Innovation is Hard.

The Lightfighter team endures a hard lesson at AFM Round 4.

Brenden was quickly up to speed in practice on Friday and Saturday, qualifying in P1 for Saturday's Sprint Race.

Our first race with Lightfighter v1 was in the summer of 2019 with few expectations on performance or where that side project for Ely and myself might eventually lead. Fast forward 5 years and we've learned a ton and fought our way forward in the club racing field through the efforts of a small, dedicated team. It would be logical to think that this same passion and dedicated effort will translate to success as we step up to professional racing next season, but we know it'll be the toughest challenge we've faced yet. Our weekend was a reminder that although we've come so far, there are still opportunities to learn.

This past weekend, the Lightfighter team attended AFM’s Round 4 event at Thunderhill Raceway in Willows, CA for what we hoped would be a fun weekend of racing with the current no.1 plate holder in the club, Brenden Ketelsen.  Things got off to a good start on Friday with Brenden nearly matching his previous best lap time of 1:50.0 in only his 3^rd flying lap of practice. 

Lead Race Mechanic, Tucker Swanson, adjusts Brenden's 44X in preparation for Qualifying on Saturday.

The team was focused on suspension set-up all day, trying to get Brenden comfortable with a slightly longer wheelbase that was the result of shorter gearing and a longer chain.  We thought this would be our biggest challenge for the weekend, but how wrong we were…  

When nearly done topping off the battery charge for the first race on Saturday, we heard a loud "pop!" from the top of the bike, where all the 12-volt electronics sit.  We now know that was the sound of our DC-DC converter failing in a hard short and applying over 400 volts to the 12-volt system components, escalating a small failure into a larger one.  First, the small 12-volt lithium-ion starter battery went into thermal runaway and began venting flame and hot gases.  Next, the fusing and wiring for the 12-volt system melted, and finally (and critically) - the fire spread to the main battery pack.  Since we had just finished charging, the main traction battery was holding maximum energy to act as the perfect fuel for the fire.   

We began fighting the small fire in the 12-volt electronics with the E-Fire X extinguisher we had on hand in our safety kit and then turned to a special lithium-ion / EV rated fire blanket when it became clear the fire was spreading.  The fire blanket did its job of containing the fire and damage to just the bike, and luckily no one was injured, and no property damage was done (outside of our beloved bike 005).  

The team has prepared these safety kits and protocols based on FIM requirements and our own experiences. We keep one kit on the wall or with the safety truck and another (at least) in the paddock at the tent. The kit proved its worth this past weekend. Contact us if you'd like us to prepare a kit for you.

The fire was out completely in record time for an EV with the help of the awesome trackside safety crew, but we made the call not to run the back-up bike for the weekend’s events.  We felt we needed more time to feel confident in our root cause and conduct a full retrospective on what went wrong.  We also used up the special fire extinguishers and fire blankets we had in our kits, so we didn’t want to risk running the bike without a full safety kit available to continue our commitment to the race organization and paddock to be prepared at all times.   

Gas motorcycles, including race bikes, catch on fire more frequently than many realize as a natural result of the combustible fuel and high heat generated by a thermic engine.

The promise of an EV powertrain is to be both more efficient AND safer, with statistically fewer incidents of fire.   Our collective challenge as an industry is training, equipment, and preparation when these events do occur.   It’s not OK for us to be on-par with the current leading technology (internal combustion) - we must be significantly better.   

Lightfighter believes strongly in the safety of our motorcycles for racing and track-day enthusiasts and will use this unfortunate event as a way to learn and make further improvements to prevent this from happening in the future.

Everyone was OK. But our beloved Bike 005 was certainly not.

Sometimes innovation requires facing brutal truths and realizing that the hill to climb is even steeper than you imagined.  Last weekend, we were forced to face such a truth and while it means we have more work to do, we remain undeterred.   Thanks to all who continue to provide their support and kind messages. We’re excited to get back on track stronger and safer than ever!    

-Brian, CEO