SQUARE WAVE RACING
 

John Wild, special motorcycle builder and vintage motorcycle racer, met Sean Ewing, electrical engineer, aircraft mechanic, and entrepreneur, in February of 2010.  A partnership was quickly formed and in only 13 weeks their first race bike made the journey from Columbus, Ohio to Sonoma, California for the first North American TTXGP electric motorcycle race.

Placing 7th in our first race was a major victory.  Square Wave Racing's bike, the SWR1, was the only bike to finish every practice session and the race, all our competitors having electrical or mechanical failures.

August 4th, 2010

The 2nd and 3rd races are over.

We have learned so much, but still have so much to learn.
Thanks to the feedback from Scotty Ryan, our “hired gun” for Road America, and Steve Belknap, at Mosport, we are improving our machine and discovering the limitations that  were designed in.  Square Wave Racing remains the only team to have finished all practice sessions and races.  Sean Ewing’s original design has proven to be robust and reliable.  That it is not the fastest bike on the grid is easily explained—the bike was originally designed to be a sporty street bike!  The SWR1 has never discharged its batteries more than 50% in a race.  This would give it range of over 50 miles at speeds in excess of 80 MPH.  It is easy to believe that a range exceeding 80 miles is attainable at legal road speeds.  Unfortunately for us the TTXGP rule book states that races will be the nearest lap to 25 miles.  The SWR1 is carrying a lot of extra capacity which adds weight, slowing acceleration and consuming power. 

We have finished the last 2 two races in 7th  and 5th place.

Scotty Ryan, being a highly experienced and naturally gifted rider, quickly reached the limitations of our bike and rode laps within one second of each other the entire weekend.  As the co-owner of Trackside Suspension and Engineering, the first thing Scotty did was set up the suspension correctly.  It was an improvement that could be immediately felt, even when merely riding the bike around the paddock.  In the searing Midwestern heat or on a wet track he rode the SWR1 as fast as it would go, but we were unable to keep pace with the faster teams in attendance.

We made extensive revisions to the machine for the Mosport round including adding cells to our battery and removing the continuously variable transmission (CVT).  The cells were added to increase the voltage of our pack which would increase top speed.  The CVT was removed because it has proven to be fragile under race conditions and we believed that its frictional losses were greater than the acceleration advantage it provided.  The results on track suggest that the CVT actually was an advantage.  The added voltage did improve our top speed but the fixed gearing slowed acceleration.  Unfortunately, there is no room for both the added cells and the CVT, so the CVT will not be reinstalled.

Steve Belknap rode the bike with all the skill a team could ask for.  Every lap he rode was faster than the last.  His fastest lap of the entire weekend was the last lap of the race! Regrettably, the bike was still a long way from the race winning pace.

Now we are preparing for the last race of the season.

Overheating has been a serious problem for us and the other teams using motors similar to ours.  The focus of improvements between Mosport and VIR has been to manage the heat produced by the motor.  Heat sinks have been clamped on and fans added.  Hopefully we will be able to turn up the power and not cook the powerplant.

Stay tuned for updates during the race weekend, August 12th through 15th.