First, I was searching for a scooter as many of may know. The main search thread(i.e., cry for help) can be found here. I used the information there so graciously provided by Fechter, Iberkt, and others along with my own internet research and using the following criteria.
swbluto previously wrote:-Foldable such that the smallest dimension, not including the handlebars, is less than 13".
-Less than 35 lbs. without batteries(and if the motor is honkin' heavy, like more than 5 lbs, than less than 30 lbs w/o motor.)
-Carrying capacity of 200 lbs. or more.
-Enough room to install a 1000-2000 continuous watt high-enough torque motor *easily* enough(Meaning, doesn't require welding or skilled mods), that possibly being an outrunner.(Top speed of ~15 mph OK, as long as it can climb 7% hills at >9 mph.)
-Must be able to have pneumatic tires installed, even if it means replacing the rim(assuming it can). Pneumatic tires are for the rainy climate that I'll be living as hard wheels don't too well as they slip and Roth's Motorboard's "friction drive" just doesn't operate correctly in(Which kind of stinks since it seemed to be perfect in almost every other way.).
-Less than $400, or $550 with suspension. If it already comes with the high-powered motor and batteries to satisfy desired future performance specs, then I could go up to 1500 depending on the scooter.
-The frame, rims, wheels, and belt/chain are durable. Motor and batteries are not of a concern as those are going to be replaced.
-Durable brakes: "Band brakes" aren't ideal. I'm heavy, I'll be riding in wet weather and I'll be going kind of fast and band brakes, quite frankly, suck with those combined factors.
The idea was that it'd be small enough to take aboard a bus(Which I frequent for long-distance travels, meaning >9 miles, or when my electric bicycle is out of commission like is at this exact moment and for the next month and a half.) and light enough to reasonably carry.
From that, I compiled a list which itself manifested in several eBay search strings that I saved using "eBay's favorite searches" feature. Basically, if a new listing shows up under that your search string(query), they'll email you the results. Since it seems all the electric scooters that qualified didn't exist now-a-days, I had to search for used electric scooters on eBay and craigslist didn't really work out for me since Electric Scooters aren't so hot here in the snowy rugged inland Pacific north-west and I couldn't find a cooperative seller in California given the craigslist warning of "DEAL LOCALLY!".
Now I wonder if I should give out these search strings as I might use them in the future and I wouldn't want the increased competition..
But, I reason if I'm dissatisfied with the current electric scooter, I'll probably give up the electric scooter idea altogether.Search strings:
(701,705,"HCF701", "HCF 701","HCF-701","X-treme 140","xtreme 140","x140","Wahlinger","Whalinger","fx1","fx 1","fx-1","zz","rad2go cruiser","HCF705", "HCF 705","HCF-705","HFC701", "HFC 701","HFC-701","HFC705", "HFC 705","HFC-705", zappy, zap, "xport", "x port", "mini e", "viza") scooter -bearings -bearing -belt -3ez -"zappy 3" -"zap 3" -"gas scooter"
("bladez", "blade z") (lite, elite)
There seems to be a qualified listing about once or twice a week, so it was only a matter of time. And... then... I found it! The Viza Volt for a total cost of $70! Upon receiving it, I found out that its "drum brake" is actually a band-brake so I'm a bit miffed by that. I'll be changing that to disc brakes eventually, if everything else goes well. Also, it seems a little difficult to fold as it feels like the folding hinge "gets stuck" or something like that. I tried taking it apart to identify the exact problem but it didn't seem like the "sticking" problem surfaced until it was all completely assembled, so it's like a ... "I dunno".
Anyways, I tried it out and it... sucked. It did okay in dry weather, although slowly, but it kept cutting out in wet-weather(It does that when the scooter is too slow for 2-3 seconds, and the rain and wet road wasn't helping out its speed) so I decided to upgrade. I decided to buy an out-runner and scavenged my electric bike's crystalyte equipment for the throttle and controller since it's out of commission and going to be so for a while. Also, if this "experiment" fails(it's an experiment if it does, otherwise, it was just an excellent build of mine.
), my financial loss will be limited to the motor and the scooter.Here's the viza volt's official page.
I ordered this motor:
Here's what it looked like after I drilled a hole in it. To drill the hole, I had to file a flat spot and ended up hammering a dent in the flat area, and then used three vises to secure the motor's shaft under the drill press for drilling. To keep heat low, I just drilled with very light pressure and it did take a long time(~10-20 minutes).
It came in a package that was labeled "Toy Parts" in the customs declarations and had a declared value of $14.84.Interestingly, the motor has a sticker with "Turnigy" with another title line below that being "AERODRIVE xp" and then the line below that contains "C6374-200". I guess there's some relationship between turnigy and HXT? The shipping was $24.99 and the motor came in about 4 business days.
Anyways, test results! For the resistance, I used a HY1803D power supply to provide a constant current source and then I used my multimeter to register the voltage drop across the different phases, and then used Ohm's law to calculate the resistance. This is equivalent to the "4 wire method" that's popularly used to measure very low resistances with accuracy. Y is Yellow, R is red, and B represents the black wire with YB being the yellow-black phase, YR being the yellow-red phase, and RB being the red-black phase.
Seems fairly consistent and is lower than I expected at about .035 ohms(I'm trying to account for the affect of high windage temperature and am setting my expectations relatively low!). I was expecting something like .4 ohms based on another person's data, but I guess the affect of the controller, wires and contacts was much greater than I assumed.
But, during a certain part of the rotation, there's a soft rubbing sound and there seems to be "smooth" resistance at that point of the rotation as opposed to the normal "clunkiness" due to the magnets. I looked around it to see if there was any point of contact, but I couldn't find any. Upon closer inspection, it almost sounds like wires rubbing.
Anyways, I continued on with the build! I tried working up a wooden motor mount as no mounting equipment I had seemed like it work well with the existing aluminum mount that was used for the previous, much larger motor. Ended up getting the belt a bit too slack, so I re-cut out the appropriate wooden parts to get the right shape. After that, it was nice and tight.
I originally put the controller right next to the scooter's handle-bar shaft, but decided it might be better to conceal it as it was kind of ugly and conspicuous with the black duct tape. I also thought that using the original battery box would've been a good idea to absorb belly-impacts to protect the airplane-aluminum frame, so I stuffed the Crystalyte controller in the battery box and added pieces of my own neoprene material to absorb any shock. I had the neoprene material left over from using it in my sound-proof box for the drywall pressed against the wooden frame.
Since the motor is angled downwards, the motor's body would've been pressing against the brake line(It naturally did with the older motor), so I secured it down to the bottom to clear the spinning outrunner. It clears it by about 1/4-1/8" of an inch.
After that, I installed the Crystalyte throttle onto the handlebars(they're removable, so that was super easy.) and also the Cycle Analyst. With the throttle, I added a potentiometer to the throttle line to decrease the signal to half the voltage so 100% throttle corresponded to 2 volts(100% throttle seemed to correspond to 4.25 volts before hand). Since the input impedance of the original throttle is so freaking high, I had to use the highest valued pot I had of 1 Mega-ohm to get any decent resolution(With 100K, just nudging it by 1 degree caused it to go from 4.25 volts to .3 volts.). I did this so that the highest voltage that the motor would see would be less than 24 volts as the motor was rated for ~36 volts max and my ping 1.0 48 volt battery puts out 51-52 volts. On the cycle analyst, I also limited the current to 10 amps to limit the amount of motor heating. I planned to put the battery in a back-pack and just ride with a wire sticking out my back-pack.
For testing, I hooked up some of my lead acid batteries for 24 volts and used a rubber band to hold down the throttle and then revved up the back wheel using a belt sander. I had a pedal-first controller, so this would work. At 100% throttle, the motor was pulling 6-7 amps! I thought maybe a lot of the energy was going towards drive-train losses(but all the parts seemed to be at a reasonable temperature), but even deducting a reasonable two amps for that left a no-load-current of 4 amps. According to my simulation program, that means it has a peak efficiency at around 75-80 percent. Anyways, the tests performed flawlessly although the entire set-up seemed a little noiser then my crystalyte system on the bike.
So I packed the 48v ping battery in the back-pack and used some extra-lengthy wire to hook it up. I limited the current to 10 amps to limit the heat generated by the motor so I wouldn't cook it. It was ~32 degrees outside, dark and there was frost on the road, so that was reassuring to know. It weighed 25 lbs, I weigh 174 pounds and the battery weighed 10 pounds, so this is about 210 pounds it was carrying about. It sped up the 2-3% hill at ~10 mph and I turned right. On a flat area, I lost track of its speed as the cycle analyst seems to lose track of its speed after the scooter goes about 13 mph, but it felt like it was going about 15-17 mph. After zooming to 15+ mph, (the road was mildly bumpy), the scooter felt like the motor was rumbling and the scooter was rapidly slowing... it kind of felt like it was braking. Thinking it might have been the kick stand I left down, I kicked it backed and went off again and it did the same thing almost immediately at "100% throttle". I inspected the scooter using the flashlights I had on-hand there seemed to be no evidence of a magnet coming loose, everything was clear, the belt was still on, the timing pulley was nice and secure, the motor was "room temperature" warm, and the motor's phase wire's banana plug seemed like it was slowly coming out. After pushing it back in, I went off again, and started going down the road. After speeding up a bit, it briefly did it again, disappeared... and then once going home going about 13 mph, it rumbled for an extended amount of time. I reinspected the phase lines and they seemed plugged-in. So... now I have to diagnose that issue.
But, I'm post-poning testing and diagnosis until tomorrow(or the day after) when it's lit outside.
For the future, I'm planning on making things a little bit more "water proof" so that's to be seen. I was also trying to add small wire meshing to the outrunners holes to try to keep particulates and debris out but it didn't seem like the loctite glue I had worked too well in securing it to the motor's casing and I didn't have any other ideas. I'm also planning on adding a123s to the battery box and an RC controller(I'm eying the castle creation products) in the original plastic control-board box so the total weight factor at that point should be around 30 lbs.
... yeah, the whole vehicle slightly vibrates when this happens. That happened for about half the test ride, and there was no particular speed or sets of speeds which this was initiated. I coincidentally noticed it started once when going over a small bump, but it has started when going over perfectly smooth road, and I've gone over many "severe" bumps without it starting up, so I don't think it's directly related to bumps in the road (But I should find a really smooth long spot to entirely rule out bumps.).
