In some ways, Ducati’s MotoE challenge is the other of all the electrical bike initiatives which have gone earlier than.
Up till very lately, standard bike producers have largely stayed nicely away from electrical bikes, preferring to attend and see how the know-how, and the political and legislative framework by which this all takes place, will play out.
Exceptions have been few and much between: past electrical scooters, KTM have the Freeride, an electrical enduro machine, and Honda labored with Mugen on their bike which dominated the TT Zero race on the Isle of Man.
That has left the sphere open for a number of recent firms, which have operated with various success. Silicon Valley produced a big swathe of begin ups, largely run by bike fans from the world’s electrical car and know-how industries, and funded with VC cash.
Just a few others, resembling Energica, are engineering begin ups producing electrical automobiles and based mostly in areas with sturdy automotive business hyperlinks. Small firms with restricted manufacturing and engineering services which relied on extensively obtainable elements and methods for a big a part of their bikes.
So when Energica gained the primary contract to provide the MotoE racer, they have been competing in opposition to different specialist electrical bike producers, generally no larger than a handful of individuals based mostly in of small workshops.
But all had the identical philosophy: to take their current merchandise and switch it right into a race bike, by stripping pointless ballast and upgrading suspension, braking, and varied chassis elements.
Their race bikes, and the Energica Ego Corsa which grew to become the MotoE bike when the sequence first began in 2019, are mainly the electrical bike model of Superstock spec machines: manufacturing bikes which have been changed into racing machines by upgrading current elements to racing spec.
At the technical presentation of their MotoE machine on Thursday, the distinction between what has gone earlier than and Ducati’s strategy couldn’t be higher.
It began with the situation: Casa Maria Luigia(hyperlink is exterior), an understatedly elegant villa exterior Modena, run by Massimo Bottura, a 3-star Michelin chef with a ardour for bikes, and particularly Ducatis.
Three-star Michelin chef Massimo Bottura (seated) with Ducati CEO Claudio Domenicali
That was only the start. During the presentation it grew to become clear simply how a lot of a bonus a producer like Ducati has when approaching a challenge like constructing a MotoE machine.
With a strong monetary foundation and a devoted racing division, they’ve the posh of constructing a prototype creating particularly for MotoE, to satisfy the necessities set out by Dorna, moderately than adapting an current highway bike to remodel it right into a racing machine.
Though with 14 rider and 17 producer titles in World Superbikes, that is one thing they’ve additionally proved themselves to be eminently able to.
The success of Ducati Corse is past doubt, and as Ducati is a part of the Audi Group, additionally they have a deep nicely of information of electrical automobiles to fall again on. Most importantly, additionally they have sports activities automobile manufacturers Porsche and Lamborghini within the group, each of whom are additionally engaged in producing high-performance electrical automobiles with comparable calls for.
They have a prepared pool of experience to faucet, to assist them construct the V21L prototype which would be the official bike for the MotoE sequence from 2023.
More importantly, additionally they have a wealth of expertise constructing and designing profitable racing bikes, and a deep understanding of precisely the way to make a bike go as quick as attainable round a racetrack.
Perhaps probably the most distinguished attribute of the V21L, Ducati’s MotoE bike, is that it’s a prototype constructed from the bottom up, with a view to utilizing the teachings discovered by designing and racing it within the manufacturing of an electrical sports activities bike sooner or later sooner or later.
It is moderately ironic {that a} bike constructed for a spec racing sequence so completely embodies one of many causes producers go racing: to be taught classes and switch applied sciences to the manufacturing machines.
The design strategy of the V21L displays this concept. At the beginning of the challenge, Ducati arrange a collaboration between their racing division, Ducati Corse, and Ducati’s R&D division.
The challenge is led by Roberto Canè, eMobility Director, and Vincenzo De Silvio, R&D Director. The challenge was led by Ducati R&D, who led the design of the chassis and powertrain, and the electronics components.
Ducati Corse offered aerodynamics and car dynamics simulation, and developed the ECU software program methods, together with energy supply, torque maps, and engine braking.
Ducati CEO Claudio Domenicali (left) chats with Vincenzo De Silvio (heart) and Roberto Canè (proper)
The first step Ducati took was to have Roberto Canè contact the Audi Group to faucet into their experience.
They have been ready to make use of the sources and data of Volkswagen’s battery analysis heart at their plant in Salzgitter, Germany, and had lots of help from each Porsche and Lamborghini, who’re creating high-performance electrical sports activities automobiles.
Dorna had given Ducati two major standards for the MotoE bike: it wanted to weigh lower than 237kg, and it wanted to be able to finishing race distance, which is mostly between 7 and 10 laps, relying on the circuit.
For reference, the present Energica Ego Corsa MotoE bike weighs round 247kg, about 15kg lighter than the primary model of the bike.
The first alternative Ducati confronted was to determine whether or not to concentrate on weight or efficiency. Basically, the extra vitality you wish to pack into the battery, the extra it weighs, as extra materials is required to retailer the additional cost.
Ducati’s design purpose was to concentrate on making the MotoE bike really feel as a lot as attainable like a combustion-engined bike, and they also selected to focus on weight, moderately than energy.
As a end result, Ducati managed to chop the burden of the V21L MotoE bike right down to 225kg. By comparability, the minimal weight for a MotoGP bike is 157kg, however the listed moist weight for a Ducati Panigale V4S is 195.5 kg.
In actuality, it’s a little greater, as that features a partially crammed gas tank, however not all 17 liters.
At the center of the bike, and the way Ducati managed to maintain the burden so low, is a carbon fiber battery pack which serves as a confused member of the body.
The pack incorporates an 18 kWh battery that weighs 110kg. Using the battery pack as a confused member created the liberty to place it in the correct place to optimize dealing with and weight distribution.
Ducati additionally selected to make use of cylindrical battery cells, moderately than the prismatic or pouch cells generally utilized in automotive purposes.
Using cylindrical cells allowed the designers the liberty to form the battery pack extra freely, making a form which fills the area usually occupied by the engine and gas tank of an ICE machine.
“It’s not a dishwasher,” Roberto Canè quipped. Other bikes, together with the Energica Ego Corsa, have used giant, rectangular battery packs which have required frames to be constructed round them.
In this respect, in fact, Ducati have loads of expertise. The Italian manufacturing unit has lengthy used the engine as a confused member of their bikes, and in reworking the Desmosedici GP15 engine into the Panigale V4 highway bike, used the engine as a confused member there as nicely.
The battery pack is related to the headstock by a brief aluminum entrance body, whereas the seat unit is a carbon fiber subframe. The swingarm is aluminum, and attaches to an aluminum pivot brace on the rear of the battery pack.
Designing and constructing the battery pack, discovering the proper stiffness and energy for the carbon fiber shell, was the toughest piece of the V21L puzzle that wanted cracking, Roberto Canè advised us.
“In my opinion, the most complicated part of the bike was the battery pack,” Ducati’s eMobility Director advised us. “The complication is in different items that you have to take into account when designing this kind of motorcycle.”
“First of all, you have to find the best compromise in the balance between the energy and power you put in the battery pack and the weight itself, because it’s a compromise of course,” Canè stated.
“And then once you have defined what is the best compromise, you have to make it work. And especially make it work in very harsh conditions like at the track where you have 35°C of air, and you have something that’s getting very hot because it’s providing very high power.”
Managing warmth, which may suck vitality out of a battery, was one other key design goal. “The other item was the cooling. The cooling system was a bit of a nightmare, to be honest,” Canè admitted.
The battery pack, the inverter (which controls the availability of energy from the battery to the motor), and the motor all had totally different cooling necessities.
The answer was to create two separate cooling programs. A big system to chill the battery pack,and a smaller system to chill the motor and inverter.
As the battery pack must run at a decrease temperature than the motor and inverter, it has a bigger radiator, with an electrical pump managing water move to optimize cooling.
Having a liquid-cooled battery additionally permits the bike to be recharged extra rapidly. Using the socket within the tail part, the battery will settle for 20kW and cost from virtually flat to 80% in 45 minutes.
It can be charged as quickly because the bike enters the storage, with out having to attend to chill down. That permits for a quick turnaround between periods.
The motor and inverter use a smaller radiator, utilizing a pump pushed from the motor. The entire appears similar to ICE cooling programs which have a big water radiator for the engine, plus a smaller radiator to chill the oil.
With restricted experience however particular design standards, Ducati turned to the various specialist engineering corporations in Motor Valley, the part of the Po valley between Misano and Milan which homes so a lot of Italy’s main automotive firms, to assist with the inverter and the motor.
The inverter is a silicon carbide MOSFET design, which weighs 5kg and operates at as much as 99% effectivity. The inverter controls the move of energy from the battery to the motor, and is roughly analog to the throttle our bodies on an ICE.
The electrical motor was designed in collaboration with a provider, one of many main firms within the area (although Ducati don’t title them explicitly).
Again, the target was to be taught as a lot as attainable within the strategy of designing and producing elements for an electrical car.
The motor weighs 21kg, together with all the components wanted to permit it to run. It will spin at as much as 18,000 RPM, produces 110kW or 150 hp, and 140Nm of torque.
That is down on the quoted Energica determine of 215Nm, however ultimately, usable torque is proscribed by tires.
Ducati declare the bike is able to reaching 275 km/h down the entrance straight at Mugello.
That is a fraction sooner than the 272.7 km/h set by Alessio Finello in race 1 for the MotoE class at Mugello this yr, suggesting the efficiency ought to be in the identical ballpark because the Energica at first.
When requested for lap instances, Ducati CEO Claudio Domenicali refused to reply, saying the bike continues to be being developed, and there may be nonetheless extra efficiency to come back.
There was one space the place Ducati have been in a position to achieve in each efficiency and weight financial savings.
By selecting to run the system at 800 volts as a substitute of the extra traditional 400V, it allowed Ducati to make the ability cables, motor, and inverter all smaller, the upper voltage permitting decrease present to provide the identical energy.
That can be a alternative made by Porsche for his or her Taycan and Audi with the RS e-Tron GT, the high-performance electrical automobiles from Ducati’s mum or dad firm.
One notable absence from the Ducati V21L is any type of wings. The MotoE bike had been developed for effectivity, and meaning conserving the drag as little as attainable.
“Of course, efficiency in an electric bike is even more important than on a conventional one,” Vincenzo De Silvio stated.
“And so reduction of drag was the main factor to be optimized. This is the reason why for instance we decided not to go with the wings, which are very good in order to increase the vertical load, but on the other side are increasing a little bit the drag.”
Ducati’s major design focus was on studying as a lot as attainable about constructing electrical bikes, so all of their R&D effort and expenditure has gone into the powertrain, and constructing a chassis to accommodate it.
Those prices needed to be recouped someplace, so the selection was made to suit the bike with high-end, however not prototype suspension and braking elements.
Forks are Öhlins NPX 25/30, the identical items discovered on Ducati’s Superleggera, from whence the Öhlins TTX36 rear shock additionally hails. Brake calipers are from Brembo, GP4RR M4 on the entrance and P34 on the rear.
The intention of all these efforts was to create a motorbike which felt as a lot as attainable like a traditional Ducati. Ducati Corse’s work on throttle response, torque maps, and engine braking was to provide a motorbike with a pure really feel.
That has produced a motorbike with very comparable dimensions and stability because the Panigale V4. The weight distribution is 54% entrance / 46% rear, whereas the wheelbase is 1471mm, a fraction longer than the 1469mm of the Panigale V4.
Ducati check rider and a number of Italian Superbike champion Michele Pirro was impressed by the bike, he advised us. “The first run with the MotoE was amazing,” he stated.
“I was expecting a bike with difficult handling, because the weight is a little bit more than a MotoGP. But after the first lap I felt this was not a big problem. The feeling is similar to the MotoGP and the Superbike. In particular the engine torque delivery is very nice and it’s very close to the MotoGP, or the Superbike, or the Panigale V4.”
Ducati check rider Michele Pirro (seated) with from L to R, Claudio Domenicali, Roberto Canè, and Vincenzo De Silvio
Designing and constructing the Ducati V21L MotoE bike had produced challenges, but additionally had supplied alternatives to make use of classes discovered from the previous. “We had to modify how approach the design, but to be honest, the methods have been the same,” R&D Director Vincenzo De Silvio advised us.
“We compared the stiffness of the old system, the battery pack, the motor, the swingarm with the conventional bike, and we worked a lot while designing all the fixing elements and the battery casing in order to not be too far from what we were used to. And at the end, we can say making this innovation of the chassis, all together we found similar values as the one we are used to.”
De Silvio agreed with eMobility Director Roberto Canè that the battery pack had been the most important problem.
“For sure, the battery pack is a very difficult component, because the bike is basically the battery pack, but the approach that we used I think worked very well. Because if we had chosen the conventional approach having the frame and the battery pack supported by it, it could be much more difficult to find the right balance, and especially to find the weight.”
Hitting Ducati’s self-imposed goal weight would have been way more troublesome. “For sure it would have added a complexity of reaching the final goal of 225kg,” De Silvio advised us.
What was my major impression of Ducati’s MotoE launch? The presentation was heavy on information and figures, whereas nonetheless withholding one or two key numbers, most notably the present lap instances.
Ducati know what the goal lap must be, as Ducati Corse have a lap time simulator which is able to take dimensions, weight, and efficiency and calculate how briskly it’s best to theoretically be capable of lap.
Vincenzo De Silvio and Roberto Canè emphasised that Ducati have been nonetheless engaged on the cooling system, attempting to optimize the temperature of the battery to maximise efficiency and endurance. That would impact how a lot sooner the bike can get.
Overall, although, it’s a powerful challenge. The bike appears improbable, as you would possibly count on from a Ducati, particularly one from the computer systems of the Centro Stile Ducati.
It appears like a race bike, each on picture and within the flesh, and it’s only when you discover the dearth of an exhaust that you simply understand it’s an electrical bike.
The intelligent a part of the bike design is Ducati’s understanding that perform can observe type.
It is apparent that the bike was designed first, and the engineers got the duty of becoming the batteries and different elements into the area behind the fairing and beneath the tank.
Using the battery pack as a confused member, and forming it in such a method as to make optimum use of obtainable area gave them the flexibility to fastidiously stability the burden in such a method as to provide a nominally normal-handling bike.
More fascinating in the long run is the truth that Ducati are working again to entrance, in reverse order to the conventional method of manufacturing electrical race bikes.
Building a MotoE bike and studying the teachings which may solely be present in racing, the harshest of environments, is a quick observe to producing a quick, dependable, and above all, fascinating electrical sports activities bike.
When Ducati do lastly launch their electrical sports activities bike to the general public, you could be sure it’s going to look and deal with in addition to another sports activities bike which rolls out of their Borgo Panigale manufacturing unit.
Will it have the vary of the Panigale V4S? Almost definitely not, however that’s unlikely to be an issue. In my travels round Europe on a bike, I’ve not usually encountered a Panigale laden to the gunwales with baggage, embarking on a transcontinental tour.
Most sports activities bikes are taken both on brief blasts round native roads, or on observe days. High mileage isn’t a characteristic of both of these actions.
It is apparent, nonetheless, that Ducati are utilizing this chance to achieve a aggressive benefit within the electrical bike market. Indeed, one of the crucial fascinating elements of the presentation was Ducati CEO Claudio Domenicali talking concerning the varied routes Ducati is exploring on their solution to producing carbon impartial automobiles.
There are three choices, Domenicali defined: electrical bikes, flamable fuels from renewable sources – so-called e-fuels – and hydrogen, both in gas cells or as a supply of combustion.
The V21L MotoE bike was Ducati’s method of exploring electrical bikes. With MotoGP switching to 40% e-fuels from 2024 and 100% e-fuels from 2027, Ducati will be capable of develop carbon-neutral engines for that know-how there.
Domenicali additionally stated that Ducati, together with a number of Japanese producers, can be exploring the usage of hydrogen as a combustion gas.
“Very interesting for us as motorsports fans, you can use also hydrogen to burn in a conventional engine. The Japanese are making tests with this, we are making experience with this, and so it’s an interesting field.”
Domenicali was clearly a fan of hydrogen. “Hydrogen is a very nice fuel,” the Ducati boss. “Sometimes even too nice, because it catches fire too quickly, so it’s not easy.”
The smartest thing about hydrogen was a scarcity of contaminants, which means higher combustion, cleaner engines, and simpler upkeep. “In terms of burning, it’s fully carbon-free, so if you look at a piston that has been burning hydrogen, it is fully clean, and so you have no carbon residue anywhere,” Domenicali defined.
“So it’s a very nice and clean engine and hydrogen is very quick to burn, so it’s very interesting for high-revving engines. Because there are lots of things that you need in a normal combustion fuel, like ignition advance, that are much better with hydrogen.”
By exploring these three paths, Ducati hope to have the ability to affect the longer term path of motorbike propulsion.
With the European Union set to ban the sale of recent automobiles powered by inner combustion engines from 2035, whereas gross sales of ICE bikes shall be allowed past that, Domenicali believed that bike producers might try to affect future laws based mostly on the teachings discovered.
“So a long story short, there are different options, so we are trying to communicate with the European Commission, that we want to go carbon-neutral, but let us choose the best option for the different vehicles,” Domenicali concluded.
Once upon a time, the primary object of racing was analysis and improvement, however because the technical laws in grand prix racing have tightened for the reason that Sixties, that position has diminished, with the position of selling taking a way more distinguished place.
Ducati’s choice to construct a MotoE bike brings the position of R&D in racing proper again to the forefront, Ducati hoping to discover ways to construct a a lot better highway bike utilizing the expertise gained in MotoE. It is a welcome and refreshing change.
Photos: Ducati
Source: www.asphaltandrubber.com
