I need to level with you: I’m about as useful for reviewing motorcycles as I am for reviewing gas cookers. I use both every now and again but am hardly au fait with the latest technology. Regardless, here’s me doing the equivalent of telling you what I think about a restaurant kitchen. It’s a motorcycle called the Ace and it’s made by Ariel, which makes the Atom 4 car I’m more familiar with, and which you also see here. The Atom relaunched the Ariel name in 2000, after it had spent a period of dormancy because it went the way of so many British automotive companies in the 1970s. The Atom is now in its fourth generation and it’s better, faster and more compelling than ever. It runs a 2.0-litre Honda Civic Type R engine, for which Ariel conservatively claims a power output of 320bhp. But while Ariel made cars in its early days, it was most famous for two-wheelers. It produced its first 149 years ago: the Ariel Ordinary bicycle, ‘ordinaries’ being what penny farthings were called to differentiate them from the new-fangled chain-driven geared bikes, known as ‘safety bicycles’, because you didn’t have to sit five feet off the ground. Motorcycles followed bicycles and were Ariel’s mainstay in the mid-20th century, and while Somerset’s modern iteration of Ariel doesn’t do retro, a lot of its staff love motorbikes, making the Ace a logical follow-up. As logical as a small company designing a motorbike can be, anyway. For one, the engineering space on a bike is incredibly tight. On a car, compromising a few centimetres of space is a conversation; on a bike, a couple of millimetres is a crisis. So the technical challenge is huge. Besides that, Ariel likes doing things big manufacturers can’t or aren’t interested in, and it’s easier to do that with cars than it is with bikes. Bikes are a niche market and all the big players already design things to be fun. In the end Ariel settled on making an exquisitely engineered, relatively expensive £20,000-plus bike with loads of options. Way more than on the Atom. Bikes aren’t usually this customisable from the factory. You can spec a BMW R Nine-T as a scrambler, a retro race bike or a naked street bike, but see them in profile and they’re pretty similar. The Ace takes the concept much further. Whichever Ace you spec, you get an aluminium frame that has been machined for 70 hours, and a 1200cc V4 engine (from Honda, naturally). But there are two different front ends – normal telescopic forks or girder forks – two geometries, three fuel tanks, four seats, options on handlebars, exhausts, foot pegs, wheels and more. The majority of buyers apparently go with something like you see here: a cruiser rather than sportster, with funky girder forks and relaxed geometry. Not that I’m totally relaxed, and a glance at the specification reveals why. The VFR1200 engine makes an incredible noise and 173bhp, and the whole caboodle weighs about 230kg, so the power-to-weight ratio (before rider) is 752bhp per tonne. An Atom 4, one of the most fiercely responsive and accelerative road cars I’ve driven, has ‘only’ 537bhp per tonne. So in the way that I know commercial gas burners get really hot, I know this bike can go very fast, although in both cases I’m taking it as read rather than sticking my hand over the flame. I can tell you it’s beautifully engineered and put together, and it is fun and responsive at low speeds. The seat is low, throttle response sharp. I read that the ground clearance isn’t amazing compared to a sports bike’s, but the only time I ‘get my knee down’ is when I’m greasing a chain. But the Ace isn’t a sports bike. And that’s fine. The Atom isn’t a conventional sports car, either. If all you wanted to do was go really fast, like everybody else does, you’d make it slipperier through the air. What the Atom and Ace share is on-display engineering integrity and a sense of occasion, and nobody else quite does it so spectacularly or appealingly. Not a sports bike, then. Not sure it’s a cruiser, either. But it’s definitely, unashamedly an Ariel, and all the better for it. Ariel’s two-wheeled heritage Ariel’s first bicycle was notable for having patented, tension-spoked wheels, and the company had been in business for more than a quarter of a century before it made its first motorised vehicles. They were powered tricycles and quadricycles with only a few horsepower, while its first motorcycle arrived in 1902. Cars were made until 1925, including, in 1908, a ‘grand prix racer’, while in the 1930s the bikes – notably the single-cylinder Red Hunter and 1000cc Square Four – were so successful that Ariel even bought Triumph. In the 1950s Ariel and Triumph became part of BSA, then not long after Japanese bikes arrived and that was pretty much it for Britain’s motorcycle industry. The last machine to bear the Ariel name was BSA’s innovative but odd Ariel 3, a 49cc tilting trike which kept its two back wheels on the ground.
Origin: Ariel assault: Atom 4 and the Ace motorbike driven
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First drive: 2019 Mini Electric driven on track
The Mini Electric is the launching point of a bold new era for the venerable British brand – but the first impression you get from driving one is reassuringly familiar. Perhaps the biggest compliment you can pay Mini’s first series production electric car is that it drives and handles exactly as you’d expect a Mini to, regardless of powertrain. Which, of course, is no bad thing, because the classic Mini characteristics – sharp steering, rapid direction changes, nimble handling – represent both a formula that works, and exactly the sort of characteristics you’d want from an electric city car. Much like when BMW first revived the brand with the hatch in 2000, the aim for the British-built Mini Electric (known as the Mini Cooper S E outside the UK) is to wrap up a progressive modern design with nostalgic-tinged appeal. And a brief run in a production version on the Brooklyn Street Circuit that hosted the recent ABB Formula E Championship New York ePrix suggests that goal has been achieved. What is the Mini Electric like? Like any other Mini three-door hatch, when you first set eyes on it. That’s aside from a few visual touches, mostly based around the front grille and a handful of small badges – and the obvious lack of engine noise when you hit the start button. Which is probably a good thing, since it’s a proven, popular design, and there’d be little point in having an electric Mini that didn’t really look like a Mini. It’s a notably different tack from the designed-to-be-different BMW i3, which the Mini takes much of its powertrain from. The production interior is highly familiar as well, using the retro-fused dash layout as the petrol-powered Mini hatch. So there are big, round driver info display and infotainment screens, with plenty of old-school toggles and physical switches, including the classic start/stop switch in the middle of the dashboard. It contrasts sharply with the minimalist, touchscreen-dominated interiors of many electric cars currently being developed, but the links to the current petrol-powered Mini – and, in turn, back to Alec Issigonis’s original creation – work well. There are some minor differences, if you look hard enough. The most notable is the replacement of the manual handbrake with an electronic one for the first time, to match the gear-free electric powertrain. There is also a mode that sets the level of energy the car recaptures under braking, which the digital display gets new screens showing energy usage, power levels and so on. Under the retro skin, the Mini Electric borrows much of its powertrain from the BMW i3, with a 32.6kWh T-shaped battery powering a 181bhp and 199lb ft motor. Unlike the i3, power is sent to the front wheels only, resulting in a -062mph sprint of 7.3 secs, and a top speed of 93mph. The battery size gives a WLTP-certified range of 124-144 miles, which is around the same as the forthcoming Honda E, but less than rivals such as the Peugeot e-208 and Vauxhall Corsa-e will offer. What’s the Mini Electric like to drive? We were among the first journalists to drive a production-spec Mini Electric, albeit for a brief run around the 1.475-mile Formula E Brooklyn Street Circuit at limited speed. That said, it was enough to confirm initial impressions from our previous run in a prototype: that electric propulsion suits a Mini very well. The instant torque offered by an electric motor makes for rapid progress at all speeds, while BMW’s new ARB traction control system ensures that delivery is kept smooth. With its capability to make rapid progress, it definitely has an air of Mini Cooper S about it. The steering is also pleasing direct, the machine responding well to rapid direction changes and betraying little signs of the extra weight of the batteries contained low down in the car. It rides well, too, soaking up the many bumps and rough surfaces that feature on a street circuit laid out on the ageing roads of the Brooklyn Cruise Terminal. It didn’t feel quite as direct or nimble as the smaller Honda E did from our brief time in a prototype version of that car, although the Mini Electric is bigger and more practical, and could perhaps prove more versatile beyond tight city streets. The three drive modes – Standard, Mid and Sport – carried over from the regular Mini adjust the performance as you’d expect, although it will take a longer run to really explore the differences in all conditions. The Mini Electric also offers adjustable levels of energy recapture under braking, as with many electric cars. In the higher setting it’s possible to drive the machine largely without touching the brake pedal, the recapture quickly slowing the car enough for all but the tightest turns. Again, it’s a driving style that is well-suited to the characteristics that have long underpinned the Mini brand. Is the Mini Electric worth considering? It will take a longer run on real-word roads to truly judge the Mini Electric, but what’s clear is that everything customers
Origin: First drive: 2019 Mini Electric driven on track
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