back to article World's first electric Chopper parks up

A group of tattooed and portly custom Chopper builders from New York State and a straight-laced electronics firm make for an odd pair. But they are the duo behind Smart Chopper - an extreme leccy bike. Siemens_Smart_Chopper_01 Smart Chopper: mean and green Brainchild of Siemens USA and the folks at Orange County Choppers ( …

COMMENTS

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  1. Lionel Baden

    stupid !!!

    the idea behind the massive engine on a motorboike is all gone !!

    and shiny ipod white really doesnt suit bikers all that well

  2. Chris Miller
    Thumb Down

    American bikes

    Look really cool, and if you need to cross 1,000 miles in a straight line there's nothing better. Take corners like the USS Nimitz, though.

  3. James 111
    WTF?

    100mph??

    Sounds like it does 60 miles every 5 hours to me, or 12mph.

  4. D@v3
    Black Helicopters

    electric Chopper...

    i instantly thought of some new fangled electro death copter.

    shame its just a bike (a mighty nice looking bike at that)

  5. Paul 4

    Interesting

    But I think they will have alot more luck building sports bikes (Much more open to new ideas) and comuter bikes if they up the range to 70-100 miles. I do 50 miles per day, and bet alot of other people do around that, and never use my bike for going any distance much further than that, so this would be ideal.

  6. Allan George Dyer
    Coat

    @Chris Miller

    "if you need to cross 1,000 miles in a straight line there's nothing better"

    Only if that's 1,000 miles with 17 regularly-spaced power sockets...

    Mine's the leather one with the 1,000 mile extension cable in the pocket.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    @James 111 - will you be my expert witness

    James 111 - if I ever need an expert witness for a speeding ticket, can it be you?

    If I get clocked at 110mph in a 30 limit, but only actually travel a journey of 5 miles before sitting in a friends house for an hour, will you tell the nice Mr Judge that I only did 5mph?

  8. Tom Chiverton 1

    No plans ?!?

    No plans to make it ? It's the perfect commuter bike if those range and charge time numbers are good...

  9. JamesW
    Thumb Up

    @Mat Stace - will you be my expert witness

    sure, that's how you avoid the average speed cameras on the motorways in places like France and Germany (or so I'm told).

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Who's Chopper is this?

    Zed's. Who's Zed? Zed's dead, baby, Zed's dead.

    ***

    Those OCC guys also featured on the last episode of Long Way Round (you know, where Ewan McGregor and Charley Boorman went round "the world" on a couple of motorbikes).

    I'm kinda warming to the idea of getting a motorbike. For environmental reasons, of course. Definitely nothing to do with a mid-life crisis. No, definitely not.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Welcome

    I for one welcome our new fangled electro death copter overlords

    oh wait...

    Arrghhh. copter-overlord icon crisis!

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    @Mat Stace

    That'd be a fantastic defence- "So, I left at 12:17 and arrived at 1:43pm, a travel time of about an hour and a half. The journey was 90 miles of motorway and dual carriageway, so clearly I couldn't have been speeding as my average speed was less than the speed limit on the motorway. You accept Average Speed cameras as being accurate, so here's an accurately measured- and verifiable; all the timings are taken from properly auditable corporate building CCTV- average speed."

  13. Peter H. Coffin
    Pint

    Predicting winners

    I'm buying the next round if Jay Leno doesn't end up with this machine. He's already got a jet-powered one: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4uoATZMJrao

  14. The elephant in the room
    Paris Hilton

    I was hoping for a helicopter

    Paris, because she's got an electric chopper in her bedside drawer!

  15. Murray Pearson 1
    Joke

    @Lionel Baden

    "and shiny ipod white really doesnt suit bikers all that well"

    That's because a black one wouldn't look like it's made by Siemens. Pearly white is perfectly appropriate! I wonder if it's sticky?

    Once in an industrial park I noticed two adjacent tenants were Siemens and Cummins. I should have taken a photo!

  16. Stewart Haywood
    Joke

    Electric Chopper

    I thought you meant how it goes all sparky if you rub it hard with beaver fur.

  17. Evil_Medic
    Boffin

    @murray Pearson 1

    Oh yeah? siemens also produces a high-end bovine AI straw filler. That is: it fills breeding straws with diluted bull semen for freezing and administratiion.

    I'm a cytometry tech with one of these companies.

    Coat? Yes the white one please.

  18. JC 2

    World's First?

    Highly doubtful, though it might be the most technologically advanced (till the next thing comes along).

  19. raving angry loony

    defeating the purpose.

    The only point of these uncomfortable, hard on your back, unreliable, poorly handling machines called "choppers" was the loud pipes. They spawned a whole generation of deaf fuckers who thing that loud pipes are somehow a good idea. This really defeats the purpose.

  20. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    @ Murray Pearson 1

    I dunno, their black-coloured traffic signal cabinets look OK.

  21. BonezOz
    Thumb Up

    Can I has cheezbooger?

    2 words:

    I want!

    My daily commute is 20K's round trip, free parking in the city (or outside the office for security purposes) so 60 miles would more than cover it.

    The only issue I can see is the lack of the "cruiser" sound :(

  22. TeeCee Gold badge

    @Tom Chiverton 1

    "....It's the perfect commuter bike......."

    It's a chopper FFS! It's the perfect commuter bike in much the same way as a Sherman tank is the perfect dragster*.

    *After typing that I came over all thoughtful and wondered exactly how many jet engines one could feasibly weld onto a Sherman tank..........

  23. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    actually, I think its a good approach

    i guess people now get some wrong ideas about how choppers supposed to be all gas-guzzling big mean machine kinda stuff, but I believe the whole point of building choppers was to customize. If this trend of using recycled materials, batteries, LED lights and whatnot continues, whether just street bikes or chopper, I think its amazing on part of saving some greens on gas and still enjoying your ride. cheers to both parties involved here

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