The Swedish Electric Invasion Begins
Get ready for a shocking new bike from Swedish company Cake. Okay, it’s not really all that shocking, but it is a fully electric motorcycle. Cake announced a street legal motorcycle that it will sell in Europe and the U.S. The bike is based on the Kalk OR, which is the company’s first bike. That motorcycle is a lightweight off-road bike, and now the street-legal version comes ready for pavement.
The new motorcycle gets lights (including tiny turn signals), license plate holder, and mirror mounts. As electrek points out those are important steps towards getting the bikes DOT and ECE certified for street use. The price and technical specifications for the Kalk& are still unknown. Cake said the bike would be available in March but didn’t list the other info.
What Do We Know?
With that said, the technical specs should be more or less the same to the off-road bike. That means it should have a battery that’s a 51.8V and 50 Ah Li-ion unit rated at 2.6 kWh. Powering the bike is a 15 kW motor. New Atlas and electrek both report new gearing for the street legal bike, meaning it can hit 100 km/h or 62 mph as its top speed.
The range for the motorcycle is also unknown at this time. However, with the higher top speed, it’s unlikely that it will be super far. The faster you go, the more battery juice you use. The off-road bike can only travel up to 80 km per charge (just under 50 miles). That number simply isn’t enough for most people, though it could work for some urban commuters.
I actually like the look of the Kalk&. It reminds me of a wimpy version of the bike Tom Cruise rode in that weird sci-fi movie Oblivion. With that said, Cake has to up the range if it wants to sell these things. The low top speed of 60 mph isn’t a dealbreaker for me, but the likely 50 miles of range would be my reason for not buying one.
The low range is even more of an issue when you consider that the bike is bound to be expensive for what it is. The off-road version costs $13,000, and the street-legal version will probably be more. I’d rather wait for Lightning Motorcycle’s Strike. It’s supposed to do 150 miles per charge and cost the same.
No thanks. Looks like a brick with wheels.