The future of personal transportation is heading down the path of electrification. As more EVs begin to hit the streets, the challenge of charging convenience will become paramount to the consumer, and as a matter of fact, it already has. Charging your electric motorcycle means having to pull out a cord physically, and plug-in to your machine for hours together. This might not be the most convenient way to do that.

BMW Motorrad->ke1398 has probably come up with a more natural way to do this, and the technology is not particularly new even. Remember wireless charging your smartphone on a charging pad?

In 2018, BMW->ke178 had developed an innovative inductive charging system for their automotive ‘I’ division that needed the driver to park the car at the right spot. A charging mat/pad was laid down on the ground, and the car when parked on it, would then start charging the batteries, without needing any physical contact, cables or plugs.

The solution by BMW Motorrad, however, will have a physical contact needed to charge the batteries on its electric vehicles, but without the need to pull out a cord and attach it to the wall/station and the machine. Just like charging your smartphone wirelessly by placing it on a charging pad, this patent shows us the charging solution by just parking the bike, knocking the side stand out, and placing it on an inductive charging pad.

This European patent, published in November 2019, makes charging possible as soon as the bike is parked. The side stand of the bike, the only non-rubber component to touch the ground, when lands on the wireless charge pad housing an AC coil, completes the circuit and charge the EV. This means the kickstand will be wired to make the connection with the battery charging unit.

Just like in your smartphone, charging will be faster using the physical cable rather than the pad wireless charging. The BMW’s pad charging might just be a Level 1 charging solution that needs an entire night to charge the battery of your bike and is not a solution if you need quick charging, at least until current technology prevails.

Although BMW Motorrad has only the C Evolution as the electric mobility solution, it is getting closer to unveiling an exciting new electric sportbike and a roadster that could rival the likes of the Zero->ke3362’s and Energica->ke4817’s offerings. With these new products, BMW is keen to design a device compatible with their entire range of electric motorcycles and scooters.

Rolling your electric bike into your garage and juicing it up just by kicking out the side stand could just become the cool new way of doing things. Because a motorcycle often parks in the same spot every day at a rider’s home, it’d be easy to land the side stand on the pad repeatedly and reliably.

But until BMW gives us more info, any speculation at this time is simply that — a speculation.

So far, the history of EVs’ has not been a fairy-tale story. But with BMW, the vast amount of experience, skill and financial resources could allow for some real development into producing better battery performance, lifespan, safety, charging, and also cut down on costs, which has been one of the major issues current energy storage solutions are tipping over.