It’s likely that the name Felo doesn’t spring to mind when it comes to motorcycle manufacturers, but the emerging brand has unveiled a prototype of an electric touring bike with a range of almost 700 km between charges.
With the strange title of “Felo Tooz”, the new bike was presented as a concept at the Bangkok International Motor Show, accompanied by performance and range claims that, if accurate, will blow the competition out of the water. In addition to the promised range of 720 kilometers, the Tooz is capable of recharging from 20 to 80 percent of the charge in just 20 minutes via a Type 2 charger and reaching a top speed of 200 km/h.
In addition to the technological specifications, the bike fulfills many of the normal requirements of a grand tourer. There’s an extensive 12-inch TFT instrument panel with all the usual navigation and multimedia connectivity, an 8-litre cool box, a 360-degree camera system, tire pressure monitoring, ABS and a six-speaker surround sound system.
At the moment, the Tooz is still a show bike, and the advertised performance and range figures are doing their job, attracting media attention. But can they be accurate? Some back-of-the-envelope calculations suggest it might be an exaggeration. Felo’s official information says that the battery is a 700V, 50Ah unit, with a total capacity of 35kWh. This makes it much bigger than any other unit currently used in a production electric bike – the Energica Experia can muster 22.5kWh and the biggest Zeros have 21kWh when their main batteries and additional Power Tank add-ons are combined – but even so it’s hard to see how it will be able to manage a 700km range. Zero, for example, claims that its SR/S, with the above configuration, can cover 320 kilometers at city speeds. The Felo is clearly bigger and heavier, so even with almost double the battery capacity, it’s hard to see where the 700 km range will come from.
Felo may be a little-known name, but it has experience. The company is based in China, but has a collaboration with Smartech, a Thai company with government funding, and last year presented a range of smaller electric motorcycles that are being offered in export markets, including some European countries.
Their initial range includes the FW-06, equipped with a 6 kW motor and a 69 V, 58 Ah battery, and the FW-03, with a 3 kW motor and a 72 V, 58 Ah battery, and identical styling to the Honda Cub EZ90, manufactured between 1991 and 96. There’s also the Felo M1, which is an updated, electric version of the old Honda Motocompo. With folding handlebars, a top speed of 45 km/h and a price tag of just 1,610 dollars, it is intended as a luggage bike used for the last leg of a journey.