Throttle Lock

Goals

Generally, a throttle lock is a cheap way to get a basic cruise control mechanism.

Electric motorcycles never stall and have a broad torque curve, so throttle locks are very effective despite their simplicity.

A Zero with a cruise control will speed up and slow down to maintain an overall constant power/torque output, which makes range and power consumption much more predictable.

5% range gain can be had just from removing wrist adjustments from the throttle.

Holding a throttle steady is a source of fatigue, so a lock helps minimize that.

Hazards

Any traction loss with an electric motor while using a throttle lock is dangerous.

The rear wheel could spin up rapidly, faster than one's reaction time.

This wastes precious seconds when the bike could lose stability and go down, when the throttle should be immediately eased off and balance recentered.

For this reason, using a throttle lock should be limited to highway stretches with good visibility and no traction risks.

Make sure, otherwise, that you can release the throttle lock very quickly and easily to avoid an emergency.

Tested Options

• Brian Rice found and installed an Atlas throttle lock which seems to suit the Zero well, particularly because it avoids taking up valuable handgrip space and has a generic fitment. The Magura throttle's space for the Atlas to fit into is extremely narrow, though.

  Atlas nicely posted a comparison chart illustrating how different throttle lock mechanism approaches have tradeoffs.

  NOTE: The original version (before top and bottom mounts were distinguished) was thinner and easier to fit.

  Some have reported using a fine amount of milling to fit the Magura throttle on 2013-2014 models, and even for later model years.

• Go Cruise throttle lock is generic and easy to use, but does take up space on the inside of the throttle grip, which can make the throttle and mode switches harder to use.
• Kaoko throttle locks operate as bar ends with a dial and are good if the bike fit is confirmed, which Zero does not have.