Suspension update after 7 years

Time sure does fly by, it was nearly 7 years ago when I bought my Honda Africa Twin and a month ago it because obvious I needed new fork springs and a new shock spring.

The AT is in the shop at the moment and “should” be done in a few weeks.

I’m really looking forward to an improvement from the OEM springs and will write an update once it’s back home.

License Plate Renewal Breakdown

I don’t mind paying my fair share to help with infrastructure, etc., but as an EV owner and now an electric motorcycle owner I was surprised to see similar fees applied to my Metacycle that are applied to my electric car.

The two concerning vehicle weight I can understand for an EV since I pay the same fee for my truck (F150) as I do for my EV car. However, my little motorcycle seems like it should not fit that criteria since it’s the size of a 500cc motorcycle and weights half what my 1000cc Honda Africa Twin weighs.

Just weird/odd, not complaining. I fully support taxation when it makes sense…schools, helping the needy get back on their feet, public transportation, infrastructure, etc.. Not these endless wars we have been either participating in directly or the many proxy wars we have going on.

Metacycle Update – April 2023

The Metacycle continues to put a smile on my face. Over the past two days I’ve ridden it around on errands and just for fun with today’s ride being around 2 hours. The Corbin seat is very comfortable and makes riding so much better.

Today I rode to breakfast at “Hidden Bagel” on South Hill here in Spokane, then headed northwest for about 30-40 minutes. Speeds ranged from 30mph to over 60mph

I should have fully charged the bike after my rides yesterday, but didn’t so I had a little range anxiety today, but got home with miles to spare.

The new mirrors were easy to install and look so much better than the stock mirrors. I do lose a little visibility directly behind me, but it’s the blind spots where I’m mostly concerned and they cover that.

So far so good with the Metacycle

With us experiencing more days of winter than spring rides have been few and far between. I have been out on the Metacycle five times so far with the longest ride being around 20 miles.

I had only charged the motorcycle once after delivery to see how many rides I could go on before I needed a change.

I’ve run errands a few times with distances between 3 and 12 miles and if I add up the mileage total so far it would be around 55-60 miles. I suppose I could go look at the total distance, but that would mean walking to the garage and I don’t feel like doing that right now. 🙂

Anyway… the stock seat is superbly uncomfortable so I ordered a new one from Corbin and it’s amazingly good!

New Corbin seat on the left in comparison to the stock on the right.
The new seat is a little taller, but not enough to matter.

The last ride I went on was about 20 miles and the seat was so comfortable! On the old seat I would begin to feel uncomfortable a few miles in.

I got the Metacycle up to 68mph so far and that was going up a slight incline. I truly love the silence while riding this machine, it makes everything around me seem closer and not separated by engine/exhaust noise.

A great place to stop for a picture.

The bike is now down to 3 bars so I would suspect running errands would be fine, but I may charge it up again in case I feel like going on a longer ride around town.

Metacycle has finally arrived!

After almost two years of waiting, the call came in from the shipper to schedule a delivery day and time. I was giddy with excitement and was not quite sure what to expect of this electric motorcycle

Unloading my Metacycle from the truck.

Of course I took it for a quick ride and was immediately impressed with its silence and quick acceleration. It’s certainly no sport bike, but it gets going quickly enough.

Photo opportunity along High Drive

It’s now charged up, but the weather turned a bit cold so it’s now parked next to my 2017 Honda Africa Twin.

Parked next to its big brother and ready for some warmer weather!

I’m so happy that this long saga has ended and this bike is here.

Gave up on Ford

I ended up cancelling my Ford Lightning order because Ford continues to raise their prices and the non-Tesla network needs massive improvement compared to the super charger network by Tesla.

I did purchase a 2023 Model Y Long Range dual motor and love it. Musk is a lunatic, but Tesla makes a great car and their charging network actually works well. I’ve only used the home charger so far and compared to my F150 it’s a hell of a lot less expensive to drive.

Supermassive color of Metacycle shipping?

A recent photo on the Sondors Metacycle portal shows the black (or supermassive) version being assembled for delivery so what does that mean to us folks who ordered one? Not much I’m sure, there have been no shipping updates and my questions to Sondors get met with a form letter. Only 2,000 to ship and they can’t seem to communicate effectively to their customers. Becoming more and more disappointed in their rollout.

I understand the delays caused by the pandemic, shipping, chips, etc., but when you don’t communicate often enough people start to imagine the bad, not the good. There are many people who just troll the company (and likely don’t even have an order in), but there are also many of us who have an order, are in the first round, and just want more information on where OUR Metacycle is within the production and delivery lifecycle.

A photo from the Sondors Metacycle portal showing bikes ready to ship.

I’ve written twice to try and get some sort of status and the same auto response from “Rigo”. The first one seemed legitimate, but when you get the exact same content on the second request you know they are not applying themselves to fully supporting this product or their customers. I feel like this was a bad way to spend almost $6K. Oh well.

Update on the Metacycle – Delivering

Bit of excitement today when I checked the progress of my Metacycle order.

Check out the message:

Pretty exciting for all of us who have been waiting for a very long time to get our Metacycle.

I still haven’t received a phone call or email about scheduling a delivery, but hopefully that will be coming “soon”. Soon is a very fluid term with this process and I hope that the Metacycle is at least a usable in-town transportation method. Would be a shame to have waited this long and realize that my hard earned money went into something poorly constructed.

Must maintain a positive attitude… 🙂