My friend from college is the founder of this company. He has spent many years building Flux and trying to bring electric scooters to the US. (They spent several years just iterating on the design before the DOT would approve them for use here.) I have a Flux moped in San Francisco, and it's great for cruising around the neighborhood.
I have one of these in Chicago. It is fucking brilliant.
The 20 mile range with 2 people is more than enough for tooling around all day. I bought an extra $70 charger that I keep on the bike so I can charge a bit if needed. It gets a full charge in about 3-4 hours.
The bike being silent is really, really nice. That makes it much easier to be aware of your surroundings. It's also really nice to be able to scoot between cars at stoplights, especially when turning left at a street during busy times. Cars can get stuck for 2-3 turns of the light, and since the bike has really good acceleration (without being obnoxiously loud) you don't end up impeding the cars at all.
Getting around twice as fast as an Uber (only during heavy traffic) for ~$0 marginal dollars is quite satisfying.
The guys actually have an office here, so they're able to fix any issues pretty quickly.
If you can't tell I am very happy with my purchase :)
It's a legal classification. Most US states designate a "Moped" as a 2-wheeled vehicle under 50cc and electronically limited to a top speed of 30mph.
In NH Registering such a vehicle costs about $5 and gives you a license plate that says "MOPED" and can be driven by people with special moped licenses if they do not yet have their drivers license.
Anything over 50cc/30mph and you need a "MOTORCYCLE" registration and license plate and must take the motorcycle test to get a motorcycle license. Most motorcycle registrations are much more than $5. ($50-200)
In CT it used to be the case that you didn't even need to register it if it was under 50cc, but that might have changed.
Mopeds is a misnomer. As several people have mentioned below, it is a legal classification. We are thinking of changing to Flux Motors, focusing on small electric vehicles, not just electric mopeds.
> Strictly speaking, mopeds are driven by both an engine and by bicycle pedals, but in common usage and in many jurisdictions the term moped is used for similar vehicles including a scooter. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moped)
This looks cool and the price is appealing. For me personally, the range is a bit short and 30mph doesn't cut it - in some cities it'd work, London is full of 50mph roads.
I'd love to buy a Zero (linked lower in the thread) if I had a safe place to store it or some good insurance (motorcycle theft is common in the UK).
WRT weather and other concerns - frankly, the time saved by riding a motorcycle in a congested city blows that out of the water, IMO. In conditions other than gridlock you can maintain an average speed ~50% higher than all other traffic.
I'd love to see electric bikes go mainstream because I think they address almost all of the concerns people have about cycling (sweaty, no good for the unfit/disabled, etc).
You can park 4-5 scooters in a car parking bay, tuck them away at the side of footpaths and in front of stores, if the roads became populated with them it'd possibly double or triple throughput for single riders.
I currently own a 125cc motorcycle and it's a godsend. Especially in the summer months it turns commuting into a joy, and reduces the time taken to perform errands by 5x over public transport (there are plenty of places I can ride to in 20 mins or take a combination of buses and trains to get to in 1.5 hours).
I think living in a large metro area for an extended period of time would be unbearable for me without owning a motorcycle. Most cities have radial transport networks - concentric journeys outside of the core have ridiculous routing as a result.
Living in Europe, a moped can be an utter joyous way to get around the world. I've dusted mine off and gotten it ready for the road, and there are great days ahead, on it. Having an electric version - no brainer for me. I'd buy an electric replacement for my Vespa in an instant, were there one...
Do anyone know why electric mopeds are still rare in US, even in big congested cities? In China there're already hundreds of millions of them running on the road.
Top speed of 30mph limits the usefulness of this for me. I could motor around in my borough just fine, but if I wanted to get to my nearest major city (10-15 miles away), I don't know if I can do it without going on a road that has a speed limit of at least 35, and that road has a lot of 18-wheelers with whom I would not want to share the road.
None of that stuff is an absolute dealbreaker, but if I have a bicycle to schlep around the borough and a car to get into the city, getting something in the middle is a tough value prop.
Ignoring range issues (wouldn't be an issue for some of the shops near me I frequent) many of the bigger roads around me have 45mph standard speeds. I don't want to try driving 30 on them on something the size of a scooter.
US roads are full of large vehicles and plenty of distracted drivers. In sf, you appear to be able to kill bikers and walk away with a ticket unless you're grossly negligent.
The biggest thing a car has over this is 2k+ pounds of crumple zone surrounding you to take one for the team.
Interestingly, in Paris, there are mopeds all over, with wintertime coverings that include glove-like handle muffs, as well as similar structures for the legs. Bundle up in a jacket, and everyone seems to think nothing of it. Throw a poncho on, and the rain is mostly handled (except for leg splash-back). Of course, Paris also has a wonderful Metro that one can fall back on if the weather is particularly nasty.
Winter, specifically snowy conditions, is certainly an issue for not only Flux but all 2 wheel forms of transportation. We are focusing on building a small electric vehicle that works in many, but not all, situations. Our plan is to build out fleet of vehicles that work in specific situations. A winter small electric vehicle is at the top of that list.
I bike through winter here in Canada. As long as you dress for weather, make other plans during blizzards, and live in a city with good road clearing it's not nearly as bad as people think.
I don't mind bundling or the cold—it's biking on ice on two wheels next to traffic that scares me. :-) Perhaps it just takes some practice?
I suspect it is also a function, as you said, of the road cleaning and available bike paths. Smaller cities and towns with lower traffic flows are probably not as effective at this for the purposes of bicycle traffic.
So basically a reasonably priced electric replacement for the 50 cc "moped" class scooter. So interesting...
How bad are the laws still? A lot of places specifically define a moped in terms of internal combustion engine displacement. Is there a generally accepted electric motor equivalent for the purposes of the exception?
What is really needed is a reasonably priced scooter that can go 50 MPH. It is hard to commute in most cities with something that can only go 30 MPH. You are better off going in the other direction and getting an e-bike, which in a lot of places gets you access to the bikeways. ... or heck, since you are willing to be rained on, just get a stinking bike and be much more likely to survive the experience...
Hah, here in Canada e-bikes are sadly the domain of DUI convicts and other losers. They're sold and Wal-Mart and generally ridden by the social underclass.
We develop the perfect solution to fighting global warming and then immediately hate on its adopters.
I have been working on classic mopeds (with the pedals) for the last 10 years. I know everything there is to know about internal combustion mopeds. I wish I could ride a clean electric version. But the Italian-style, legs-together scooter look is just so painfully lame.
What's the battery chemistry, does anyone know? I had an electric scooter in China until recently. It was pretty great. Lead-acid battery, 40km range, 40 kmph top speed (about 25 mph).
What's the news? Electric mopeds have been around for several years now.
(A couple of years ago I almost ran into one when I absentmindedly walked on the street because they are completely silent. Their silence makes me wish gas mopeds were outlawed (at least in residential areas))
You are correct. Electric Mopeds have been around in multiple types of formats but they have not become a platform of hyperlocal transit. That is our goal.
They may look similar but the Flux EM1 meets DOT standard and, more importantly, is built to meet the high standards of the American consumer to be a very low maintenance, fun and dependable vehicle for years.
E-mopeds in China often come with no warranty and the market is fix them regularly to just keep them going.
