The range and charging leave a lot to be desired for many applications, but the bikes themselves seem to be quite nice.

My concern is that finding chargers will be even more difficult than it already is since I don’t think there is any DC charging support. So none of the side-of-the-highway EV charging stations will work, and you’ll specifically have to seek out a level 2 charger next to a coffee shop or something. Just makes any travel longer than the ~130 km range even more hopeless.

If I didn’t already commute everywhere locally by bike, I would definitely consider something like this though.

Definitely agree on the recycling. Carbon fibre is a whole can of worms there.

In general, agree with your explanation here, but would disagree on the repairability point. Lots of carbon repair shops will repair carbon parts. Often just needs paint sanded off and additional carbon bonded on. Generally doesn’t bend and deform like metal parts, so the cracked bit can just be cut out and reinforced.

On the other hand the aluminum alloys a lot of car parts and bikes are being made of end up quite difficult to weld and re-heat-treat in practice, so no easier than carbon.

In the PinkBike video, they mentioned that the full-face helmets didn’t perform as well in at least the rotational impact tests due to their higher mass and moment of angular momentum.

I think it always ends up being a bit of a trade-off, depending on the types of riding and impacts expected. In a low-speed impact to the side of the head a regular bicycle helmet will often do better than a big heavy motorcycle one. Obviously the opposite is true for a motorcycle crash at 80 km/h.

Run energy changes sound like a good idea. IIRC this is already similar to how RS3 does it; Iwonder when it changed there. Though weight feels like it has no impact in RS3, so that’s probably a good way to balance it.

I’m not sure I see this one to be honest. As bad as a car-dense city is for everything else, it’s probably the best option if the whole city had to be evacuated.

A large portion of alternate transport is focused within the city (trams, bikes, subways, etc). I suppose at least busses could be re-purposed for evacuation, but it requires a whole lot more organization.

Furor might be too, sibling.

Lol

I think this is the correct link for the SpaceX official feed on X/Twitter: https://twitter.com/i/broadcasts/1LyxBnOvzvOxN

Looks like it’s scheduled to start at 6:56 CDT now that launch is targeting 7:30 AM CDT.

Looks like some sort of fuelling is underway. Or at least chilling lines in the OLM and tower in preparation for filling.

Countdown and Flight Test Timeline (from SpaceX Site)

Countdown All times approximate Hr/Min/Sec Event

• 01:15:00 SpaceX Flight Director conducts poll and verifies GO for propellant load
• 00:53:00 Ship LOX (liquid oxygen) load underway
• 00:51:00 Ship fuel (liquid methane) load underway
• 00:42:00 Booster LOX load underway
• 00:41:00 Booster fuel load underway
• 00:19:40 Raptor begins engine chill on booster and ship
• 00:03:30 Booster propellant load complete
• 00:02:50 Ship propellant load complete
• 00:00:30 SpaceX flight director verifies GO for launch
• 00:00:10 Flame deflector activation
• 00:00:03 Raptor ignition sequence begins
• 00:00:00 Excitement guaranteed

Flight Test Timeline All times are approximate Hr/Min/Sec Event

• 00:00:02 Liftoff
• 00:00:52 Max Q (moment of peak mechanical stress on the rocket)
• 00:02:42 Booster MECO (most engines cut off)
• 00:02:44 Hot-staging (Starship Raptor ignition and stage separation)
• 00:02:55 Booster boostback burn startup
• 00:03:50 Booster boostback burn shutdown
• 00:06:36 Booster is transonic
• 00:06:46 Booster landing burn startup
• 00:07:04 Booster landing burn shutdown
• 00:08:35 Starship engine cutoff
• 00:11:56 Payload door open
• 00:24:31 Propellant transfer demo
• 00:28:21 Payload door close
• 00:40:46 Raptor in-space relight demo
• 00:49:05 Starship entry
• 01:02:16 Starship is transonic
• 01:03:04 Starship is subsonic
• 01:04:39 An exciting landing!

Blackjack and hooters?