A quick overview after owning the bike for a distance of 2.000 km right now. Shouldn’t we all talk about distance in terms of ownership anyway?
First service
Was a blast. I took into my dealership, had a meeting remotely (for work) while they were performing all checks and whatever was needed. They even cleaned and lubed my chain for me.
Part of the first checkup is to install firmware updates if they are available. And there was one for mine so it went from 38 to 39. One of the changes I noticed was that now on the dash you get distance since last charge and trip instead of a duplication of the consumption values.
First issues
I also got my first minor issues. For comparison, at this point I had a broken brake light switch on my Zero. Most of my zero issues came later on. On the Energica the issues I now had were all caused by that 750 km ride in constant rain.
The first thing I noticed failing during that ride were the switches on the left of the handlebars. Those are shared with the Zero platform. Although on the Zero platform these didn’t give me any problems. From that I can see they are more rotated forward so that water doesn’t stay on top ready to infiltrate.
Cause that is what happened with the Energica implementation. On the menu button I could see a pool of water. That clearly also infiltrated the assembly cause it triggered a few times during the ride. Another issue with that assembly is that the indicators toggle started to stick instead of return by itself.
The day after I gave the bike a good wash. No issues there. A few strange places where dirt builds up and doesn’t really have a way to go. The chain also needed a good clean and lube but again that is to be expected after this use. And I increased the tension while at it. It looks like my chain had some markings already. It did seem within spec but I increased it anyway.
Asking other Energica owners this chain wear is common. The rear swing arm is fully protected with pieces that can be removed when worn down. So I’m not concerned anyway. Might be dirt build up somewhere or who knows. I think it’s better now that I tightened the chain for the first time.
The other issue I only noticed 2 days later when I took the bike out for a very short ride using motorcycle jeans instead of the usual rain trousers. My butt was wet after the ride so the seat had clearly soaked up a lot of water and was now giving it back to me.
I didn’t really figure that out during the wet ride but the added weight of all the water in the seat now also prevents the seat to go up on itself when unlocked and it also wants to drop back. I’ve placed it in the sun once but that didn’t help much. I’ll probably just have it covered with something water tight.
First modifications
I also started to personalise this bike. I’m already pretty convinced I’m going to use this one more and more, even in the rain. The initial idea to keep this one for dry weather won’t work :D. I still love riding the Zero, now mostly for it’s smaller dimensions and lower weight. But the CCS charging to cover longer distances is really hard to beat. Anyway this is what I’ve done to it so far.
Quadlock motorcycle mount with wireless charging head
Well this is just the quadlock mount I had on my SRF so I moved it over to the Energica now. The nice thing about the Energica is that it has a dual USB socket up front on the dashboard so I can easily connect it. For the Zero I had to wire either underneath the tank cover or down to the 12V battery. The Zero version was better protected for rain though.
Keyless seat lock mechanism
One of the things I noticed most when riding and charging all day long was how I had to take the key from the ignition, put it in the seat lock, put it back in the ignition and plug in a charger. I like to have the bike powered on when connecting chargers cause for some reason that helps for most of the chargers. So I wish I didn’t have to use the key for that.
I’ve checked and there are very nice push button options for that. Downside however is that the opening where the lock mechanism lives has to be enlarged for the push button to fit. On the EVA, EGO and Ribelle that is not really an issue since that part is made from plastic. But on my SS9 that is a metal piece so I would need to have that machined instead… Not ready for that just yet.
For now I’ve just connected a wire to it so that I can release the lock that way. In the future I’ll probably look for an extra key with a very short handle that I can leave in there. I’ll just have to take it out when I put the bike on lock cause otherwise they can use that key to unlock it. They shouldn’t be able to ride the bike since it won’t have a transponder. But still that would make it a bit too easy to undo the steering lock.
Hydraulic locking parking brake
Something I wanted for a long time already was the bullet brake system. That is a hydraulic lock that you can activate within the brake line. That way you can have an actual parking brake. I have to park on slopes most of the time and on my ICE motorcycles I would just leave it in gear. Not an option on electrics so this was my solution.
The installation was straight forward. The only downside is that it really needed a good bleed afterwards. I think I now got most of the air out of the system again but still it feels a little less solid than before.
Using it is awesome. I even use it on the driveway now to get my keys and open the garage doors. You just pinch the brake lever in as much as needed to hold the bike, then activate the bullet brake and release the brake lever and it’s locked in place. To release it again you just use the brake lever and it will pop out. This is perfect on the Energica since you need to push in the front brake lever to activate the bike anyway.
Splash guard
I wasn’t completely sure if this piece of plastic mudguard for the rear was worth 99 EUR, the asking price here locally. I thought let’s see first if I really need it. And then it turned out I did. I also thought of just cutting a cheap 10 EUR black bucket and then attaching a piece of plastic using tie wraps… that would’ve probably worked.
But when I went in for service my dealer had that mud guard on stock so I took it with me anyway. The installation revealed that it was a precisely molded piece of plastic fitting without issues within the metal plate holder bracket.
There were also longer screws in the bag so everything would fit with the extra width of the plastic. And even new grommets where needed. So there is a lot attention for detail involved. Happy that I didn’t go for the cheap solution in the end.