Fonzarelli NKD electric motorbike unveiled, with eye to manufacturing in S.A.

The Driven

Sydney-based electric motorbike maker Fonzarelli has unveiled its first full electric motorbike with mid-drive motor while it looks to South Australia, the former home of Australian vehicle manufacturing.

As Fonzarelli’s fourth electric vehicle, the NKD breaks the mold for the 10-year-old company which made its mark with moped-style scooters designed for city traffic.

The new NKD model, which has the most range so far of Fonzarelli’s offerings at 120km, sports an efficient mid-drive motor delivering a feisty 9.6kW of power and 56Nm of torque at 6000RPM and has a top speed of 100km/hr.

The dual announcement, made by Fonzarelli in Adelaide on Thursday, has founder Michelle Nazzari who is in talks with potential manufacturers pumped.

Working with Adelaide local Simon Modra, a motorcycle enthusiast and Future Submarine design researcher at the University of South Australia among other things, the two are in discussion with a number of promising manufacturers.

“There are partners here we are very interested to work with,” Nazzari tells The Driven. “At this stage we will keep [manufacturing] in Sydney so we can start getting some bikes out, but hopefully by end of year we will have full scale production down here in SA.”

The NKD, one of the bikes Nazzari intends to manufacturer in South Australia differs from Fonzarelli’s previous vehicles.

Far from ruining the weekend, Nazzari says that you can “chuck it on the back of the 4WD”.

To read the full version of this story on RenewEconomy’s electric vehicle dedicated site, The Driven, click here…