Crank the throttle. Fire up the engine. Motorsports maker Polaris Industries Inc., known for its snowmobiles and ATVs, this fall will debut a line of electric bikes.
The company, based in Minnesota, has serious muscle in the realm of motorized trail transportation. It cites annual sales of $2.7billion, which is more cash than any bike company, let alone the niche products and brands that currently dominate in the e-bike category.
Indeed, Polaris is staking a serious claim with e-bikes, a category still getting its legs under it in this country. The company has a new division, Polaris Electric Bikes.
Cites a press release, “The Polaris brand entering the electric bicycle category is a major move toward making electric bicycles a viable mainstream recreational option in the U.S.”
What makes these pedal-assist bikes different? Polaris touts a special motor and transmission that balances speed on flats with a high-torque mode that kicks in automatically on hills.
They have a throttle on the handlebar like a motorcycle. Or you can turn on a pedal-assist mode, which gives a boost to each turn of the cranks.
The bikes have regenerative braking, meaning they capture energy produced while braking and add power to the battery pack.
A dashboard on the bikes gives speed, distance, odometer, battery range, and a carbon footprint meter.
The guts may differ from some current e-bikes. But it looks like Polaris has not departed far from the current “cruiser-style” aesthetic embraced by many e-bike makers.
