Despite the indefinite postponement of the TT Zero, students at the University of Warwick are ploughing on with their plans to build ?Frontier?, an electric race bike, with help from Norton Motorcycles. The machine they?re working on is said to produce 160kW, equivalent to about 201bhp, and a tarmac-tearing 400Nm of torque. Fair play, Warwick Uni, if that?s true, it?s going to be one hell of a thing!

But let?s just hold the phone for a second, shall we" Because it?s alright being able to make all that power, but how long can it make it for" Well by my reckoning, with its 16kWh immersion-cooled battery pack, that?s about six minutes. You won?t get very far in six minutes, even with 200bhp. You certainly won?t get all the way around the IOM TT course. I know that?s minor details at this point, and I?m sure they can dial the power down to give the machine the longevity it needs. I?m simply pointing out that we needn?t get all excited about a 200bhp electric bike. Not yet.
The team of thirteen students at the University of Warwick is made up of first to final-year degree students. Helping them achieve the Frontier dream is a selection of leading academics, engineers and researchers, as well as designers and engineers from Norton Motorcycles.

But Norton?s involvement doesn?t stop there. The team have been gifted a ?high performance motorcycle frame? from the good people at Norton. That came after having started the build around a Fireblade frame.

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