead for fabrication and testing are higher per motorcycle until they manage to produce and sell ten times as many motorcycles per year than they are now.
• Also, they can't demand volume deals with their suppliers until they prove sales that can justify the volume orders.

Impact on Purchase Decision

It's worth getting a battery pack that provides perhaps 50% more range than you require for your commute or average needs, so that you can suffer some loss of capacity and still have a safety reserve. That way you never need to worry about it and you'll easily get your 8-10 years of useful service by which point you've certainly had your money's worth from the bike and can upgrade.

Cost of Ownership

The payoff for a Zero is a combination of freed-up time and reduced cost of ownership per mile (or per thousand miles).

• Regular, high-mileage commuting gets the best value out of a Zero.
• The simplest way to ensure that you'll be happy owning a Zero is be able to use it for as much mileage as possible per year.

Maintenance

From a gas motorcyclist's perspective, a Zero means a cleaner garage and lower maintenance cycle.

Longer maintenance intervals

Mileage put on a Zero instead of another bike or car reduces or delays the need for chain maintenance, oil changes, and other regular chores.

Brakes

Regenerative braking slows the wear on brake pads if used broadly.

Tires

Lack of powertrain vibration eases the wear on the tire tread.

Drivetrain

Belt sprockets stay cleaner since there's no oil to gum up with road debris; soft brushing keeps sprockets clean.

The belt typically lasts per the manufacturer's recommendation, and tension doesn't require frequent checking and adjustment.

• However, belts can snap if jerked on a bad landing or if gravel or sand gets between the sprocket and belt.

Repair

Zeros sometimes need repair like other motorcycles, or have issues that are completely novel.

• Because they're a small manufacturer that has qualitatively different issues from the major existing manufacturers, this can still be a bumpy process in terms of troubleshooting, parts ordering, and time to deliver.
• Zero's corporate customer service hotline can be quite helpful, but they often direct you readily to your dealer at some point as a matter of policy so it's not always an ideal interaction and your relationship with (and proximity to) your dealer can be very important sometimes.
• One reason this website exists (apart from forums) is to complement this experience and share knowledge to improve everyone's experience with these vehicles.

Performance

Power

Horsepower levels for the S/DS technically match a healthy 500cc sportsbike; torque levels are similar, however, torque on any Zero is accessible in such a way that it will feel like a bike in a higher class. For most traffic situations, even these basic configurations are enough to escape all but the most determined sports car drivers.

The SR/DSR models have horsepower that matches a healthy 650cc sportsbike. Torque levels are technically similar, but don't peak by dumping the clutch or any other gearbox-focused techniques. Torque is broadly available in a way that matches Zero's specifications on their website but does not exceed it without changing the gearing or overriding software-configured limits (and few will do this for you).

The FX and FXS are marketed as offroad and supermoto configurations, and this is fair to characterize, but they won't quite match expectations from others in that market. Again, torque is high and broadly available, but no gearbox-based peak torques are available to wheelie trivially.

Exciting Exception

2017 SR and DSR models appear to crank out enough torque accelerating hard from a stop to lift the front wheel, due to upgraded motor and controller specifications, a stronger belt, and a slightly higher gearing ratio.

Range

Electric vehicle ranges are a critical factor in a buying decision (because charging is so much slower than refueling), and electric motorcycles work differently from electric cars or regular motorcycles.

Interpreting Zero's Claims

Zero's marketing leads with the city (30mph) range, and then shows the highway (70mph) range of their largest-capacity configuration.

• This means the SR over S and DSR over DS.
• ...with the largest battery.
• ...with a Power Tank installed.

The specs are very accurate for the conditions described; Zero's claims are repeatable.

How This Varies

Zero describes range factors officially on their website.

Electric motorcycles are inherently sensitive to circumstantial range loss:

Speed

The central factor in range is speed:

• The bike is working with very little stored energy compared to gasoline (at most ½ gallon of gas with a Power Tank).
• Despite maybe a 95% powertrain efficiency, the stock vehicle and rider together interfere very strongly with the air above 50mph.

For these reasons of drag, Zero is right to point out that the 70mph range is half its city range.

Hilly Terrain

The energy spent climbing an incline will not be fully recovered by regenerative braking descending the same altitude.

Cold and Wet Weather

Anything that cools the battery significantly risks reducing its performance.

This may or may not be accounted for in the onboard range estimation.

Headwinds

Headwinds increase the bike's airspeed, and drag/power requirements increase exponentially with additional speed.

• (Yes, it's technically more like a quadratic figure.)

This can be mitigated by investing in a windscreen or fairing.

For these reasons, it is worth considering a margin of range beyond your absolute needs in order to account for these factors. But once practiced with these bikes, range estimation is fairly straightforward.

Charge Time

The onboard charger will charge a Zero in several hours, which means you can recover a full charge during a workday or overnight.

• Drawing from 220V vs 110V will heat the cord up less but not improve charge rate.
• A larger batter does not improve charge rate, but will increase charge time.

Upgrades

Investment in charging should be made with one metric in mind: the rate of range recovery per hour (mph or kph).

• The onboard charger will recover range at 12-15 miles per hour.
• Each charging upgrade of 3kW will recover about 35-40 miles per hour.

Your daily range needs, if an overnight charge does not cover them, can be accommodated on a schedule determined by your charging equipment.

Comparisons

Charger Comparison in the aftermarket page describes the common options and tradeoffs.

Travel Upgrades describes the tradeoffs between buying a Power Tank and installing charging upgrades, which are for most customers mutually exclusive.

Components

Through 2014, suspension and brakes were sourced from FastAce and Nissin. The economic factors that force choices for a manufacturer of their size are basically that a large manufacturer will not give them a good price until they prove sales volume.

Zero invests in mechanical component upgrades as soon as they can get them available at prices their MSRP can afford. Better parts generally would raise the price of the vehicle.

Battery price also figures as from a third to a half of the vehicle's price overall. Lithium batteries are not cheap, and Zero's cells are denser in charge to weight and volume ratios than all electric cars. Zero targets a price point and a vehicle weight to make a useful standard commuter bike with performance features.

Electric motorcycles with better components than Zero tend to cost from $5k-15k higher, because they're produced in smaller batches. The economics of scale are unavoidable - if Zero sells more units, they eventually can demand better component deals.

Buying Options

Buying New

Zero has pursued a dealer-centric sales strategy, which means that for the most part, Zeros are placed next to gasoline-powered motorcycles with sales and service staff learning them as a new aspect of their work.

When New Models Arrive

Zero announces new models in the late fall (October or November at prominent motorcycle shows) and then delivers them towards the end of the year or the start of the next.

Haggling

We strongly recommend against negotiating a lower price:

• These motorcycles do not make a dealer a lot of money in servicing fees, so they don't anticipate making back profit after the initial sale.
• The margins on these vehicles are not generous; see above about the batteries, etc.
• New dealers especially need to prove that these vehicles will make them money, and there are many concerns for dealers about electric vehicles.

For these reasons, haggling seems to be detrimental to the health of the community and market until battery prices reduce significantly, which is not foreseeable yet.

Buying Demo Models

Demo rides are arranged on bikes that are handled separately from the regular sales path; it's unclear whether the dealer buys the bikes outright or what arrangement is going on.

• Buying demo units once the following year's models have been released is a viable strategy if the unit has had all its regular maintenance and firmware updates applied.
• Demo units are vulnerable to damage from customers not taking the bikes seriously and over-torquing during the demo rides, so they may have taken some damage, but the real risk is a loose electrical connection after buying.
• Consider asking the owner for the (MBB) log files (see Obtaining Logs). The log files may give clues to how the bike has been used (charging patterns, RPMs, temperatures, possible issues etc.) and is a simple way to verify that the latest firmware has been installed.

Buying Used

Here are the big picture items to check when considering a used Zero.

Battery Health

Find out how regularly the bike was charged and ridden.

A bike left in unheated storage for several months or more will need significant scrutiny of the battery or possibly entire replacement.

Check whether a dealer visit happened recently to get firmware updates.

Range

Definitely ensure that the motorcycle's range matches your needs (daily commute plus a buffer for errands or distractions, or whatever joyrides intended).

Battery capacities tend to improve 15% every two years.

Maintenance

Generic maintenance might need fixing if the owner assumes the Zero needs no attention:

• Loose and/or corroded bolts.
• Belt tension and vibration while riding.
• Brake pad wear.
• Brake fluid condition.
• Consider asking the seller for the (MBB) log files (see Obtaining Logs), possibly before arranging a test drive. The log files may give clues to how the bike has been used (charging patterns, RPMs, temperatures, possible issues etc.) and is a simple way to verify that the latest firmware has been installed. Please note that the log files that can be retrieved using the app are limited in time and a fresh download will only list the most recent entries.

Pre-2012

• Any models produced before 2013 were produced in small numbers, which makes them worth scrutinizing for quality issues.
• Each year iterated on a number of engineering pieces that make them a little too special to keep running without decent expertise, or using them modestly with a little luck.
• The original motors are brushed, which have maintenance issues over time.
• The cells are from EIG, not the current manufacturer Farasis, and are not as mature a design, so at their age are likely to be in poor condition if not used regularly.

  On the positive side, rebuilding an old battery pack can be done with Nissan LEAF or similar cells with enough professional knowledge and care.

• Zero did offer 2014 model trade-ins for these bikes for a number of reasons.

2013-2014

These models are the first years of the main line, and as such will be reasonable to buy, but they do present issues with age:

Suspension

• Made by FastAce and less robust than later years.
• The models used are no longer sold; Zero does seem to have warehouse spares, but these are not easy to obtain quickly.
• The forks are susceptible to leaks on the left side, presumably due to the strain of a single-side disc brake coupled with perhaps slight installation mistakes or quality issues.
• Not very robust overall. Seek out replacements if possible. Frontend and shock swaps have been performed by some shops, and might get better support soon.

Braking

• No ABS support.
• Smaller brake discs limit stopping power.

Various

• Lower 12V system capacity (related to the ABS support).
• The mirrors are angular and don't suit everyone's ergonomic needs.

2013-specific

2013 models retained some 2012 characteristics worth considering:

• The frame is marginally less robust.
• The frame and systems do not support a Power Tank or Charge Tank.
• The Accessory Charging Port only supports 30A input and is fused at that limit, so the fastest charge time will be 2.5 hours.
• The instrument cluster is a generic Koso gauge and is much less informative (especially for battery charge) or integrated than later years.
• The lower plastics are a stylistic holdover with a different mounting.
• The charger is a group of Meanwell units managed by a separate circuit board called the "CCU".

  These generally behave well but present a slightly more complicated troubleshooting process if something goes wrong.

2015-2016

Overall, these bikes have been reliable and robust.

Onboard Charger

• The original onboard chargers had a noticeable failure rate after the first thousand miles or so.
• Replacement chargers seem to behave better.

Buying Salvage Titles

Because electric motorcycles have totally different systems and their frames are not produced in wide numbers, any bike that has been written off by an insurance company as a total loss should be treated as extremely risky.

Any money saved by buying a salvage title is at risk from damage to the frame or powertrain being a catastrophic risk in the future or some of the electrical components being compromised over their lifetime.

If you really want to get a bike this way, have an expert on Zeros specifically look the bike over and give a thorough assessment. Also consider treating it as a parts bike for yourself or others. It is conceivable that the recovered battery, when used in a stationary setting for a house battery, could deliver some value, but you will definitely want a professional for lithium batteries to be involved in assessing it.

Storage

The battery is impacted and potentially damaged by temperature extremes, or by small electrical defects if compounded over a period of months.

In the cold

• Keep the motorcycle above freezing temperatures throughout the winter.
• Store it indoors with some insulation or a minimal safe heating element.
• A motorcycle cover with a warming element under the bike but not in contact with the battery might work if a garage or shed itself cannot be heated.

In the heat

• Keep the motorcycle from overheating in the sun in particularly hot climates.
• This means storing indoors or under shade as appropriate.

Long term

• If the motorcycle will be unused for months at a time or longer, even apart from the temperature concern, plan to monitor it monthly for battery state.
• Most batteries will lose their charge at an extremely slow rate, but a tiny inefficiency in a battery can magnify over a period of months to produce a real risk of damage.

See Zero's Hot and Cold Weather Operations Guide for specific limits.

Warranty

Zeros have a limited warranty. Terms of the warranty are subject to change. As of this writing (April 2017) you can find the specifics for any model/year at Zero Warranty Information. In general, the warranty for the battery is five years; everything else is two years.

Extended Warranty

Some dealers may offer extended warranties for the bike and (from personal experience) separate warranties for wheel damage, etc.

As of this writing these warranties are third-party, and are in no way connected with/endorsed by Zero Motorcycles Inc.

Discussion

gyrocyclist posed a question on the Zero forum: extended warranty: is it worth it? Doug S responded with an excellent post that's applicable to vehicles in general, electric or ICE:

Defining "worth it" is the problematic part. Virtually all warranties aren't "worth it" in the sense that it's a bet you're hoping you lose (you're betting your equipment will fail, in which case you collect the cost of repair or replacement), and more often than not, you pay more for the warranty than any service/parts/replacement the warranty covers.

But it's a very different story in terms of peace of mind and how expensive it can be if something does happen. Virtually nobody with a mortgage doesn't have homeowners' insurance, and rightly so...the potential for loss can easily be permanently life-changing. Even though homeowners' insurance may be pricey, it's a fool (or a wealthy person who can afford to self-insure) who has a mortgage and doesn't have it.

So it's a numbers game. If the stars (mis)aligned and your battery failed just out of warranty, would you be catastrophically affected or could you scrape up the money to repair it? That's the downside of not having an extended warranty. The upside is not having the payments. So it's a small chance (5%?) of a major expense versus the certainty of a somewhat smaller expense.

Keep in mind that the insurance companies are not in business to pay out more than they take in, on average, and extended warranties are some of the most lucrative for them.