Before...

This image shows my donor bike for the electric motorcycle project. It is a 1993 Kawasaki Ninja EX250. This bike is a common choice for electric conversions because of its extensive body fairings. These fairings will cover all internal workings (batteries, motor, controller, wiring, etc) and maintain the original look of the motorcycle.

I also chose this motorcycle over my Vespa for a number of reasons. The Vespa has smaller wheels and drum brakes, which make for unstable high speed travel and longer stopping distance. The Vespa also had its motor, controller and transmission housed in the swing arm, which created a lot of unsprung weight. Lastly, the Vespa frame was prohibitively small and had reached its limit in terms of battery storage capacity. Even with 12 smaller batteries distributed throughout the frame, the Vespa only carried 30Ahr of juice. With the Ninja upgrade, that number will increase to 68Ahr, effectively doubling the range of my EV.