Retro EV: The Auranthetic Charger, an Electric Motorcycle from 1973!
Long time readers will remember that I've covered 1970s electric vehicles before. Cars specifically though, motorcycles weren't even on my radar. Enter the Auranthetic Charger:
First of all, can we talk about that company name? I don't know what the fuck Auranthetic means but I want to buy whatever they're selling. That's the name of a bond villain's corporation. Anyway as should be evident from the picture, it ran off two 12 volt SLA batteries in series for a total of 24 volts. Mostly because of the weight of lead acid batteries, the bike was a little over 200lbs(!)
This thing supposedly had a range of 20-30 miles and a top speed of 30mph. The specs say the motor was 1hp, which is about 745 watts. I find that dubious. But then if the current was increased to compensate for the low voltage I suppose that's doable. Remember, these were the old flooded type batteries you had to top off with distilled water once a month to replace what was lost to evaporation.
In '73 probably a lot of the other boys at your school would've had gas dirtbikes, and would not have appreciated how cool an all-electric motorcycle was. The media, even then, focused harshly on the speed and range limitations of electric vehicles. This bike would not have gotten you many dates, unless you could find somebody into the environmental aspect of it.
Here's a collector's video of a restored '73 Charger in action. It actually does haul ass, and I do mean ass. That's a hefty guy, but it's moving him along at a very decent clip. I can definitely imagine this thing being useful for grocery runs, going to/from school, or commuting to work. Full specs below:
What do you think? Would you have rocked this cute little bike back in '73? Would you have cared what anybody back then had to say about it, or ridden confident in the knowledge that you were ahead of your time?
Stay Cozy!
@alexbeyman,
Dude personally I like this bike! Coz it has a petrol tank! So, the back up plan is there, if anything went worst with Electro, yeah we got back up!
Cheers~
I just fell in love with the bike. I thought all bikes consume petrol or gas.. never crossed my mind to search for bikes that make use of batteries. If the company still exists, I think they should make mass production of such bikes.
What the hell is that ?
I have never seen one.
Provided it runs on batteries I think it's the best we can get but it won't be available here so back again.
Nice one for you though
It looks heavy, but I would have been happy to drive it no matter what they said.
But it is interesting that already in '73 there was a vehicle so advanced at the time is great.
Those are large batteries there, and for it this to have existed in 1973, I never even knew of it, and for a 30km speed, I think it's a sweet ride if you ask me, I love it buddy
I'm not sure if I would, but in the mid 70's my dad did have a baby blue ford pinto hatchback, and my mom had a green gremlin. I mostly remember the black rambler station wagon and the drive in movies.
I think this motorcycle is great, and of course I would have had the pleasure of traveling in it no matter what society thought at the time, it was not important to me because I am a person who does not pay much attention to what they will say , people always think differently to you "every head is a different world" I think so.
there are electric bike convertion kits that cost around 1k
I really don't think i would have preferred this to the gas bike in those days, first because as you rightly put it, i wudnt get any dates with it and also the top speed is not enough for me, 30mph? Lol
Your technology is realy great boss. this motorcycles is really beautiful. grat job boss @alexbeyman