Bikes & Cars...

Motorcycles and scooters always get better gas mileage than their four-wheeled counterparts, but that hasn’t stopped alternative-fuel innovations for two-wheelers. In honor of the approach of bike weather, here’s a few of the latest green upgrades.

First, the Gray Eagles have converted a Harley-Davidson V-Twin engine to run on diesel gasoline. This proves it can be done, and the group says Harley itself is on its list of potential customers. But don’t try this at home: the Gray Eagles are a group of retired H-D engineers, so they know what they’re doing. Mostly. They added a turbo charger and fuel injection, and they say a production version could do 100 mph and get 80 mpg – a big improvement when diesel prices are hovering at a national average of $3.82 today.

In other diesel bike news, the New York Times recently test drove the Marines’ custom-built Kawasaki KLR650. Built by Hayes Diversified Technologies, the bike is known by its catchy military name, the HDT103M1. According to writer Dexter Ford’s article, the bike is loud, shaky, and slow on the uptake, which sounds a lot like a diesel Volkswagen bus, but without the hippies. The people at Hayes say the bike will get 96 mpg at a steady highway speed of 55 mph, which is enough to make a civilian hanker for a matte-green, all-terrain bike with a camo seat cover. Almost.

Race tracks have a history of inspiring people to push their vehicles to go faster, and electric motorcycles are no exception. A bike named “Tron” and built by ThunderStruck Motors shaved a second and a half off the record 1/8-mile time in its class in February, then did nearly 105 mph in the quarter mile a couple weeks later. The bike only weighs a little over 50 pounds without its rider, Michael Swallow, but it’s got 93 volts of new lithium-ion batteries on board, courtesy of Lithium Technology Corporation.

And don’t forget the trusty old 50-cc scooter, which will turn in 80 mpg any day of the week in two- or four-stroke form and are available just about everywhere these days. There are even quiet EV versions from the likes of Zap, in case you want to be extra smug as you whizz by the gas station yet again.

Photo from electricmotorcycles.net

For more information, check out:

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