Finished building my 25mph Ebike
 

Gas is getting a bit much and decided to make my old mountain bike to an Ebike. After 3 weeks of searching for the cheapest options, I found a setup for $240 shipped on Ebay. I purchased a 500W 48V system and wasn't expecting much for the money. But I was suprised at the speed I got out if it. Setup doesn't come with batteries, as I was going to use either Lipo or A123. For fun I went from 15s to 20s A123 and GPS'ed a speed of 25mph today. Now I just have to buy some more pack and use the bike to commute to work.

http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...e/DSC03679.jpg
http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...e/DSC03677.jpg
http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...e/DSC03675.jpg
http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...e/DSC03670.jpg

http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...23Fujibike.jpg

1937W peak. Averaging 5.17A. Next up is 16s Lipo.

Well done. Great idea! If I did not need my truck every day to shuffle my daughter around, I would do something similar. And gas is ridiculous here on Cape Cod..us natives hate the "bridge tax". Go back over the bridge from the Cape and things are a lot cheaper. Gas is 15-20 cents more than on the mainland.

Nice! And please tell me you have some torque arms on that thing! :gasp:

Thanks peeps. My new work schedule allowed me to do this. I don't have to bring the kids to day-care anymore.

About the torque arm. What the hell is that? I've seen them on the forums and whatnot, but do I really need them? My axle has flat spots that slides the wheel in place. No twisting whatsoever. I'm a noobie on this.

If you have steel rear dropouts you might be ok, but as the power goes up the more likely you will spin out your dropouts from the torque. If they are aluminum you really need a torque arm. I would definitely get/make one at the power level you are running at, but you might be ok. Over time you might spin your hub.

http://endless-sphere.com/forums/vie...lit=torque+arm

http://endless-sphere.com/forums/vie...lit=torque+arm

Ah ok man. Thanks! I'll check it as I ride it more.

If you need something fabbed up just let me know, I have SST and mild steel at the shop.

Jeff

Cool beans man. I'll drop by your crib for you to check it out.

Not tonight, I am in San Antonio, I won't be back till Monday night. After looking at the pics of what is needed I am sure I can make some pimp reinforcements.

I maxed out at 28mph with me pedaling like a madman. Without pedaling I got 26mph at one point. So it's not worth pedaling at all when going full throttle. I use the hardcase Acepow lipo's this time. 14S done with three 4s packs and one 2s pack. Not sure if I want to try 16S and risk frying the controller.

I gained some speed today. All I did was switch over to a rear Serfas Drifter City tire. I peaked at 27mph and used 3000mah to get to work. So time wise it is the same getting to work. Only this time I don't use any gas whatsoever.

http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...e/IMG_0365.png

Sweet! How much pedaling did you do?

Pondering.
 

So do you take a charger to work with you, or is there enough power left to get you home round trip? Looks pretty good and seems very low profile in nature. The only obvious thing is the battery/ESC bag on the rear rack. I bet a lot of people do not even realize that it is an E-bike when they see you cruising along at 25 mph. Wondering how in the hell are you coasting so fast on level ground.

I have been pondering doing one of these for a while now, but the money is still an issue, because I would have to pull money away from something else in order to accomplish the task. I still need more time. We are about 7 miles from the US Embassy where the wife works, and so will I eventually. It would be nice to be able to drift my way to and from work on my bike without any added daily costs and without killing myself physically. THere are a few up hill stretches to deal with but nothing too demanding. Round trip would be approximately 14 to 15 miles and the traffic here is very light even during what they call rush hour, compared to just about any place we have lived so far. Rush hour in Brussels was just rediculous. It would take about two hours to get home from work by car, and was only about 3.5 miles. I only tried to do it twice and never wanted to do it again. Rush hour in Korea was not much better. I just saw an E-bike in a sports shop here in Prague and the price was in the $1300 range already built and ready to ride with dual disc brakes and a top speed of 25mph. It looks similar to the stealth bike that I saw for like $10K on the internet.

I used 3000mah in 5.5 miles, doing full throttle. The only pedaling done was the 2 seconds moving from the Green light and the first 500 feet from my house. It was cold out today, so I had to warm up a bit. I only stopped a bit to turn on the GPS and let it go for the 1.6 miles as seen in the picture.

I am using my old FMA 6s 10A charger at work. I'm allowed to bring the bike inside my lab, so no risk of anybody stealing the bike. I do use my eagletree logger to see what is going on. Waiting for the LCD screen to arrive, so I can see live data like mah used, voltage, amperage and maybe motor rpm. I could also add my eagletree gps module and see current speed.

Jerry,
the bike rides nice and worth it as long as the weather is good. 1300 bucks for a complete bike is not bad either. My bike when new was near 500 bucks after tax. Add new onroad tires, $240 motor kit and batteries and you come out to the same. Going to work in the morning is a breeze for me, but going home is a pita. Wouldn't be so bad if I drive Toyota, but with the big family SUV it is. I put 75 bucks of gas yesterday and the tank still wasn't full. Gas prices is just killer nowadays. My daily commute time is the same with the bike.

I got looks while cruizing on HP campus. Security didn't know what to think of it.

This is my datalog from my commute after work.

http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...e/Ebike14S.jpg

Cool, it was a good ride home I bet. Did you use more mah on the way home?

Jeff

No, It was a bit less actually. I didn't really start up from a stand still. By less I mean 100mah.

This is from my ride home. Weather was a tad warmer and the wind behind my back. Dunno what happend really but I only used 2400mah in 7.5 miles.

http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...e/IMG_0367.png

J57ltr made this torque arm for me.

http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...e/DSC03904.jpg

Looks beatiful! That bike should go strong now for a long time to come!

Hopefully the larger motor doesn't use a larger shaft, although I can remachine the slot. It would give me a chance to remove that area I mentioned before, and give it a conture.


I am bouncing back and forth thinking of this. I figure I can use the lower grade batteries and 4P. I sae your setup and an 800W and a 1000W. The 500 you have pushes me around pretty well. I was impressed. :yes:

Jeff

That cheap Ebay kit is better than I thought it would be by a large margin. Awesome setup for those wanting to stay at the legal speed limit. I think the system is just rated for 500W to be considered legit. It actually pulls 700W continuous. It will probably be able to do more with the new controller and better motor wires. Might not even need a new hub after that.

I've learned one thing about lipo's in a Ebike vs Rc. Your batteries are depleted when the voltage reaches 3.7V per cell. Voltage under load is 3.95V per cell. Batteries stay in balance when I leave at least 20% capacity in there. I don't gain much more capacity when I charge to 4.1V per cell over 4.2V per cell.

Linky?
 

Can you link this kit, and can one purchase it anywhere else besides ebay? I closed my ebay account a few years ago, and have no desire to open a new one. Too many dammed hassles selling stuff on there now with bigger fees plus more and more rules to deal with. I just can not be bothered with all that crapp. If there is a link for direct purshases from China I would be willing to work directly with them and leave out the middle man (ebay) and keep things simple. The way you did your conversion seems pretty straight forward, and making a locking plate is not that hard to get done just about anywhere. Plus using the A123 cells seems the best way to go as well. They are not expensive and easier to care for. So now that you have your conversion behind you now what do you recommend?

The guy has a Ebay store and is based in California. http://stores.ebay.com/Xcceries-Stor...id=p4340.l2563

I'm gonna do A123's after my lipo' die. But I'll be going to the big prismatic cells or bigger cylindrical A123's. No point at this time to blow money on batteries, while I still have good ones that do the job.

On the forums I see people going gaga about using power poles. Deans just work fine for me.
I use 4mm bullets for my motor wires. Easy to disconnect when something happens. What is the point of having big connectors when I'm only flowing 15A continuous at most.
Getting a good tire for the supplied rim is a good idea. Tire that it came with is too skinny.
I set my suspension and seat position for comfort. I soften up the rear shocks. Lowered the seat post. Moved the seat back a bit.
Cruise control doesn't sound like a bad idea when going 2 miles straight. Holding the thumb throttle gets your hand tired.
Is good to have some type of logger to see your battery usage.
Throttle control gains range.
Hill climbing doesn't require gear changes anymore.
I don't have to wait in the back of the traffic line anymore. I scoot all the way to the front.
If you really want to pedal at top speed, I suggest getting a 11T sprocket.

For upgrades:
I ordered up the new speed control for a bit more power and ability to tweak the controller at will by the use of a pc.
Upgrading the motor wires when I get a chance.
A more powerfull hub for a greater top speed(not high on my list though).

Can you please?
 

Hey Snell can you get a direct contact email address for these guys. Since I no longer have an ebay account I can not even send them and email from the site. I would like to contact them directly and see if there is another way to do business with them without using ebay. Maybe you can email them and ask if there is another way to communicate with them outside of ebay. Its worth a try. Thanks for the info and help Sir.

These E-bike projects are very inspiring and I would like to do one myself, but I do not want to end up spending $2000 trying to make something work. The drive distance from our house to the US Embassy is only about 5 miles, which is where I will be working starting June or July. Using public transport is OK at about $3. round trip, but with morning traffic it can take 30 to 60 minutes. By bike it can take less than 30 minutes and one can still arrive at work refreshed and ready to work without pouring of sweat. The biggest benefit would be at the end of the day not having to peddle my butt home, and still making it home in less than 30 minutes through rush hour traffic. A setup like this one would be a killer idea for my situation.

The website is Yescomusa.com.

Got it.
 

Got it Snell. Thank you for the address. I will report whatever I come up with. Thanks.

Man this site is great. $289 for the complete package (48v 1000watts). Then all you need to do is fabricate a good battery pack and you are ready to rock and roll. Of course the reinforced hub lock piece woulb be a must have. But this site is great for anyone who is considering one of these projects. (http://www.yescomusa.com/product.php...&cat=91&page=1)

Nice.... I want one now.

Jerry, that is a best deal I found man. Also I plugged in a 16S lipo config and the ESC did not blow. My throttle lights went on, but the esc did not react when I hit the throttle. I plugged in the 14S setup and all is well again.

Thanks Nis720! This bike build pales in comparison to your sick 720. How have you been man?!

I've been messing with laptop batteries again for a milder ebike setup. Trying to build a 13s4p pack, which is around 8000mah. But cycling and weeding the bad cells out takes too damn long.

http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...e/DSC03931.jpg

Matth
 

Where is the cheapest place to purchase A123 cells. Their site states that they only do large volume business and do not deal with individual projects like cars or e-bikes. I think that may be our best bet for setting up an E-bike configuration and keeping the overall costs reasonable. I want to make sure that I end up with the power required for such a setup, but also enough capacity for a good long ride. So is there any place special that gives good deals on A123 cells that will fit the bill and maybe a discount as well. Not sure of exactly what I would need, but with a little research I am sure that I can figure it out. That motor kit recommends at least a 48volts, 20amp setup which I would assume means 20,000mah, right? I wonder how long of a full power ride that would give on average if you were to put together say a battery pack 48volts with 20,000 mah capacity? Doing the math on electrical stuff is not my best atribute. I see that they have more indsutrial battery packs already made up that would be awsome, but the cost of those would easily be $1000 just for batteries. Hardly a budget project.

I found this site a while back through a different forum. Prices look ok.

http://www.a123rc.com/goods-468-Exci...TIC+CELLS.html

Prismatic cells look nice.
 

Thanks again Snell for the info. I was thinking about those prismatic cells as well, but I am not seeing the voltage on them? At $51 a pop how many would one have to acqure for the (48VOLT, 1000 WATT HUB system? Just trying to get a good picture as to what getting my bike setup for this. I also much rather prefer the split/twist throttle because it is more like a motorbike, which I am used to. All of the info is great and the pricing is pretty good as well. Escept that is for batteries when you add everything up. Cells can run you quite a bit, and acquiring a custom pack would be even more so. No matter how you do this your looking at pretty much $1000 to $1600 for a good setup that will move you around easily even up hill, and cover a fare amount of milage on one charge. Hell one could easily run back and forth to the local market and fill up on food without breaking a sweat.

Those prismatic packs are just like the round ones, which is 3.3v nominal. So you would need like 20 of those bad boys. But if you do so, you could probably do 40 miles at full speed. More if you can control yourself. I calculated about 3Ah for 5.5 miles, give and take headwind, and some hills based on my datalogs. This morning I was still averaging 25mph on my 14s Lipo. Tire pressure set at 60psi for both front and rear.

I build up a ghetto battery pack consisting recycled laptop 18650 size batteries. Total of 13s4p setup. Startup is sucks, as there is not enough Amps. So more pedaling is required. But once you start to roll, it will go all the way to 25mph on a flat road. It just takes longer to get there compared to the lipo pack. Battery pack was at 109F at the end of the trip to work. A 6p pack would do better. I'm running at the max continuous ampdraw of the pack. But now I'm averaging 500W, like the system is rated for.

http://i189.photobucket.com/albums/z...13s4p18650.jpg

Great specs
 

This setup sounds like it would have some great specs and more like what I would like to do on my bike. But man that would be over a $1000 just for those batteries plus all of the work putting the right pack together, but what a great battery pack that would be, right? Seems to me this would be the best way to go for a really good e-bike.

I build up a ghetto battery pack consisting recycled laptop 18650 size batteries. Total of 13s4p setup. Startup is sucks, as there is not enough Amps. So more pedaling is required. But once you start to roll, it will go all the way to 25mph on a flat road. It just takes longer to get there compared to the lipo pack. Battery pack was at 109F at the end of the trip to work. A 6p pack would do better. I'm running at the max continuous ampdraw of the pack. But now I'm averaging 500W, like the system is rated for.

Just seems like a whimpy way to go for what you are trying to do. No take off power and going up hill would be terrible, right? The A123 pack is a much better option if you ask me. All of that work putting together that pack and then having to peddle like a mad man just to get up to speed is not a good option if you ask me.

Building that ghetto pack was a learning curve. Seeing what the little batteries can do under max load for 20 minutes. I know what they can do in tools, flashlights, laptops and RC. But I never knew what the capability would be in a bike for example. I can always use those packs in my kids power wheels or stick them in my souped up flashlight. I made my home-work-home commute without needing to recharge. I used up 6000mah and voltage dropped enough to trip the low voltage cutoff intermittenly. So now I know the cheapo ebay setup does have a low voltage cutoff and a over voltage protection. So the Ebay setup is not so bad afterall.

Have no fear, because my new controller is being shipped to me. Bad boy is suppose to run sensorless and support high rpm's. Also capable of running 100V and currently set at 45A max. Controller is set to run on 12s and 16s for now. But I have enough to run 22S 5000mah. But 85V will require some plugs and wire upgrades. Not something I would want to mess with right now.

Great info
 

Well its good research on your part and will save a lot of us time and money trying to figure these things out on our own. Reading through your E-bike experiences should help out a lot for anyone trying to figure out the best way to go on their own E-bike porject. I know it is helpoing me out a lot. I really do like the cheap Chinese hub/wheel kit for sure, and those Prismatic batteries are just awsome, but the price is pretty steap for the average Joe. If there was something similar technology wise for half that price that would be the way to go. I do like their smaller Lipo batteries that look like lawnmower batteries. That would be another option, but anything we do outside of the prismatic cells will involve using a much larger setup(weight & size). I sure wish that CC would start making Lipos for R/C applications. That would be very cool.

If I remember correctly, Castle did have batteries at one point. Dunno what happend with that one. A123racing/Enerland is out of the hobby market. Not enough sales to justify that market sector. Acepow had a good chemistry, untill the bossman screwed up. So all that there is left is Hyperion as a quality pack. And how many people will really spend big money on a battery pack, when they can get the same capacity for 50% less. Not many, I'm guilty of that one myself. So in my eyes, it will be a gamble for Castle to make any money in the current USA market.

My 4s Acepow packs have a cell resistance of 0.9 mOhm on average when charged at 30A. At 40A charge rate the resistance doesn't register for a 1p config. That is not bad at all for a 67 dollar pack, considering the A123's are at 8 mOhm. Difference is that the A123 can put out some serious amount of Amperage in an instant. More then my logger can record. But you can see the difference in RC's. My GTP for example has faster launch on 4s2p A123, compared to the 4s1p 5000mah Acepow. The Acepow will have a greater topspeed, but in a dragrace it's too late.

All good points
 

All good points Snell, but remember CC has a factory in China already, which would make it fairly easy for them to start fabbing up Lipo packs and shipping them stateside or wherever to make some money. With manufacturing in China they should be able to keep overhead down and make a reasonable profit, and at the same time provide a competitive price for the hobby. So I think it would be a win-win for CC and for us.

I have not had a whole lot of experience with anything but the nickle/metal batteries. I have a couple of Lipo packs but have not even gotten to use them because of our move. Plus I have not wanted to invest a ton of money into Lipos while waiting for the prices to drop to reasonable levels. Lets be real here making Lipos is not any harder than making alkaline batteries. SO charging these rediculous rates just because they are the newest technology on the block has to run thin at some point. Personally I don't see why Lipos should be any more expensive than Nicads or Nimtl batteries. It just doesn't make sense to me. Even something like those Primatic cells at $51 a cell is pretty greedy if you ask me. $25-$30 would have been plenty, but anything with a new design seems to get jacked up just because it is somewhat unique until the chinese knock offs start coming out. I don't even see how Maxamps stays in business with their outragious prices. Anyway all good info. Thanks.