You have to admit that the prospect of a simple-to-ride off-road machine is quite tempting. In fact, it might be the best option for many beginners, and perhaps even tired veterans
It’s hard to deny that electric motorcycles are carving out a niche, and it’s also hard to deny that the concept of owning one gets increasingly enticing by the day. However, one doesn’t have to go out and buy the latest Zero, Sondors, or Surron in order to get on with the electric revolution.
If you didn’t already know, some companies and brands are more than happy to sell you an electric conversion kit for your motorcycle. Buying into this would mean that all the gas-powered stuff on the bike must stay in the garage or perhaps on another project.
Pat Outdoors on YouTube was looking to rebuild his Yamaha YZ250’s engine. Hailing from 2006, the bike has seen a lot of action, and its engine needed a refresh. Though, with other bikes in the garage, and the conversion kit being something new, it made for a good project. On top of that, his wife needed an easy-to-ride motorcycle on the trails, so it was a perfect fit, really.
The kit that Pat used to convert the YZ250 was a 72V E&C QS138 V3 kit. E&C stands for Electro & Co, a kit that would set you back $1,099 USD. You can probably still run all the stock fairings, bars, and a few other stuff with this kit, but Pat’s gone on to purchase other stuff for the project which includes a YZ Restyle Plastics Kit, a Pro Taper handlebar mount, an HTTMT fat bar, and many more.
Installing all the parts and all the commentary in between lasts for about an hour. After everything was said and done, the bike looked great. The black plastics were also a nice touch and it actually looked fast while test-riding it on the street. The bike even went up to 58.8 miles per hour, which is actually kind of impressive. It was also zippy getting off the line, spooling up quickly enough, and accelerating with a respectable punch.
Now the real question is, would you do this to your old dirt bike? Some of us will still cling to our two or four-stroke noise makers that run on boom juice, but the argument there is that electric motorcycles are one of the easiest things to ride on the trail, currently. However, livability leaves a big question mark above my head at the moment. Still, the build is impressive and hats off for the detailed breakdown and commentary about the build.
