HT Norko Aline - Resurrected!

[sn0wchyld]

Between hours spent on uni work ive been sneaking in an hours ride or two most days this past week. Today however was a tad warmer than it has been the last week. I was riding at about 25deg and a hot sun as opposed to overcast, windy and about 15deg. The temp probes in my bats read a peak of about 28deg, when they normally run at closer to 20. And what a difference it made!!!

I thought that the CA must need recalibrating or something, because it was showing me a pack V of 76, with 6.5ah having been used, normally by this time ive only used about 5.5 ah or less! I knew that lipo liked being used in warmer temps but I didnt know it was this sensitive! makes me wonder if something like this...
- i'd found a battery pack warmer on hk, but cant find it now...
is worth it for the colder winter days. better yet, a heat exchange that takes heat form the motor and puts it on the batts! hehe. Might be a tad bit of overkill i think...

Bikes been going great. Got the rear tube upgraded to a heavy duty DH piece, hopefully that means less punctures in the future. Getting the tire off and on again was a pain in the ass too, Im thinking I might have to switch to a traditional slot dropout with a pinch bolt. Should be just as strong if I make it out of SS or similar too.

top speed so far has been 64km'h, confirmed via a gps. it was on about a -3% grade or so though. Fastest on flat has been about 55. Makes me reconsider the switch to 24s, as I really dont need more speed for what I use it for. Still, Ive gone and bought the batts now so may as well give it a go. It'll make reconfiguring the pack for balance charging much easyer too, given that ill be using 4s packs and I have an 8s charger. Ill make each 4s pack into 'effectively' a 8s 3p sub pack, before hooking these subs up to be a single 24s 3p pack for discharge. Im hoping the extra voltage will give a bit more mid rpm push too, witch couldn't hurt.

Range has been great for a smallish 700wh pack. 24km friday, 26km today, both on about 6.5-7ah each time. Works out to an average of around 17wh/km, and given how ive been raging around the local hills to find little dirt trails Im pretty damn happy with that. I do however still pedal like a maniac, I feel guilty letting the motor do all the work, particularly up hills. makes you feel like superman too to be going up a 6 or 7% grade at 35km'h. and Ive started trying to hold wheelys and being a bit more agressive on the trails since upping the support inside the battery cases, to stop em moving as much. The throttle in those conditions takes some getting used too, best ive managed so far is a pretty abismal 20m or so. Keep giving it to much and falling off the back. Moving the battery case down lower should help with the balance.

Speaking of witch, with the mid semester break coming up I will hopefully have the time to do a bit more work making a neater batt case and clean up the hornets nest of wires I have at the moment.

Damit, how the hell do i keep making these long ass posts?

[sn0wchyld]

DAM

too pissed off to right much now, but suffice to say that 3ft drop = broken spokes. Sheared off at the nipple. Rode for another 5km or so, wondering why the bike felt unsteady. durrr.



I think I know when it happened. landed awkward off a small jump, smacked my knee into the batt case, which I thought was the reason for the bang. Guess it was a couple of spokes too. Makes me reconsider the purchase of a 5404 too. That'll have to be a pure on road commuter I think... RC drive 4 offraod asap. witch is ages, since the funds are near gone .

Back to the shop, hopefully the rims not too frocked from the riding i did after. Since it was just riding round streets ill hopefully be ok. guess its a good time to drill the side covers etc while im at it...

[MadRhino]

Forget about jumping with a hub motor, one or 2 feet is max your wheel can take landing flat. If you're going fast in a slope, it can take a 3ft drop as long as your suspension is well set and you're standing. That is what my X5 builds take usually, with wheel trueing average weekly over a year. Sun BFM rim, 12ga spokes, 2.7 Kenda Nevegals.

[sn0wchyld]

Forget about jumping with a hub motor, one or 2 feet is max your wheel can take landing flat. If you're going fast in a slope, it can take a 3ft drop as long as your suspension is well set and you're standing. That is what my X5 builds take usually, with wheel trueing average weekly over a year. Sun BFM rim, 12ga spokes, 2.7 Kenda Nevegals.

yea im seeing that now... im using 14g SS spokes, DT swiss fr600 rim, the rim held up ok, doesn't appear to be dented fortunately, just way out of true.

It was a downhill landing, about a 10% grade actually, so I thought it'd be fine. Was a shit landing though. And onto a road, so not soft either.

Ah well. Shit happens as they say, least I can start to see the limits of this build. I was hoping to put off the RC build for a while, but this makes me think ill be brining it forward as the funds allow, and as HK or wherever I source my motor from gets stock. I'd probably bail on the 5404 purchase too had I not already committed (and paid!!). Still, with an 18fet and 94V 15ah of lipo planned it should make for a hell of a commuter!!!

Ive got what should be the ideal bike for RC conversion now, an old Avanti D8, made of good ol cromolly. The plan is to cut out the lower 'pole' of the frame and replace it with a large square steel pole, to house a motor, reduction drive and batteries. Should end up looking like a chunky DH frame. There's a member who's done similar in ally, though I cant remember his nick right now. Bike looked great though. Hopefully I can equal, or even surpass it!

I got some footage with the new GoPro, which arrived on Saturday. If I can figure a good easy way of editing it ill get it uploaded. Nothing exciting, just a run through some local small trails. And the event that lead to the broken spokes. Wish it had at-least been on a more spectacular jump.

[GCinDC]

Forget about jumping with a hub motor, one or 2 feet is max your wheel can take landing flat.

There's some hub motor/suspension/spoke/rim combos out there that handle big drops... key is finding the right combo. 14ga prolly not gonna cut it. what does the stealth use?

hey madrhino, what's the bike in your pic there? any other photos of that? RC build under there? what wheels? photos w/ that custom bike stand ok too..

I got some footage with the new GoPro, which arrived on Saturday. If I can figure a good easy way of editing it ill get it uploaded.

Looking forward to it! If you've got a decent internet connection, just upload it to youtube and edit it there. easy to make simple cuts..

[sn0wchyld]

Forget about jumping with a hub motor, one or 2 feet is max your wheel can take landing flat.

There's some hub motor/suspension/spoke/rim combos out there that handle big drops... key is finding the right combo. 14ga prolly not gonna cut it. what does the stealth use?

hey madrhino, what's the bike in your pic there? any other photos of that? RC build under there? what wheels? photos w/ that custom bike stand ok too..

I got some footage with the new GoPro, which arrived on Saturday. If I can figure a good easy way of editing it ill get it uploaded.

Looking forward to it! If you've got a decent internet connection, just upload it to youtube and edit it there. easy to make simple cuts..

Yea im gonna get the lbs to just use 14g again, but when the funds allow Ill order some 13 or 12g from holmes. I think though I may need to drill out the eyelets a bit, the nipples arn't quite able to 'allign' properly, so they're at a slight angle from the rim... increasing tension on one side of the spoke. Im thinking the rim wasn't the best choice, Its strong but the eyelets are kinda small. Still, hopefully fixable. at least the washers seem to be holding up ok.

yea id classify the ol' aussie internet as somewhat less than 'decent', particually by USA/CAD standards. I think ive got about 900kb's upload, so a 1gb 'tube vid will take an age. Anyone know of a good (hopefully free) video editing software? I have access to adobe stuff, but its a steep learning curve, and I have windows movie maker that I havent really tried yet. Problem is I need to convert the .mov to .avi for WMM to read it. Takes ages too.

[GCinDC]

what windows version do you have? wmm on win7 ain't that bad. get used to long conversion times...

[MadRhino]

...
hey madrhino, what's the bike in your pic there? any other photos of that? RC build under there? what wheels? photos w/ that custom bike stand ok too..

It's a Stinky Deluxe, leopard custom paint, old pic. Not motorized.

My Ebikes are Norco A-Line, Specialized Demo 8, and Santacruz Heckler. All builds with Clytes hub motors. I will build next on a GasGas trial frame, Agni 95BR setup. Other than that I prefer the silence and simplicity of hub motors, and I plan to work on a liquid cooling system this winter, for one of my Clytes.

[sn0wchyld]

The other day I found a guy selling his old avanti d8. beaut bike, made of cromolly and in good nick, very good nick considering its age. Given the events of yesterday the plan is to change this into a RC drive monster, 1kwh or more of lipo, and a yet-to-be decided motor and drive system. I may buy a purpose kit, even a crystalyte kit to begin with, and then make up my own one. The idea is to remove the lower beam of the frame, and replace it with a large 'C' shape box beam. Hopefully, it will still be strong enough compared to a box frame, but allow simple access to the batts and the drive system. Its early days yet, but I'm aiming for ~5kw continuous and peaks of at-least 7. Making a reduction and drive system to handle this power is going to be the hardest part. Ill prob only run ~2kw 90% of the time anyway. Also aiming for quite operation, at least at lower power levels. A brushed motor may even be the go , given their simplicity and controller reliability.

Heres some pics of the new toy...



And what i plan to do with it...




The rim went to the shop today for replacement. Also noticed a nice big dent that wasnt there before. Guess I did more damage than I initially thought. And having to go easy on a bike just makes the RC drive option make even more sense, and leave this hub motor stuff for commuting and light trail rides.

Managed to get windows movie maker working, but I have to convert the video before it'll recognise it, so hopefully ill be able to get a short vid sorted over the next couple days.

[deepfraught]

Quicktime Pro is a good basic tool for conversion and cutting up .MOV and uploading to youtube. If you want to add anything more than that like titles and transitions or corrections, use it to convert to format of choice and go from there with your step-up editor.
Free too if you talk like a pirate Yarrr! Otherwise Apple are kind enough to slug you $30 for it =P

Was it the front or rear rim that copped the damage in the drop?
Any current pics of your road going setup prior to the wheel breakage?

[sn0wchyld]

Quicktime Pro is a good basic tool for conversion and cutting up .MOV and uploading to youtube. If you want to add anything more than that like titles and transitions or corrections, use it to convert to format of choice and go from there with your step-up editor.
Free too if you talk like a pirate Yarrr! Otherwise Apple are kind enough to slug you $30 for it =P

Was it the front or rear rim that copped the damage in the drop?
Any current pics of your road going setup prior to the wheel breakage?

Now that ive got the windows editor working in conjunction with a video converter I should be ok now thanks any way mate...

It was just the rear, lost a couple of spokes and a minor flat spot.

this
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=29373&start=30#p455676
is basically how it looks now... Ive added a cover for the wires and done a bit of general tidying up, but since Ill be building a new case soon Im not going to do too much more to the old one.





What do people use to protect their connections (namely those from the controller) from the eliments, and keep them all neat and tidy (ie hidden) For now I've just been using good ol' ducktape/electrical tape, but it then becomes a major chore to disconnect anything... Ive had a hunt around for some waterproof connectors but they dont exist locally, and I'd like to get this done in the next week rather than wait a month or more for shipping from china!

[sn0wchyld]

Well, its been a while since I added anything to this thread... but thats not to say I havent been busy.

Ive finally finished the new battery cases. Well, nearly. They're good enough to last me till the uni holidays in a couple of weeks time, when Ill polish 'em up and make 'em look all nice and pretty.

The upgrade to 24s is also complete (main reason for the new cases)... and it makes for a MUCH bigger egrin! this is the kind of performance I was hoping for in the first place. I havent done any speed tests yet, but the bike now pulls hard past 45+, where before it was getting a bit weak at 40.

The positioning of the batteries is much lower now too, and the whole case is thinner, making for a much nicer ride. The new seat makes it far more comfortable too (new meaning ripped off my 12year old bike!)

While I had the controller open to upgrade the Vsense I also upgraded the regen - new regen is about 100V, and its nice to have it from the time I leave my house rather than by the time ive gone to uni and half way back.

Ill have to keep a eye on the motor and controller, the controller seems to warm up allot quicker now and so I've removed its little case to allow better airflow. The motor doesnt seem to get notably more warm on the short couple of rides ive done so far, but a longer ride later this week might show some more heat. Neither has gotten anywhere near what I'd call 'hot' or even 'too warm' yet, I'd guess max of about 30-40deg or so (~18deg ambient).

So... some pics of how she looks now...


You can see the gap near the handlebars on the second pic that still needs to be filled in - after adding the padding between the case and the bike it ended up being a bit wider than initially mesured so I had to cut the lid in half and add a bit more width.

Otherwise just needs another coat of paint and a few extra bits to blend it into the frame and its done. Still need to tidy up the wires on the bike a bit, but I think I'll leave that till the holidays.

[deepfraught]

What do people use to protect their connections (namely those from the controller) from the eliments, and keep them all neat and tidy (ie hidden) For now I've just been using good ol' ducktape/electrical tape, but it then becomes a major chore to disconnect anything... Ive had a hunt around for some waterproof connectors but they dont exist locally, and I'd like to get this done in the next week rather than wait a month or more for shipping from china!

Some ideas... for connectors locally, try a motorcycle wrecker and see if they've got any old harnesses or bikes with damaged ones that you can poach relevant sized silicon/rubber sheathes used on those connectors. Look to the Japanese manufactured wrecks and not the Europeans for waterproofing electrics =D
Also check out marine supplies if you have any locally.
Once you have your physical protections, You can use Lanolin sprays (e.g. Inox, Lanox here) as a di-electric grease on the contacts, and plenty of other di-electric grease options to insulate the non-contacted points from corrosion and conducting.

[full-throttle]

Heres some pics of the new toy...

Love it!!

You even got the red one

Just remember to measure twice, cut once

[heathyoung]

The D8 is what full-throttle used for one of his builds IIRC.

Nice frame, and weldable. Bit of a bugger about the spokes though

[sn0wchyld]

The D8 is what full-throttle used for one of his builds IIRC.

Nice frame, and weldable. Bit of a bugger about the spokes though

yea im thinking ill just order a mx rim, ive found some around the 1.5kg mark, witch is heaver than i'd like, but they're solid as a rock and reasonably cheap. having a slightly smaller wheel + thicker rubber should help compinsate for the extra weight... will hopefully be a 23-24" wheel. I almost never go top speed anyhow. almost...

Not much news to report on this bike, apart from the spokes its been going great. I've been getting <15wh/km on a regular basis, sometimes lower than 10wh/km, with pealing. Its good fun on well surfaced trails/roads but offroad I have to take it so easy to aviod snaping spokes that its not as fun... so hopefully the mx rim and some 12g spokes will help.

Only thing ive changed is to upgrade the wireing for the balance leads. They were too long, and too thin, (some about 80cm long, and all about 32g or so) now its all 22g, and about 25cm at the most, using a 9pin vga plug for each 8s subpack.


Something that will be changing soon though is the side covers. Summers 'ere, its hot as hell, and I dont want to limit the power if I can help it... Thanks to 'oldhaq' im the proud owner of his burnt and fried HT motor. He really did a number on it, the windings are black as night and there is a number of shorts to the body of the motor. not to worry, I only wanted it for the 'spare' sidecovers and the chance to pull one open while still having one to ride.

Forced air is the plan, with a ring of little alluminium heat sinks that I got from DX (http://www.dealextreme.com/p/aluminum-cooler-heat-sink-chipset-for-ram-memory-w-type-8-piece-set-35816?r=79543430 right around the inside of the stator. I'm thinking ill use a disk of alluminium to help hold 'em against the stator + some thermal glue, and then mount the fans onto the disk. i found some pretty low profile blower fans on the bay that still throw out a fair bit of wind. should help keep things cool.

on another point ive started recieving parts for the d8 build - the thread can be found 'ere...
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=33657&start=45
So far I have the motors, and the lyen controller. sill need to get the gearbox, a ~1:1.2 belt drive for the 1st stage and the other usual parts that are needed before I can start putting it together. fortunately my old 5s packs from when I was running 20s are sill in good nick, so that'll do for a 10s20ah pack to start with!

Im also going to try my hand at fabing a magnetic torque limiter. I built a crude one out of timber as a test peice, and with a handfull of weak magnets and a hastily made build I got about .8nm breaking torque... I've got ideas now for a bit larger and higher quality alloy peice, that should be about 9cm in diamiter and 3cm wide, that should break at about 8-9nm, asuming ive calculated it right. It'll be interesting even if it doesn't work...

Ill try and rememver to get some photos/vids up soon too. its weird with the chesty mount gopro... I think I can hear my heart beat!!!

[sn0wchyld]

Finally!

http://youtu.be/ejh_9UWomGg
still uploading at the moment... about 2 hours to go. hopefully works out, its my first vid ive made, so just kinda hacked and thrown together.

1st scene is the old motor/rim setup. In hindsight I should have destroyed the tyre/tube, but at the time I wasnt sure if I was going to stick with the MX rim. That and the tyre got so tacky that doing a burnout became bloody hard... the bike just gripped and leapt forward! ah well... next time . The rest is all local riding with the MX rim and a mx knobby tire. Music by 3 inches of blood.


let me know what you think...




PS
Riding today it sounds like the barings are pretty much stuffed. anyone recommend where to get good quality replacements? pref in aus?






edit
a few quick shots of the 'new' setup... sorry for the crap quality, they're just pulled off the video. will get some good-er ones up later.

vlcsnap-2012-02-16-02h15m40s0.jpg (169.09 KiB) Viewed 712 times

vlcsnap-2012-02-16-02h15m17s197.jpg (166.04 KiB) Viewed 712 times

looks a bit weird with the 26" front, going to have to get a 24" i think...

[deepfraught]

Don't sweat the rear dia. Just looks like a 21in front 17in rear road trail bike.

[hydro-one]

GreaT bikE and GreaT ViDeo!!!!!!!

[fractal]

Good job!!! I like it!!! I cant wait to get mine up and running!!!

[MadRhino]

Nice vid. your trails are smooth.
You wouldn't like that small rear wheel here in the rough.

[sn0wchyld]

Don't sweat the rear dia. Just looks like a 21in front 17in rear road trail bike.

yea im trying to keep it looking as much like a normal push-bike as possible (cops )... though thats getting harder and harder.

Nice vid. your trails are smooth.
You wouldn't like that small rear wheel here in the rough.

its surprisingly not too bad... rock gardens and similar would be a different story but short of that it does fine so far (its effectively a 23"). pedal clearance is a bit of an issue though.

[deepfraught]

Re: push bike and cops, I kept mine to look like a normal bicycle with dorky panniers, but wouldn't suit your style of riding with no front weight for speed and too much rear for drop offs.
I know a local traffic cop M/C rider who has dealt with some local petrol powered bikes. They don't know power ratings etc. but when you're not pedalling and doing 60kph (because you removed the pedals), it shouts against the "primary drive by pedalling" rule for motor assist and then becomes an unregistered motor vehicle which he's confident in seizing etc. The dumb redneck attitude of "pig defiance" didn't help that guy's case either. Riding style correct for time and place, and a humble attitude in worst case should steer you safe. Don't do a runner, the fines system is an option, often anything that attracts a fine can also attract a court order, for when someone earns a pineapple =P

[sn0wchyld]

I can honestly say I am sick of hubs. To big, too heavy, to much maintenance. I think it'd be better if I could afford a way bigger/stronger shock than the current fox, or if I put some big effort/$ into weight reduction and hardcore mx rims... but with my budget its not really on the cards, and even if i did, the performance still couldn't match a non-hub (at least in outright suspension performance).

It was the last ride I had that finally got me to say 'enough'. I rode to uni, and before heading home had a little tear around the campus, which has plenty of stars/small drops etc to play with. Nothing too exciting, but I still managed to bash my rim so far out of true in just a few min of tearing around that it was almost unrideable. On the limp home after, one corner that I took at no more than 20km'h almost had me loosing the rear end the wobble was so bad... The whole ride home was like sitting on a giant vibrator. I'm not one to get motion sickness but I was feeling queezy within about 5 minutes. I'll freely admit some of this is due to the cheap ass mx rim I got, which seems to kink WAY to easily, but still... its more than a little annoying, and the lack of suspension performance is a constant dissapointment. it no longer glides down stairs, but bangs and bounces down them.

Needless to say, after exams there's going to be a big push to get both my D8 and my norko both running with mid drives. the D8 will likely get a BB drive, and the norko a left side 2 speed. hopefully I can make a more reliable system this way.

[fractal]

that totally sucks! I'm going to have to read a bit more on mid drives, I know nothing about them. Are you using the stock rear shock that came with the A-line (Fox DHX 3.0). What does it say on the spring? it should say : ... X 3.25. If it says 300 X 3.25, then maybe the coil is too soft????