New kinds of motorcycles are born when different makers think at combining this and that to achieve what they believe the market asks for and when it comes to downhill riders, we usually don’t expect to hear an engine roar, but we’ve come to find that someone did thought at using the power from a 125cc four-stroke single on a light bike – 125.6 lbs (57 kg) – in order to get across high ground with greater ease. The bike is called FX Mountain Moto and it is the only engined downhill two-wheeler that we know about.
Light and nimble as a mountain bike and enough powerful to put it up against your everyday dirt bike, the FX Mountain Moto is a very successful combination coming from New Zeeland. In fact, this thing is claimed being the world’s lightest adult-sized dirt bike. Does that motivate you to pay $5,040 (€3,700) for it?
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Although it wears the BMW badge, this is a concept bike created by a group of design students at ISD of Valenciennes, France. Called the “BMW HP Kunst”, the whole concept spins around the idea of hydrogen power, so it features the fuel cell where you’ll normally find the internal combustion engine on a regular motorcycle, a 20-liter cryogenic tank and a lithium polymer battery pack for electrical energy supply.
The French students do offer a glimpse in the ecological future of motorcycles, but the thing still had to look good and perform even better. Being asymmetric, dynamic and featuring electronic brakes and controls as well as electromagnetic suspensions, we believe this is an overall great concept motorcycle with good chances to hit production if BMW ever thinks to turn their research effort on hydrogen into something profitable.
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The Bat Bike concept was designed by Marouane Bembli who drew inspiration from the movies Dark Night and Transformers in the attempt to combine the raw mechanics of a transformer with the stealthiness of a batmobile.
Claimed being a guardian of the city, the V4-powered concept could handle itself without human interference. This makes us thing of it as the future of police bikes. What do you think?
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For the upcoming Geneva Motor Show, Honda has prepared a rather unique concept vehicle called the Honda 3R-C Concept. It is actually a single-seat trike that accommodates the rider in a fully enclosed cockpit and which is, obviously, powered by batteries.
This is more like the kind of concept you’d expect from innovative designers eager of global recognition, but considering that this is an official Honda concept and it is going to Geneva, it actually stands great chances to be proposed for production. Read the full press release after the jump.
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Bulgarian designer Krasimir Emilov Aseno has come up with a different kind of helmet. His concept is supposed to comfortably accommodate the rider inside and be handled by joystick. Power will come from several electric motors fed both by an accumulator battery and by a solar energy system which collects outside power thanks to a folio of solar sensitive cells. Ingenious, huh?
The best part about this concept is that it doesn’t roll you over as it goes down the street, but has what the designer calls a “speed track system” consisting in many treads covered in elastic, flexible, and strong material in order to make movement possible. Also, driving-belts can be used.
The joystick handling system is a gyroscopic one that determines the vehicle to bend left or right depending on the direction indicated by the rider.
Needing to be strong and yet very light, the Rollersphere will be made out of materials such as carbon or titanium and it will even have shock absorbers as it is designed for huge jumps too. Sounds crazy to me!
Is this supposed to turn into the world’s safest ride if it’s ever made?
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