Packcycle 2.5 (watercooling mods in progress)

[Link]

Nah, the batteryblock is ghetto enough to earn TWO 40s!

LOL, sounds about right for a mounting/masking tape SLA pack with a breaker and controller on it wired with 13ga (equivalent) speaker wire.


But this is all anyone sees when I'm riding it.


Won't even be that much when I cut a hole near the bottom to thread the wire through.

[ngocthach1130]

They don't even need to see the back pack at all. They sell vest where you can stick lead weights for weight training. Replace those with your lead battery. Weight train while you're off the bike and put it to good use once you're on it.

[TylerDurden]

They don't even need to see the back pack at all. They sell vest where you can stick lead weights for weight training. Replace those with your lead battery. Weight train while you're off the bike and put it to good use once you're on it.

Just don't wear it into a bank or a courthouse.

[Eric G]

Very nice work there Link!

Eric

[Link]

Nooooooooo...

...

I think I killed my batts. Took a ride down to the ATM and back before work yesterday. Didn't think it would use that much energy. Gave it a while to charge up. Didn't get them all the way up before work, but they should have been close to full charge. I have a little spare capacity anyway.

What I failed to consider was that the second charger was NOT 1.5A like I thought it was. It was a 1A charger. Meaning that, while the other batts might have gotten close to a full charge, the 24V sub pack (e.g. the friggin' NEW batts ) did NOT. Full speed normally is 31.6mph (according to my cheap but accurate cycle computer). By the time I was three or four blocks from work, top speed started dropping. Big time. Down to like just below 20mph.

I had hoped they weren't screwed up TOO badly, but it looks like it. With 50% more battery, I should be able to get to get there with more to spare than the old pack, which didn't even start to sag quite as badly. Now, though, I have to start babying the throttle a mile from my house. It's a friggin' 2.3 mile ride .

*sigh*

As much as I want a lithium pack, I can't really afford it right now. Well, I can, but I don't want to HAVE to afford it. I had hoped this pack would last me another two weeks or so.


On the other hand, the motor performs beautifully. Only gets pleasantly warm on even hot days. 72V on a BD36? Acceptable.

[kbarrett]

SLA sag freaks another rider ....



( You might want to baby them by dumping voltage down to 48 or even 36V. At those speeds wind resistance is going to eat those SLAs like candy. )

[Link]

The 48V pack is the same used on the Schwinn S40, which did 27mph on 48V in a 26" rim. They didn't like it, but they held up. The 24V pack is of higher quality than that. They should've been fine, and they were fine the first time I rode it (the time before I screwed them up ).

BTW, the Kreuzotter is still down, and the Wayback machine doesn't have a copy . Anyone have a copy of it in their internet cache?

[Link]

Random update:

I have a whole 13 miles on the new odometer. It got reset by accident when it had 4 on it though, so I've really done about 17, LOL.

These batteries are killing me. I have to really be careful if I'm going farther than like 2 miles. The farthest I can go is about 3.5 if I keep my speed to 20mph max and accelerate very softly. I think I have only like 70 or so whrs available to me. It sucks. Can't wait for the 72V 5Ah pack. I'll have to remove half the shunt to keep the batteries happy, but I have plenty of acceleration, anyway. I was drag-racing a guy on a sportbike from stoplights. He does a double-take at me like, "WTF?". He got away from me in the end (full throttles it when my batteries are almost dead), but it was still priceless.

[dogman]

Love your posts link, a lot of my fuzzy thinking I like to blame on paint stripper. That stuff goes into your skin, and straight to the blood and makes the brain think its smarter while cells die. Near my house there is a dead goat lately. it's realy dead and stuff, and my dogs love to roll in it when it's good and juicy.

[Link]

Official water-resistance rating: very.

Took a ride in the rain today (had to get back home from the bowling alley, LULZ). It was raining pretty hard. I got soaked. I'm still kind of damp. Big raindrops start to hurt at around 30mph .

No problems with the bike. I had already waterproofed the hall sensor in the throttle with some hot glue. I was a little worried about the battery/bike connector, but it didn't have problems even when soaked, either. Motor ran cold, of course .

[Link]

Ah, dammit. F*ck me. F*ck me with something hard and sandpapery.

So, I've managed to screw up charging them AGAIN. This time, I accidentally plugged the 48V charger into the 24V pack.

I got back from seeing how fast I could accelerate and plugged in the chargers like I always do. First thing that I noticed was that the 24V charger never went red; it thought the batteries were fully charged from the start. I didn't think too much of it, since it was a very short ride and the charger would only have to just top it off.

The thing should have been done in less than half an hour, but two hours later it was still charging. Huh.

Three hours later I'm like WTF why is this thing still charging. I felt the batteries to see if they were getting warm like they should be. The 48V pack was cold, and the 24V pack was quite warm. Then I realized there was a sizzling noise coming from the thing. I realized what had happened in a second and thought, You have got to be friggin' kidding me.

Apparently, the plug from the breaker to the batteries is NOT arranged the same way as the breaker to the controller, allowing me to effectively plug it in upside-down and switch the chargers around. So, basically, the two good batteries were being charged at 26V apiece and the crappy ones were sitting there slightly discharged for three hours.

Bloody hell. I'm stuck with this thing until I finish that lithium setup, and that's gonna take a while.

[ngocthach1130]

Big raindrops start to hurt at around 30mph .

Rain? Shit, rock hurt even worse. I was riding behind a truck the other day and we start heading into one section where the road was a little beat up. Damn truck wheel start hurling rock at me. It pelt me in the head. Rock hurt no matter what speed it was hurl at you. Worse when it is 30mph. Mental note, drafting behind truck is bad.

[monster]

buy some NiCd's they can take the abuse that us e-bikers WILL throw at them

[Link]

buy some NiCd's they can take the abuse that us e-bikers WILL throw at them

I've got 48V and 20Ah of half-dead duct-tape on the way.

[Drunkskunk]

buy some NiCd's they can take the abuse that us e-bikers WILL throw at them

I've got 48V and 20Ah of half-dead duct-tape on the way.

So you bought Dirtdad's pack? The half dead liFePO4s?
Wait, doesn't that make it a Half-Life pack?

[Link]

So you bought Dirtdad's pack? The half dead liFePO4s?
Wait, doesn't that make it a Half-Life pack?

I do believe that you just got served, Mr. Freeman.

[Link]

What have we here? A C'lyte 406?

This thing's pretty massy. Way more metal than the BD-36. I'm thinking I'll put some copper tubing in it and liquid cool it for the novelty. That and upgrade the puny phase wires. Anyone else done 5kW on a 400 series before?

[Ypedal]

Since you have that sucker apart..

If the bearings are loose in the side covers ( like if you can just push them out by hand ) consider a light smear of JB weld or other equivalent high temp epoxy on the outer race ( sticking the bearing permanently to the cover, but not to the motor side so the covers can be removed at some point in the future.. should you ever have to do that )..

Sometimes you get a good motor and the bearings are tight fitting and life is good.

[Link]

OH WHAT'S THIS?

http://www.hobbycity.com/hobbycity/stor ... oduct=7639

Hmm...it appears to be a 6s pack of lithium polymer destined for this here bike. Of course, being backordered, the two I ordered (and suitable Accucel-6 chargers/power bricks/lipo sack) could take a while to make their way here, not to mention a third battery/charger which will probably be ordered eventually. Not really a problem, though, since I have schoolwork to do. And I really need to clean up my garage; I don't even know where that 406 or those two sensorless conversion modules I planned to use are.

Oh yeah. Thanks to spending a couple hours going through that site learning how all the parts interact, I have approximately $150+$30 shipping in electric R/C plane parts lined up, too. *facepalm* Not that I really need another money/timesink hobby.

[Link]

So I mangled the axle today. By mangled I mean cut slots in them for some tube. FWIW, I doubt I'm going to be getting much water through a 0.17" ID hole. I would have LIKED to use the 1/4" ID tube, but I really don't think the axle could handle a pair of gouges that big in it. I'm going to be questioning its reliability as it is.

Reason I didn't drill it is because I haven't actually SEEN it in quite a while, and there's no way to actually get the bit to where I'd need the exit hole to be (behind where the bearing would sit). If I had a machine shop where I could press the axle out, that'd be different...



There's another gash on the other side. I'm going to be lucky to see 0.5gal/min through this thing.

Checked the bearings. I couldn't get them out without a mallet and screwdriver, I think.

Oh, and the batteries still aren't in stock. Friggin'...*drums fingers on table*

[nicobie]

I'm waiting for two of them too.

What are you planning to do about charging-BMS-LVC? I only bought one charger so I guess I'll have to separate them and charge one at a time. I also bought a couple of voltage monitors that are supposed to check eash cells voltage and sound an alarm if under or over the voltages you choose. The batteries are for a 22v boost pack on top of my 48v Ping.

Nick

[Link]

I bought a pair of Accucel-6's to go with them. I'll just have a jack stuck on the battery case (which will be vaccuformed 1/8" ABS covering the triangle) and charge them through that. The chargers balance the cells, so that takes care of that, and the controller should be able to handle LVC okay. Of course, since my ride should leave 20% charge left in them (which I hear is necessary if you want them to live a long time), I don't have much to worry about.

I was gonna get those monitors, too, but I had to redo my cart several times because I kept going, "Ooh, 2g micro motor...*add to card*...gonna need the 1g controller...*add to cart*...and I'll need...No, this is getting ridiculous *empties cart*". By the time I was actually ready to order them, I had totally forgotten about the monitors and filled the rest of the weight in my current shipping tier with a cheap infra-red themometer. Which I needed, anyway, so no big deal.

[Link]

Right...though I had to good fortune to discover some high-temp (500°F) repair putty (two part pseudo-epoxy stuff) to affix the metal disc to the stator, all I could find to make the disc out of was some unspecified (almost certainly steel) metal plated in zinc.

So, how's zinc fare in water?

I should actually be able to finish the hub and leave it to cure (a week I think is what the stuff calls for) tomorrow. And possibly finish putting together that vacuuform that's been sitting half-done in a corner for two months.

[docnjoj]

Hey Link!
Zinc is part of the galvanization process, so it should be OK in water.
otherDoc

[Link]

Sweet...I had figured it'd be more-or-less okay since one of the things it was specified for was gutter repairs.

I would have gotten the pipes attached to these today, but noise curfew around here is 10PM. Tomorrow, mebbe. Assuming I get a nap between...say...3 and 6AM.

Started by cutting a disc out of the metal.



Stuck it in the drill at a low speed to draw a perfect circle on it, which I cut along to make it more round.



Enlarged the hole in the middle to fit the axle through via Dremel and cutoff wheel.



Did it to another piece of metal.

Made marks on the discs where I needed the copper pipe to go and drilled them out. (They're not really round anymore, since I trimmed them to fit in the stator.)



You'll notice that for some reason, the drill bit I used likes to make Rouleaux triangles for holes. The pipe wouldn't fit through these, since they're less than 1/4" in diameter at points, so I ground them out real quick with an aluminum oxide cone.

This is as far as I've gotten at this point.



All that's left is to cut out a bunch of short lengths of copper pipe, bend them, solder them in place, putty the whole mess in place, and leave it alone.

Then I can finish the vacuuform while I wait for the batteries.