Just a few months since its first motorcycle, the Redshift, became available to the US market, Alta Motors is set to roll out a new concept model. Inspired by flat track machines, the Street Tracker is conceived as a road-legal battery-powered motorcycle built around the Redshift platform.
Californian startup Alta Motors spent six years setting up a production facility, organizing a dealer network, and developing its first model from the ground up ahead of its market launch in 2016. The Redshift is a lightweight electric off-road motorcycle available in a motocross (MX) and a street-legal supermoto (SM) version.
The American company builds the motorcycle's engine, frame and battery cases in-house, as well as all the electronic gear tasked with controlling the motor's 40 hp (29.8 kW) power and 122 lb-ft (165 Nm) torque output. These are complemented by equipment outsourced from industry leading brands, like WP suspensions and Brembo brakes.
Is there a market for silent motorcycles?
(Score: 1) by butthurt on Sunday April 09 2017, @05:24AM (2 children)
Does the term simply mean a racing track that isn't banked, as a photo gallery on the World Wide Web and an Urban Dictionary entry lead me to believe?
http://www.hotbikeweb.com/super-hooligan-flat-track-race [hotbikeweb.com]
https://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=flat-track [urbandictionary.com]
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday April 09 2017, @07:18AM
That's certainly the etymology, and I think it was originally opposed to racing on banked board tracks [wikipedia.org]; however, as it applies to motorcycle racing today, it indicates a specific class of racing on unbanked dirt tracks, and the bikes (with suspension and brakes) used for it; other motorcycle races, such as speedway (with no brakes and no suspension), are not called flat-track, even though they're also run on unbanked dirt tracks. (In general, flat-track is a US thing and speedway is a Europe/Australia thing, so it's maybe not as confusing as it sounds.)
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday April 09 2017, @11:06AM
I think that "flat track" refers to flat dirt tracks - no pavement. Let me check on that . . .
http://www.americanflattrack.com/news/view/ama-pro-racing-announces-2017-american-flat-track-schedule [americanflattrack.com]
Image at the top of the page suggests that I'm right, but let me dig a little further . . .
http://www.indianmotorcycle.com/en-us/flat-track-race [indianmotorcycle.com]
Scroll down the page a little for a very early flat track racing image - those crazy bastids didn't have the brakes we have today, or any other safety gear.
This is the link you want: http://www.americanflattrack.com/news/view/motogp-world-champion-valentino-rossi-hosts-american-flat-track-stars-brad-baker-and-sammy-halbert-for-a-flat-track-training-day-at-rossis-ranch [americanflattrack.com]