Well, no. We’re not at the cusp of cutting edge technology that would let us charge an electric vehicle battery to 100 percent. But leave it to the engineers to work around the problem and so, we now have portable batteries – charge them up at your apartment on the 10th floor or replace it with a fully charged one at a battery swapping station. This is the model Bounce are relying on. The company, in fact, has been using swappable batteries on its ride-sharing fleet for sometime now and are convinced that the model will work for personally bought scooters as well.
The Bounce Infinity e1 electric scooter is the same we saw at the 2018 Auto Expo under the Twenty Two Motors and Kymco collaboration. It makes use of swappable battery tech that Bounce have been working on and the scooter has been tested some one lakh kilometres. The company currently has 200 battery swapping stations in the city of Bengaluru and aims to set up one station per 1-2 km in the cities it will be operating in.
Dimensions and colours
The scooter has very friendly dimensions with only 780 mm of seat height, plus it feels very lightweight to move around as well. It gets four colours, along with graphic customisation options. The fit and finish on the product are satisfactory and it has a smooth mechanism to access to the under seat storage. The scooter is covered under a 3 year/40,000 km warranty.
Battery and power and range
The Infinity e1 is powered by a 2 kWh portable battery pack and the hub motor puts out a peak power output of 2.2 kw. It’ll do a top speed of 40 km/h in Eco mode and 65 km/h in Power mode. These speeds are ample for moving about within city limits, however, it could feel a little lazy getting up to speed. For example, getting out of a situation like making a quick U-turn is currently close to perilous.
Bounce claim a range of 60 km in Eco mode and about 50 km in Power mode. In the real world, the scooter will use a mix of both modes and the range could be roughly in the ballpark of 55-60 km (depending upon usage). But here’s the good part. To get to a full charge, Bounce say that all a customer needs to do is ride to a nearby battery swapping station and replace the drained battery unit with a fully charged one at swap charges as low as Rs 35.
The process to swap the battery pack is fairly simple and would take no longer than a minute. The battery pack is portable and hence can also be charged at home (which would take about 5.5 hours to full charge).
Features and equipment
The scooter gets disc brakes at both ends, assisted by combined braking system. The braking, to say the least, is appropriate for such speeds. It would, however, help make the scooter more comfortable if the suspension setup was a little more plush. The seat, on the other hand, is wide and well-cushioned.
Besides the Eco and Power mode, the Infinity e1 gets Drag Mode and Reverse Mode. In the Drag mode, the scooter can roll at a speed of 3 km/h so the user can walk beside it in case of a flat tyre. The Reverse mode lets the user simply twist the throttle to reverse the scooter. While the two are good to have and may be helpful to some, they don’t seem to be too necessary.
Pricing
The company offers two methods to own a Bounce Infinity e1 electric scooter. A customer can purchase it with the battery at Rs 68,999. Under this model, they will only be able to charge at home or public charging stations.
Alternatively, the scooter can be bought without the battery at Rs 56,999 plus a monthly battery subscription at Rs 849. To bring the initial purchase cost down furthermore, a customer could also opt for a larger subscription pack of about Rs 1,200. (All prices ex-showroom, Delhi)
To sum it up..
..the Infinity e1 holds a promise to solve EV adoption for the mid-speed electric scooter segment. If the battery swapping model works efficiently, the effective swap cost per km (claimed) would be Rs 0.65. For now, the Infinity e1 has its fair share of problems, however, it could be the first step towards a battery swapping model that could help convert two-wheeler purchase decisions in this segment to be all electric ones.
