CSC ES5 launched as speedy seated electric scooter, taking shot at the major competition
Move over, electric Vespa. Get nervous, NIU. There’s a new seated electric scooter in town, and it’s got better performance at a lower price. Meet the CSC ES5, an electric scooter that packs in plenty of power, speed, and range without a sky-high price.
CSC Motorcycles, headquartered in southern California, is no stranger to electric motorcycles and scooters. After several decades of imports and sales of gasoline-powered motorbikes, the company began expanding its lineup into electrics back in 2018.
In the last five years, the CSC badge has graced four unique models offering everything from city commuting to highway riding. Now the CSC ES5 has become the fifth electric model offered by CSC (if you don’t count the company’s several electric bicycles).
The ES5 isn’t a slow scooter like CSC’s retro-styled Monterey, yet it isn’t a fast 80 mph (130 km/h) highway bike like the CSC RX1E either.
At 52.8 mph (85 km/h), this electric scooter splits the difference with enough speed to take riders on pretty much any road in the city. Urban highways might be within the question, though interstates aren’t likely to be a fun experience on a 52 mph scooter.
With urban commuter-level speeds, the CSC ES5 is obviously meant for daily commuting and utility riding, not pleasure cruises. But it’s still quite peppy with a 5 kW belt-driving centrally mounted motor. That’s the continuous power, too. The peak power is rated at 8 kW.
And the ride is likely to last for a while too, thanks to a set of three 60V and 31Ah lithium-ion batteries. Together, that means riders get 5.58 kWh of capacity, but divided into batteries small enough to carry inside for charging if you don’t already have a convenient garage charging option (I see you, fellow apartment dwellers!).
CSC says that the scooter’s range at a steady 31 mph (50 km/h) is around 68 miles (110 km). In my experience, CSC generally gives realistic performance figures that are often even slightly lower than what riders actually achieve in real-world conditions. It’s a nice departure from the industry standard of quoting amazing performance specs measured in a vacuum with an 80 lb. rider going full tuck in a spandex body suit.
Now if you’re cruising at the scooter’s 53 mph top speed all the time, you definitely won’t achieve that full 68 miles of range. But since very few cities are 68 miles across, you’ll probably be fine with enough range to last for a few days of riding.
With a pre-order price of US $4,995 and an MSRP of US $5,295 (not including another $410 in dealer fees), the CSC ES5 is quite favorably priced compared to the competition.
The closest comparison is likely the NIU MQi Sport Extended Range. For US $6,199, you’re getting a top speed of 43 mph (70 km/h), a motor power of 3.1 kW and a battery capacity of 4.03 kWh. Or in other words, for 15% more money, the NIU gives you 20% less speed, 28% less battery, and 38% less power.
NIU has a very nice app with excellent smart features such as GPS location, as well as a wider dealer network, but there’s no denying that the CSC ES5 is taking a major shot at the established players with serious bang for your buck.
And that’s before you consider the ES5’s other features, such as keyless start, full-color TFT instrument display, Bluetooth audio player, and built-in dash camera for recording rides (either for posterity or for legal reasons).
There’s even seating for two with a set of pillion pegs and rear grab bars, just in case your pillion happens to be another dude that needs to preserve his masculinity by not holding your waist. I tell my wife it’s safer to hold me, partly because it’s true, and partly because I like the way it feels.
Available in three colorways, the CSC ES5 is currently taking pre-orders with a fully refundable $300 deposit ahead of deliveries expected to begin later this year.
Electrek’s Take
I’m very excited to see CSC’s latest electric addition. This scooter definitely looks better than the CSC Wiz they first marketed in 2019, and it’s got better specs too.
I’m loving that mid-motor and belt drive, especially at this price. I’m not big on blasting tunes while I’m riding, but I’m sure many people will like that Bluetooth speaker.
At nearly $5,500 all-in, it’s still considerably more expensive than a cheap gasoline-powered scooter or moped. But it’s also got major advantages over a gasoline-powered scooter. Electric scooters are much cheaper in the long term, not just due to fuel savings but also with reduced maintenance and repair. You can rack up thousands and thousands of miles with the entirety of your maintenance consisting of checking tire pressure every few weeks. Then there’s the quieter operation, the lack of vibrations or heat coming off a baking engine at red lights in the summer, and of course the environmental impact of not contributing to pumping more emissions into the air. At this point it’s a toss-up about which is the more immediately dangerous part of those emissions, the carcinogens you’re breathing in or the climate changing impact that your kids will have to deal with.
I recently took a vacation trip on a cute little Honda scooter, and it reminded me why I went electric years ago – the ownership experience and ride quality are simply nicer.
So at this price, I think CSC has a compelling new bike on their hands. It may not be as much fun as the RX1E, but it’s more affordable and better suited to city rides. So for many people, this will be the attractive, approachable electric scooter to win them over.
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Tesla has reportedly yet to start testing its robotaxi service in Austin without a safety driver behind the wheel – just weeks before the planned launch.
For months now, Tesla and CEO Elon Musk have been hyping the launch of “Tesla Robotaxi”, a Uber-like ride-hailing service powered by autonomous Tesla vehicles, starting with a launch in Austin, Texas in June.
We have extensively reported that this launch is disappointing compared to what Tesla promised for years: that all its consumer vehicles built since 2016 are capable of self-driving.
Instead, Tesla plans to build an internal fleet of “10-20” Model Ys and have them offer ride-hailing services in a geo-fenced area around Austin, Texas, helped by human teleoperations. This is very similar to what Waymo has been offering in other cities for years, specifically in Austin, for months now.
Even with the significant downgrade in self-driving capabilities promised with this project, there are many doubts about Tesla’s ability to achieve the lesser goal.
That’s because the robotaxi service will be based on Tesla’s ‘Supervised Full Self-Driving’ program, which is currently achieving about 500 miles between critical disengagements fleet-wide, according to the latest crowdsourced data.
Tesla will be able to improve on that by optimizing a version for the geo-fenced area in Austin and it has been training its neural nets for that for months with vehicles going around Austin.
However, a new report now claims that Tesla has yet to start testing its service without safety drivers at the wheel – similar to Tesla’s public ‘Supervised FSD’. The Information wrote in a new report:
Elon Musk’s deadline for launching Tesla’s first robotaxi service, in Austin, Texas, is weeks away, but the company hadn’t started testing its cars without a human safety driver as of last month, according to an engineer close to the testing and a former employee. That’s a crucial step required before Tesla can launch the pilot service for customers.
For comparison, before launching its paid ride service in Austin, Waymo tested its vehicles with safety drivers in the area for 6 months and then without safety drivers for another 6 months.
Waymo has now taken over a significant market share of ride-hailing rides in the Texas capital, but it still has limitations; for example, it doesn’t drive on the interstate.
The report also mentions that Tesla has been working with local emergency services in Austin to develop intervention plans in order to avoid causing issues if its autonomous vehicles fail.
Electrek’s Take
This is the biggest softball goal. It’s a fraction of what was promised, it’s something that others have achieved before. It’s a punt created for Tesla to finally get a “win” in self-driving.
If they can’t even make it, it would be disastrous, but at least, I hope that it will finally open the eyes of many Tesla shareholders to the reality that Tesla is actually behind in autonomous driving and that Musk’s latest claims that Tesla will have “millions of robotaxi on the road” in 2026 are just the same as when he claimed it would happen in 2025, 2024, 2023, 2022, 2021, 2020, and 2019: corporate puffery.
My main concern now is for public safety. I have little hope of US regulators being able to stop Tesla considering Trump is firing anyone who got in Musk’s way after he gave him over $250 million.
If Tesla brings its cowboy approach to this, it could get bad quickly.
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The development of Rivian’s R2 validation builds continues to progress. We know so because the American automaker’s founder and CEO, RJ Scaringe, continues to pepper us with welcome updates with plenty of fantastic images. The latest post features the inner workings of Rivian’s Maximus drive unit, which will propel the upcoming R2 EVs when they hit the market next year.
Another day, another exciting social media update from RJ Scaringe. Nine days ago, the Rivian CEO shared a peek at the company’s new Maximus drive unit, designed to be more compact and efficiently built to help reduce cost-per-unit production.
Our only look was from outside the drive unit’s casing at the time, but it was exciting news nonetheless. As an encore, Scaringe posted photos of the R2 validation builds on a pilot line at the automaker’s facility in Normal, Illinois.
This evening, Scaringe took to Instagram and X once again to share a better look at the inner workings of the Rivian Maximus drive unit. Check it out:
RJ shares more images of Rivian’s Maximus development
Rivian’s CEO posted the three images above, which showcase some interesting perspectives of the developing drive unit. As previously shared by Rivian, Maximus uses a new continuous winding technique that reduces the total welds per stator and thus the total overall cost of building each one.
For comparison, Rivian’s current Enduro drive unit requires 264 stator welds, while Maximus only needs 24. You can see the stator windings in the image above to the left. Scaringe shared excitement in the progress of the Rivian team’s Maximus drive unit as well as some insight in his post:
I love the packaging on Maximus — the drive unit for R2. It has a side mounted inverter that utilizes flat area at the end of the motor to minimize the length of bus bars, keeping them light and efficient. The large planar shape also allows all processing and power electronics to exist on a single printed circuit board.
The inverter chassis closes out the oil cooled motor cavity and seamlessly routes coolant from the power modules to the drive unit’s heat exchanger with no extra parts.
Overall, the inverter part count is reduced by 41% relative to Enduro and structural inverter lid saves more parts and fasteners by also serving as the drive unit mount. I love this design efficiency. (heart emoji)
Looks fantastic, RJ. We can’t wait to see the visual progress of the R2 you share next!
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On today’s thrilling episode of Quick Charge, we’ve a huge spike in global EV sales and a huge dip in Tesla deliveries. Plus a whole bunch of news from Toyota, including an updated bZ that’s just a bit better than before … but is a bit better going to make a big difference?
We’re also on track for more than 1 in 4 new cars sold this year to be electric, with a whole lot more hybrids coming in to make up the difference and drive fuel demand down to a new yearly low. All this, plus the top 5 cheapest EVs to insure when you hit the play button.
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