This Electric Motorcycle Can Replace Your Gas Bike!
This is my clapped out piece of DRZ 400 SM that I put S rims on so that I could go play in the dirt. This is Zeros XE, their brand new all electric dirt bike. And the question I want to answer today is, could I get away with replacing my DRZ here with this electric dirt bike? Down we go. This right here is a motorcycle that I have been interested in ever since I first saw it at AIM in Las Vegas in like February of this year. I have been dying to get out and rip this thing in the dirt and see what it’s all about because I think this segment right here has largely been ignored by a lot of the bigger manufacturers. And we’ve seen a ton of Siron and Suron clones step into a place where we really could have benefited from having Livewire, Zero, Energ, or somebody step in and show them how it’s done. I have a Siron clone and it’s fun, but the suspension is not motorcycle hardware. The brakes are not motorcycle hardware. And as somebody who wants to ride it a little bit harder, it’s not there for me. That’s where a bike like the XE steps in because this thing is basically an electric CRF 250F. The XE is making roughly 20 horsepower and 468 foot-lbs of torque. And no, I did not read that number wrong. That is more than my fullton E350 van. We’re going to have to talk about all that torque a little bit later on. The bike weighs in at 223 lb, can go 65 mi on a single charge at 31 m an hour, your mileage will vary. But contrary to the claimed numbers for most electric street bikes, I wouldn’t be surprised that if on average you got more out of a charge than that because most off-road riders aren’t averaging 31 mph on single track. It takes a few hours to charge, but you can swap the batteries, which is the first time we’ve seen this on a bike from a major manufacturer. It’s got a bunch of rider modes, reverse, park mode, and while there aren’t any indicators or brake lights on the bike, there is a 17digit VIN and a blinker switch, so maybe we’ll see a street legal kit coming soon. The XE costs $64.95 in pre-tariff dollars, but at the end of November, the price is going up almost a,000 bucks. But wait, I thought they said the tariffs weren’t going to increase prices. I don’t feel like I really have to introduce the DRZ, but I’m going to anyway. The DRZ has been puttering around the world since the late Cretaceous. It’s packing a 398cc single cylinder, putting down 40 horsepower and 29 ft-lbs of torque while weighing in at 321 lb. It’s got a five-speed transmission, a carburetor, and in my bike’s case, it has fully adjustable upside down forks. Yeah, mine is an SM, but at the end of the day, the street suspension works pretty well in the dirt. It’s ancient, it has no tech, and used DRZs are dirt cheap. It’s hard to get an average, but mine cost me like a,000 bucks, and that’s part of the reason why people love it. But before we can ride the old Steed, we need to check out how the XE feels first. All righty, so we are heading out on the XE. Uh, this would be my choice if I was uh if I was looking at purchasing one of these bikes, which spoiler alert for a little bit later, yes, I am. Um, this would be the bike that I would want to get because this just seems like basically an electric CRF250F. It’s got a little bit more range. It’s got a little bit more punch. Uh, quite literally double the punch. And it just it has more motorcycle feeling hardware versus the XB which uh feels pretty suresque. That’s one of the best things about this bike right there is just the instant torque no matter where you are speedwise. I could deal with this bike being uh a little bit bigger just because I’m a bigger human being. wee. Just paddle my way through the sand. But in my experience on the CRF250F, there are ways to make a little bike feel a little bit more substantial. Obviously, you’re going to want to put on some uh now you’re going to want to put on some risers and stuff. Get some different foot pegs and all that. And because this sort of segment has really been on fire lately, there’s a lot of options out there already, which is really nice. It means that Zero’s entering a segment that already has some aftermarket support. And not just that, they’re entering a segment that has aftermarket support and desire. you know, they’ve got riders who have been testing these bikes out and uh trying to do all sorts of fun shenanigans with them. The best thing I can say about a bike like this is how quickly it changes directions as well as how immediate the power is. Right? So the second you need a little bit, it’s there for you to the point where it’s uh it’s actually really a challenge in some cases to keep the front wheel down. riding one of these. The the I was out here last year actually on my uh I forget the name of it, but basically my Suron. Um and uh the the thing that I learned doing actual trail riding on a bike like this is that it’s as close to cheating as you’re going to get. I will say the suspension does feel a smidgen harsh going over like the the rocky stuff. This is the last little ascent up to uh decision point and it’s basically just this little rock garden and I dropped it down into eco mode cuz it actually keeps the tire from lighting up which is pretty nice actually. Um, I find especially in standard over this sort of like smooth rock. Um, it does end up getting a little uh quick to break loose. Here we is. We made it in one piece. That’s the Buchanan Dam, I think. Um, I’m going to take some B-roll and the next cut in the show is us going back to the DRZ to see what I’m missing. All right. So, as you can hear, we’re now out on the DRZ. And the first thing I’m going to notice about this bike versus the XE that I was riding around is this thing is a full-size motorcycle. Like, there’s no close to approximation almost. This is just a motorcycle. And so in that sense, it handles a lot more in that in that vein that you’d expect. I also have much more aggressive knobbies on this bike. I’ve got uh Moto’s Tractionator Rous Z’s, which are the gnarliest tire I could put on at the time I set this bike up. Having the full size of this motorcycle really does work for a bigger guy like me, so it would take some getting used to switching permanently over to something like the XE. That said, the power isn’t as immediate and it’s a little bit lazier on this bike. You know, it it makes power like you’d expect from a standard dirt bike, right? a little bit a little bit lazier or well maybe not dirt bike but dual sport little lazier a little bit more predictable I think and in that sense like the size of the motorcycle it does help keep this thing ridable oh sometimes I forget how good of a motorcycle the DRZ actually is Now we’re going to get into the single track stuff. And this is where I anticipate the DRZ having some issues because I’ve been managing the clutch on this bike for a while. Um, it’s been it’s been a project and it’s still not quite right. And so digging in to the power and like riding the clutch and stuff and so going over some stuff and working the clutch, it’s it’s a failure point on this motorcycle, right? Whereas it’s and it’s one more thing you got to worry about on the uh XE. All you’re thinking about is where you’re going and what’s going on at your right hand. And there’s no stalling an electric bike. How many times have you gone up a climb on, you know, one of your dual sports or ADV bikes that you know you can make it up? You just know you can make it up cuz you’ve done it a hundred times before, but this one time you accidentally do something a little different. You take it a little slower. you’re d, you know, the bike dies halfway through and you drop it. If I had a nickel for every time I did that, I’d at least have a handful of nickels. I will say though, too, switching back to this bike, especially going through here, it’s heavy. You wouldn’t think 300 and I normally wouldn’t think 317 pounds is particularly heavy because it’s not in the world of motorcycles, but off-road, yeah, I’m working. There are definitely pros and cons to each one of these bikes, man. And I actually think that’s a great opportunity for me to pull both these things over and talk about what I really like about the XE and what I miss on it when I come back to the DRZ. And more importantly, do I see a world where I can replace my DRZ with that XE? Now, obviously, both of these motorcycles are in what I would consider completely different categories when you’re looking in terms of size and displacement, right? This is a full-size dual sport. This is a lot closer to something like Honda’s CRF250F. However, I have a ton of experience on the 250F, and I have had some of my best adventures on the back of one, so downsizing really isn’t a problem for me. The biggest issue I have switching between these two bikes is I miss the size of the DRZ. This is a fullsize motorcycle and you can get one of these XES to feel bigger. They have one of these that’s been speced out with upgraded suspension that’s a lot beefier for somebody my size and an upgraded handlebar mount which makes it just a little bit roomier. Doing that makes this thing fit so much nicer and then I start to miss the DRZ a little bit less. One thing that I think I will always miss is being able to drag the clutch going downhill. Yeah, I have the rear brake on the handlebar and it works in much the same way, but there’s something about just using the clutch to come down a hill that I’ve gotten very used to. Also, you’re coming down a hill in second gear. On a bike like this, you can just jam it down into first gear. You don’t even need to use a clutch quite frankly and it just it helps the bike settle down going over some of the gnarlier bumps out here. One thing that I’ve seen on some other electric bikes that I think would really help the XE out here is having a thumb toggle that basically activates regen. I think you do that and this bike would behave a lot more like a traditional IC dirt bike. However, it is worth pointing out that I only have a afternoon worth of riding experience on the XE. It’s entirely possible that I could get used to the way that this is laid out and love it more than this bike. And this is where I really want to get to the yes or no on can I theoretically switch out from my DRZ to this XE. And that’s really going to come down to your use case. Right here in Texas, we don’t have big vast open trails to go ride. It’s really hard to find a spot where you can go 60 miles in one direction on a dirt road. Instead, we have mostly off-road parks where you go park your bike and then you go do loops throughout some rich guy’s ranch out in the hills, which is kind of basically what we’re doing right now. In a situation like that, I’m already putting the DRZ in my truck because I can carry my cooler. I can carry my gear. I can carry a change of clothes for when I’m done with the day. It’s easier for me to go ride off-road out of the back of my van, and that’s where this is perfect. It’s easier to load up. It’s got the reverse, so you can back it down a ramp if you need to. But most importantly, having only 60 mi worth of range doesn’t matter in a situation like that. Not to mention, you’ve got the swappable battery. So, if for some reason you run this battery flat and you’re not tired enough to call it a day, you can just put a new one in there. Another benefit for my use case is I don’t get to ride off-road all that often. So, this thing ends up sort of sitting around. Sure, I’ve got super moto rims and I do take it out every now and again, but I’m at the end of a longass tollway and I don’t want to sit on a single cylinder for 15 miles just buzzing down the freeway. I’ll take one of my bigger motorcycles that and this is carbureted. If I let it sit for too long, I got to clean the carburetor. I got to replace the gas. It’s a giant pain in the butt. In terms of maintenance alone, the XE makes so much more sense. And that’s why I’m so happy to see a company like Zero step into this market segment because they’re bringing actual OEM support to a place where usually you’re just buying it online and crossing your fingers that the quality control is there. Yes, this motorcycle does come at a premium to your average Suron, but it’s also bigger and better than your average Suron. So, at the end of this video here, I am considering getting rid of the DRZ and replacing it with the XE. So yeah, if you’re interested in a super moto with dirt rims, let me
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The biggest complaint about electric motorcycles is that they’re too expensive and they don’t have the range of a gas bike. But what if you could solve for both of those issues? That’s what the Zero XE claims to do for offroad riders, and it begs the question, could this electric dirt bike replace your gas bike?
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00:00 – Intro
00:45 – Zero XE Specs
02:42 – DRZ400 Specs
03:25 – Zero XE Test Ride
07:06 – DRZ Test Ride
11:15 – XE Flaws
13:05 – Gas Or Electric?
