Chimera Begins Production of the Lightest, Fastest, and Most Powerful Electric BMX on the Market

    LOS ANGELES, CA, October 08, 2022 /24-7PressRelease/ -- Following up on their successful Indiegogo campaign, Chimera BMX announces today that they have begun producing the framesets and motors for their 24" electric BMX bikes. The framesets include frame, fork, and handlebar. Each of these parts is meticulously welded using high-grade 3Al-2.5V titanium tubing, supplemented with 6Al-4V titanium plates for additional strength in the motor housing and other key areas. The geometry of the design is a near carbon copy of freestyle BMX bikes, but features the widened MTB hub standards of 135mm in the rear and 110mm in the front for increased wheel strength. To ensure that BMX riders can benefit from these hub standards, Chimera manufactures their own 10mm bolt-on hubs that can be used with pegs both front and rear, and also offer peg-ready conversion axles so that their front forks are compatible with the wide variety of front 15mm thru-axle "boost" hubs on the market.

The Chimera motor is a black-anodized IP53 rated inrunner design. It's at the heart of the company's patent pending powertrain they've dubbed the "High-Drive". The design is modular, comprised of a motor, motor controller, and transmission that are each housed on separate areas of their unique frame. This allows each motorization component to be removed independently of the other, a feature that makes the bike easy to service, modify, or customize. Together, the High-Drive components weigh just 6.6lbs, but spin the rear wheel at over 100nm torque, yielding one of the highest power-to-weight ratios of any ebike motorization system available.

The proprietary High-Drive system and lightweight titanium frame are the primary reasons that the Chimera Electric BMX offers stats that are unrivaled amongst its peers, weighing as little as 35lbs, but offering 3800 watts of power, and a top speed of 35mph. By comparison, the second lightest Electric BMX on the market is the EINS weighing in at 41lbs with a 550 watt motor and a top speed of 20mph. The BMX-styled Zooz UU1100 has a large hub driven motor capable of over 1000 watts peak, but the bike weighs in at 65lbs and tops out at 33mph. "The trend in the industry is to churn out pedal-assist ebikes with closed-box motor systems and huge batteries for long range", remarks Founder Austin Duggan. "I wanted the opposite; a lightweight, throttle-on-demand stunt bike that riders can customize in their garage and race with their friends. To me, that's more in the spirit of BMX."

For years Chimera was only known to those who stumbled on their occasional Instagram posts during their long prototyping process. But the company gained increased attention online when they were first covered by the EV-focused website AutoEvolution. After that, they were invited to a Nitro Circus practice session, where X-Games Gold Medalist Ryan Williams accelerated throttle-only on flat ground to backflip their electric BMX prototype off of a motocross ramp (link). Chimera followed that up with a video of their bike repeatedly accelerating from zero to thirty miles an hour in just 5 seconds (link). Shortly thereafter, YouTube Influencer Mike Fede posted a Reel of the bike titled "Electric BMX Done Right" that has attracted over 500k views (link). It is likely that this online attention helped the relatively unknown startup collect over $111k selling pre-orders on Indiegogo for their first run of bikes. The 30 day campaign ended Sep 6th. They've since been offering their few remaining pre-orders via their website (link).

As of this writing, Chimera have sold out of their 35lb "Founder's Edition", and have limited slots left for their 37lb "Standard Edition", available for delivery only in the U.S.. This Standard Edition Electric BMX has an MSRP of $5500 but is currently discounted to $4400 until the remaining pre-order slots sell out. The titanium bike comes complete with an impressive parts package, including a pair of Magura MT4/MT5 hydraulic brakes, Accelerated Systems BAC855 motor controller, heat treated 4130 steel High-Drive clutch, hollow spindle 48-splined BMX cranks, sleeved 32mm wide rims, and a thermally potted and aluminum encased 52v/500wh battery pack made of Molicel P42a 21700 cells. The battery pack and bike are assembled in Los Angeles, and are promised to ship by August of 2023 for anyone who orders by October 15th.

Media photos can be found here.

Summary of key points about the Chimera Electric BMX:
- Titanium frame, fork, and handlebar with BMX geometry
- Widened MTB hub standards for increased wheel strength - 135OLD rear, 110OLD Boost front
- Compatible with pegs both front and rear
- Patent pending High-Drive powertrain is modular, 6.6lbs, and runs at up to 3800 watts peak.
- Top speed of 35mph.
- Total weight of bike w/ battery is 35lbs for the Founder's Edition, 37lbs for the Standard Edition.
- Standard Edition Electric BMX MSRP $5500, discounted to $4400 for pre-orders.
- Parts package includes Magura MT4/MT5 hydraulic brakes, Accelerated Systems BAC855 motor controller, heat treated 4130 steel High-Drive clutch, hollow spindle 48-splined BMX cranks, sleeved 32mm wide rims, and a thermally potted and aluminum encased 52v/500wh battery pack made of Molicel P42a 21700 cells.

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