Quick as lightning battery tech gives 135-mile range after 10 minutes of charging

Pioneering battery innovation company Enevate have announced a partnership with Lightning Motorcycles to equip their 150mph Strike Carbon sportsbike with new advanced lithium-ion cells which could revolutionise charge times.

The Californian firm specialises in extreme fast-charge and high-energy density battery technologies for electric vehicles known as XFC-Energy Technology which are aimed at reducing the delay when plugging in and – most importantly – shrinking the gap on refuelling conventional combustion machines.

 As part of the collaboration, Lightning integrated a 24-kWh battery pack with XFC technology into the claimed 118bhp Strike Carbon, resulting in a charge time of less than 10 minutes for an additional 135 miles.

Charging times for similar production electric motorcycles can be between one and four hours which, Enevate claim, makes their XFC cells the fastest charging EV rated Li-ion batteries available.

In addition to fast charging, XFC technology is said to have a higher energy density and longer range compared with existing batteries.

It is also claimed to have the added capability of improved low-temperature operation, lower production costs and safety benefits over existing tech.

Enevate CEO, Robert A. Rango, said: “For the consumer, this means that riders of electric motorcycles with Enevate Technology can now ride all day alongside conventional motorcycles without being left waiting hours at the charger.”

The company’s multi-layer design allows more energy to be safely packed into a single cell and the XFC-Energy silicon-dominant anode requires a fraction of the space of a graphite anode used in a conventional cell.

As a result, Enevate’s large[1]format EV size cells achieve over 850 Wh/L (Watt-hours per litre) and 340 Wh/kg (Watt-hours per kilogramme) energy density without compromising safety or other performance metrics.

In comparison CATL (Contemporary Amperex Technology Co), one of the world’s leading lithium-ion battery producers, announced back in June that its third-generation cell-to-pack (CTP) EV batteries will have a 265 Wh/kg.

The Strike Carbon/Enevate prototype has achieved over 1000 miles of on-road testing while ‘refuelling’ at 350kW public charging stations.

Lightning’s engineering team have been working with Enevate’s scientists and engineers since last year conducting numerous road tests in to order to integrate Enevate’s battery cells into the Strike Carbon prototype machine.

Lightning Motorcycles CEO and Founder, Richard Hatfield, added: “This has been an outstanding partnership with Enevate as together we push the boundaries in e-motorcycle innovation by achieving the fastest motorcycle charging rate reached from a public charger.

“For myself, and everyone at Lightning, building our products and company not only provides us with the opportunity to be part of something bigger and better, it also allows us to contribute to progress in the relentless effort to save our planet.”