My buddy just brought one home for testing. There were a handful of them at the dream cruise, but I haven’t had a chance to see it up close. Looks like a lot of fun for $20k, thoughts?
The 2.4-liter GM Ecotec four sits up front, channeling 173 horsepower and 166 pound-feet of torque through a five-speed manual transmission and carbon-reinforced drive belt to the solitary rear wheels.
weighing just 1,700 pounds, Measuring less than 150 inches tall by 77.6 inches wide and 51.9 inches tall, and riding on a 105-inch wheelbase with a 69-inch front track and sitting just 5 inches off the ground, With 11.8-inch vented disc brakes at each of its three corners
Speaking of T-Rex, I wonder how / if they’ve worked out how to stop the rear wheel bearing on this from wearing prematurely since it gets so much force put onto it when turning. I know @LAFENGAS had to replace the T-Rex hub / bearing several times.
Bob Weaver is getting in 3 in october, 1 is spoken for. 1 of the owners of my company most likely is getting the 2nd one. We went in last week and talked about it.
If they gave it another rear wheel, i believe it falls out of class for insurance/registration and you could not have bike/rv/atv shops inspect/sell/repair them.
I was thinking about how to accomplish that. The mechanical aspect would be fairly straight forward but integrating the braking and stability control would pose problems. So much cheaper than an atom and having two wheels out back would help the styling tremendously. Plus there’s no sense in boosting that motor until you can actually put the power down.
…and reinforce the structure so it could pass front and side crash tests, have airbags, a proper wind screen and wipers, a multi link rear suspension that not only controlled vertical movement but also camber an toe… and still keep it under 1,700 lbs right?
It’s fine as a “motorcycle”, and I’d love to beat on one. But at $24k fully loaded I’d rather get a Miata that can be driven for 3 seasons rain or shine. And for a transportation I’d rather have an Elio for $7k.
The biggest flaw with this Slingshot is that it doesn’t have a special engine. Internets says Polaris snowmobile 800cc 2cyl are rated around 150 hp and can hit ~8,500-8,700 rpm, so a 1600cc 4cyl at 300 hp would be special, and I’d guess would be lighter than the Ecotech. Cooling though?
I’d be curios to see how it would perform with “just” a 800 cc, CVT, and sub 1,500 pounds.
6 years later, still a lame semi-motorcycle for people that are too scared to ride a motorcycle but are getting barely any better crash protection. Basically the, “My wife wouldn’t let me get a motorcycle so I convinced her this was safer” crowd.
