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Yatri: First electric motorcycle to be made in Nepal
- mkagenius 7y agoMay I take this opportunity to highlight to our American friends that its not pronounced as Nay-Paul. No. Its pronounced as Nay-Paal.
- Zombieball 7y agoAlso it’s not pronounced to-may-toe. It’s pronounced to-ma-to.
- weregiraffe 7y agoLet's call the whole thing off.
- throwaway5d097 7y agoWith languages that are not written phonetically with wide regional variations in pronunciation (English), I think it makes sense to not care as long as you're understood. Might as well demand that Japan be pronounced Neep-on or Cuba Cooba and not Cyooba.
- sesuximo 7y agostill interesting to know
- sm4rk0 7y agoWhile we're here, μ and π are not myoo and pie, but me and pee: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28yu1PFc438 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=28yu1PFc438
- mantap 7y agoIn Greek not in English though. In spoken English "Pee" is urine, not the ratio of a circle's circumference to its diameter. Also it's worth noting that Ancient Greek and Modern Greek have different pronunciations. Some of the English pronunciations are actually more 'correct' than the Modern Greek names, e.g. the English pronunciation of Gamma.
- ojosilva 7y agoCooba is the generic Spanish pronounciation. Most Cubans pronounce it as something that resembles Cooa, the b is so soft you can hardly hear it.
- NeedMoreTea 7y agoI always liked the BBC's approach -- English words and well settled loan words are allowed to have regional pronunciation, foreign words go via the pronunciation unit. So news readers pronounce (or try in the case of that Icelandic volcano) locations, names etc as they are intended to be. Names are personal, it's offensive to mispronounce them. Make the effort, even if it involves struggling a little with sounds that are not a natural part of your language. "Not care so long as you're understood" reminds me of US TV approach, where every report pronounces that funny foreign name different, often painfully wrong; or periodic fashions in education -- during the sixties and early seventies UK fashion for "no one cares about grammar so long as the little dear is understood". It's coloured, limited and ruined my communication for the following 50 years, despite much effort to self teach as an adult. I'll probably never put all commas, semicolons and what not in the right place naturally, nor clear sentences structure -- they come with a second editing pass. A pass HN mostly doesn't get, sorry. :) We got, in total: "verbs -- doing words, adjectives -- describing words, nouns -- naming words, tenses, and the use of the full stop". I honestly remember nothing else of grammar being taught whatsoever. TL;DR I would start wars against "not care as long as you're understood". It's a horrible, disrespectful and limiting approach. Happy New Year. :)
- lgessler 7y agoI'm generally in agreement and want to anticipate an objection—that the sounds of foreign words often fall well outside of any given person's native set of sounds. Take Iran for example. It's rendered often in English as [ɑɪ.ɹæn] (eye-ran). What it "should" be is [i.ɾɑn] (ee-rahn). Fortunately, all the sounds in [i.ɾɑn] are ones that occur in most varieties of English (with the exception of the [ɾ], but that's minor), so most speakers are able to accommodate without issue. Now compare that to Shanghai: its English rendition is [ʃeɪŋ.hɑɪ], and its Mandarin pronunciation is [ʂâŋ.xài]. Most Englishes lack the voiceless retroflex fricative [ʂ], and the same for the voiceless velar fricative [x], and to make matters worse, Mandarin is tonal, which puts the correct pronunciation of this word squarely out of reach for almost all English speakers. It still makes sense to insist that people try as hard as they reasonably can. Perhaps to say that speakers should get as close as possible—in the case of Shanghai, for example, maybe this would mean [ʃɑŋ.hɑɪ] instead of [ʃeɪŋ.hɑɪ].
- harry8 7y agoFrom the country that prudishly changed route to rowt, uranus to yewr-nus...
- samatman 7y agoIn American English there is nothing prurient about the word root, it means the part of a plant which grows into the ground, connotations derived from same (e.g. etymological root), and to cheer for your favorite team. It's just accent drift, happens all the time. The other pronunciation is also in use, I would say "Root 66" but I call the network packet devise a "Rowter".
- mkagenius 7y agoLet's start fixing one by one. Why are you against learning to properly correct as you go along, the list is long doesn't mean we should not correct even one of them.
- aliswe 7y agoI always thought it was more like nuh-paal ?
- dragonwriter 7y ago> May I take this opportunity to highlight to our American friends that its not pronounced as Nay-Paul. No. Its pronounced as Nay-Paal. Er, while it's not a construct that appears much in English to start with, I'm fairly sure the natural phonetic interpretation of “Paal” to many and perhaps most American readers would be identical to “Paul”, so that's a non-helpful correction. Also, I'm pretty sure the “Nay” part is not part of the (English) pronunciation; this source[0] gives what I would write out informally as “nih-PULL” as the UK pronunciation and “nuh-PALL” as the US pronunciation. [0] https://dictionary.cambridge.org/pronunciation/english/nepal https://dictionary.cambridge.org/pronunciation/english/nepal
- dfee 7y agoHere is a list of English words with two consecutive a’s: https://www.morewords.com/contains-by-length/aa https://www.morewords.com/contains-by-length/aa Despite having a cumulative 8 years of foreign language courses against three different languages, I have no clue how you’re expecting me to pronounce “paal”. Is it “pal” - like friend / buddy? “Pail” - like something you’d carry water in? Something else?
- lgessler 7y agoIt's approximately same sound that's in "all": https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_back_unrounded_vowel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open_back_unrounded_vowel
- nrp 7y agoThe specifications and renders certainly look interesting, but there’s nothing on that site that indicates there is anything more than specs and renders.
- clort 7y agoI felt that the site was a tease. The pictures way too close up, not showing you the whole thing, hidden in the dark. When I finally reached a picture of the device, I thought the very square 'battery' (?) looked chunky. "And now for something completely different" more pictures of the same (or very similar?) except with a tablet glued on. Marketing.
- ivanvanderbyl 7y agoI hope that's not a touch screen. Anyone who has ever ridden a bike can tell you how impractical and distracting that would be. Try using it in the rain, with gloves on.
- mayniac 7y agoDefinitely looks like a touch screen interface from the photos. The screen itself is distracting enough even without being a touchscreen. I really disklike the tesla-esque design with it, it feels completely wrong for a bike.
- Zenbit_UX 7y agoThat was my first thought as well, it only looks pretty to someone whose never had to pull over and take off their gloves to check their phones GPS... It also looks like a free tablet to anyone bold enough to rip it off while you're parked on the street.
- bhhaskin 7y agoThe title is a bit click-baity. It almost reads like it's the first electric bike, which it's not. Also interesting choice in name. Project Zero is pretty similar to the Zero bike. Zero bike has been around for quite awhile now. I am glad to see some competition in this space.
- stanislavb 7y agoIt's great. It seems like something that could make me buy one.
- aaron695 7y agoPeople in Nepal and developing countries need cheap/er gasoline powered motorcycles/scooters. I'd start with people with first world problems to develop the tech. Anyway, video, what they have done seems pretty insane given the timeline, not sure how much is off the shelf https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBNV2gbrswg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DBNV2gbrswg
- NeedMoreTea 7y agoNo, they need western help to skip right past fossil fuel infrastructure. It should probably be a key requirement of any western aid or trade.
- aaron695 7y agoNo, they need to be allowed to use fossil fuel infrastructure to develop just like us. The arrogance we have developed such that none of us in the first world uses or have used electric bikes predominately in our families, now, or a 100 years ago by our ancestors when they first appeared and were about technologically the same as today. This, it's good enough for them idea is astounding. This road has been well travelled.
- NeedMoreTea 7y agoDon't get me wrong, I'd like the West to rip out all fossil infrastructure as soon as possible, so we're using electric cars and bikes too. I figure it's better for us and them. Why is it any different to the developing world experience of mobile phones? They expanded directly to mobiles without any landline phase first, and because of that have been surprisingly successful. Do you claim Western arrogance here? If we simply shrug and let all the developing countries go via the worst of Victorian era coal, then 20th century oil, RCP 8.5 starts to look like an optimistic pipe dream. Everyone will suffer.
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- jacknews 7y agoSorry the website is a complete disaster for me on Firefox OS X. In any case, it looks targeted at the higher end. I would think electric bikes/mopeds can be cheaper and more reliable than gasoline, and there would be a very big market, especially in poorer countries, competing with Honda Cubs etc as general workhorses.
- wayneftw 7y agoWorked fine for me on Chrome / XFCE / Linux. I think it would be fantastic if electric motorcycles would become popular here in the US. Maybe then I wouldn't have to hear super loud and scary exhaust pipes! Who am I kidding though... the people who do that would find some other way to be annoyingly inconsiderate.
- jdavis703 7y agoThat loudness is a safety feature. It helps keep drivers alert for the presence of a motorcycle. I don’t ride, but I see our streets are becoming more and more dangerous as people ditch sedans for SUVs and trucks; extra sound proofing is added to cars; and people continue to text, eat or be under the influence while driving.
- thefounder 7y agoYeah, now let's make the cars that loud as well to keep the pedestrians more alert. Preferably loud enough to make you deaf unless you get out the way and take cover.
- peatmoss 7y agoI’m by no means an advanced rider, but I am a rider, and I don’t buy the “pipes save lives” argument in the slightest. The cone of sound goes out the back of your bike when accelerating: pretty much alerting the motorists I’m least worried about to my presence. I’m way more worried about people doing stupid stuff in front of me than behind me. And when I’m worried about people behind me, I’m mostly worried at stops that someone will rear-end me... when my hypothetical loud pipes would be idling at a purr anyway. On my very sensible Honda CB500X, I have a quiet exhaust and have a daytime headlight modulator, which I’m positive has caught the attention of distracted motorists. I’d take a very cool and very legal headlight modulator over loud pipes 100 times out of 100.
- milap 7y agoHere is a video of the motorbike running in the Himalayas https://youtu.be/uNKIqbdIS9o https://youtu.be/uNKIqbdIS9o
- mayniac 7y agoNot a single shot of the bike going around a corner... Those footpegs look very low. At 0:32 it looks like the rider's toes are only an inch away from the ground.
- nickfromseattle 7y agoBased on :017 and 0:38 the footpegs appear to be at the same level as the center of the wheel. An SV650 appears to have slightly higher pegs. I agree they look low, but checking out other bikes they appear to be in similar places.
- dharmab 7y agoI used to scrape my toes when turning left at intersections on my old KTM if I didn't move my toes back on the peg. It's not a terribly unusual stance for a road bike.
- aww_dang 7y agoLooks like it only goes downhill...
- fbnlsr 7y agoIt definitely does. No sign of acceleration in that video, I wonder if it was even working. Also it seems super uncomfortable to ride.
- Zenbit_UX 7y agoThe thing is a flat line and they didn't bother to flare the "tank" so I'm not sure what your thighs are supposed to hold on to? It looks like braking too hard might cause you to flip right over the front.
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- forinti 7y agoIs there a reason for most motorcycles not to be electric by now? Few people take them on the road, they seem to be used mostly in cities, so there's not a big problem with range. They are small, so you would have less of a problem setting up the charging infrastructure in your house.
- upofadown 7y agoFor the city you might as well just do an e-bike or something a lot like an e-bike. So that leaves things like this for the highway. Motorcycles are not very aerodynamic so they tend to take a lot of battery when run fast. So you are probably better off with a small electric car.
- IgorPartola 7y agoExcept you do not really ride bikes because they are efficient or convenient. They are way less convenient than cars almost every time. Exception: lane filtering in CA in traffic. Bikes are just the most fun you can have with your pants on.
- kiliantics 7y agomost motorcycle fuel economy is much better than it is for most cars
- orange3xchicken 7y agoThey are definitely coming. I would totally love to get one. I think one issue is that they are typically a lot more expensive than traditional motorcycles. Additionally, there are not too many used electric bikes that have significantly depreciated in value. For example, I purchased my current bike at ~2k from craigslist. I just looked up the prices for some used Zeros on CL and they vary around 10-20k. In the US, for the most part, motorcycles are still typically viewed as being toys. Looking forward to see how well the Lightning Strike does.
- Gibbon1 7y ago
- achikin 7y agoWhy all electric motorcycles are so ugly?
- cerberusss 7y agoRead the HN guidelines, which advise to not post short, unfounded dismissals. I for one, really like the design. It shows something different than the past decades of motorcycles.
- floki999 7y agoSarolea: Belgian electric superbike right here https://www.sarolea.com/motorcycles https://www.sarolea.com/motorcycles
- gambiting 7y agoI mean, electric mopeds have been a thing for decades now, when I was growing up certainly most kids had electric mopeds as petrol ones were more expensive and required more maintenance. Somehow these companies make it look as if electric bikes are something new that hasn't been done before - that's nonsense.
- jacknews 7y agoSure, they're a thing, but where was this where 'most kids had electric mopeds'? I think classic 'moped territory' would be somewhere like South-East Asia. I don't see too many electric mopeds there.
- codr7 7y agoGrowing up in the Swedish country side, most kids including me had mopeds. Not electric, but considering I'm 42yo it just wasn't a thing back then. Usually they used the same parts as more powerful motorcycles, but with cheaper breaks and crippled engines to reduce the max speed. And that's how I got my only engine mechanics experience, by finding ways to make them run fast. Sort of the worst of both worlds, fast motorcycles without proper breaks driven by kids without traffic experience/common sense.
- dharmab 7y agoThere are other companies targeting other areas of the market. Ultra high end: Harley Davidson Livewire, Zero SR/F High end: Fuell, Cake Mid range: Zero S/DS/FX Low end: Sur-on Light Bee, CSC City Slicker The biggest problem for electric bikes is recharge time. Motorcycle batteries are physically small and have low range, and take hours to recharge compared to 1-2 minutes to refuel at a gas station. That makes them unusable for anything except city commuting or tossing in the back of a truck on the way to the OHV area. Meanwhile the fastest growing segment in motorcycling is adventure riding, which is for bikes that can be ridden thousands of miles at a time both on and off road (sometimes 50-100 miles away from paved roads or services of any kind).
- leggomylibro 7y agoWow, what kind of adventure bikes can be ridden for thousands of miles at a time? I only get about 200-250 miles on dirt, and that's with an extra tank of gas strapped to the back. Are they like 650cc+ with huge fuel tanks? I shudder to think of trying to pick one of those up on a muddy slope... Anyways, an electric bike that could do ~200 miles seems like it could do well as a replacement for smaller engines, but I haven't seen any dual-sports that realistically claim a range of over 100 miles with normal use, and you're right that that would barely get you away from the major highways in most places.
- peatmoss 7y agoI assume they mean with periodic stops for gasoline, which is a lot more common than a quick charge station. That said, it’s an interesting thought exercise to go unsupported and make your own (solar) fuel via motorcycle. Of course to maximize charging / travel you’d have to ride at night, which would sort of suck.
- dharmab 7y agoEwan McGregor and Charley Boorman just completed a ride from South America to Alaska on electric motorcycles. They had some Rivian electric support vehicles carrying charged batteries, and also people along their route often let them top off their bikes while hosting them. They'll be making their trip into a web series called Long Way Up (the third in a series of trip blogs they've done over the past 15 years)
- 9nGQluzmnq3M 7y agoHow much of this is actually made in Nepal? India's been churning out vast quantities of increasingly decent domestic/joint venture bikes for decades now and is starting to get serious about car manufacturing, but I wasn't aware that Nepal was building much in the way of anything -- there can't possibly be much of a local supply chain.
- polymorph1sm 7y agoOne thing I notice with electric motorcycle is that riding experience is much better than gasoline version ( way less vibration and better throttle control ). In Taiwan there's a local company call Gogoro selling electric scooter (Scooter/motorcycle is a very common here). Another interesting feature is that it doesn't rely on charging station rather you swap the empty battery for charged ones from any battery exchange stations ( of course you had to pay for it).
- karmakaze 7y agoI loved the design, pausing and accepting the 2h charge to run 100km. The iPad instrumentation however I don't approve of and can't accept. I at least hope it all goes orange-red on black at night.