Specialized Big Hit + Crystalyte HS = :-)

[Jimbo]

Knoxie - Yes, sunny Bournemouth. I've just had a look at your I drive thread - very nice, come down with the GT when its done and we'll go for a hoon. I like the battery box by the way - from Wickes perchance?

DimGr - Crystalyte Europe, they were fairly helpful, a chap called Thijs seems to know his stuff. It's odd the CA isn't featured on their website yet.

[SamTexas]

Top Speed on my way to work today....50mph!!!!!

Wow! How stable, controllable is the bike at that speed?

[knoxie]

Knoxie - Yes, sunny Bournemouth. I've just had a look at your I drive thread - very nice, come down with the GT when its done and we'll go for a hoon. I like the battery box by the way - from Wickes perchance?

DimGr - Crystalyte Europe, they were fairly helpful, a chap called Thijs seems to know his stuff. It's odd the CA isn't featured on their website yet.

Ahh sunny Bournemouth! had many a fun weekend with the ladies there back when I was a lad! gotta take it for a sprint along the sea front to pool harbour would love to see some seaside sunny ebike videos , the GT thread is actually my buddy Greg, I got plenty of bikes to play with though, my X5 will hit 30mph easily any excuse for a bit of ebiking, looking forward to seeing more photos of the bike and some video.

[nicobie]

You sure about the display reading amps?

I got a new sensored controller direct from Kenny at Clyte that was wired for his display and wouldn't work with a REAL CA. When I took it apart to find out why and send pics to Justin to ask for advise, I discovered that it didn't have wires to the controller shunt so couldn't even do amp readings. I extremely doubt that you can change the controller amp limits with this display. I bet it needs you to tell it what amp controller you are running so it can GUESS how many amps you are using. It doesn't display how many amp hours are used so there is no way to accurately figure your range. It's probably like the throttles that have the 3 leds that aren't really useful to determine battery capacity left. It seems to do everything with voltage drop and we all know that's not useful with lipo .

I'd like to know how it determines % efficiency.

Does Kenny actually call it a "Cycle Analyst"?

[deecanio]

sweet i bet thats a barrel of monkeys to ride?
vids please

D

[Jimbo]

Nicobie,

Afraid I dont know who Kenny is mate. The documentation i have refers to it as an 'APM Display'. You can select the controller amp limit from anything from 0 to 50amps, hit enter and thats what it will draw - i've tested it and it does work. The display gives you a relatime current draw but it doesn't tell you how many AH you have used. It has a battery gauge but as you say im not sure how accurate this will prove to be.

I've no idea about the efficiency readout accuracy, have been more interested in the speedo thus far! It could be as basic as more current draw = less efficiency, will do a few tests to see how it reads.

Have a chat to the guys at Crystalyte Europe, im sure they will fill you in on the details if you ask.



Sam - its not bad, mind you i havent done any high speed cornering yet. Took it down to the local outdoor velodrome last night, ace fun getting up into the the top of the banked corners.


What do you guys use as a helmet cam? - Im in the market for one but haven't a clue as to whats decent, cheap and light.

Cheers

[Spicerack]

Go Pro cameras are just about the industry standard down here...

[dogman]

Go pro is the best, but you can rig a mount pretty easy for the 30 buck cams that are about cigarette lighter size. Just some kind of stiff material attached to the helmet at the right angle. Looks kind of like a quail topknot. Then a rubber band to attach the cheap cam.

[knoxie]

yes gopro for the win anything else (cheapo jobs like the oregon) you just wont be happy with, the contour HD is also a great camera looking forward to some videos from you though

[Craigh85]

Nice bike , well done
I also bought a big hit on a wimb recently, ebay £700 really happy with it off road, downhill ect.
shiver forks , 6 pot hope brakes front and rear .
My project plan is very similar, tho im thinking ht motor at 50amp 72v for off roading and a123 batt pack currently have 80cells saving to buy more.
cant wait to see vids of off your bike in action.

[kudos]

Hey Jimbo,

This is my first post on ES having been a lurker for about 4 months.

Just wanted to say your bike looks awesome, simply the best looking ebike I've seen and something I would really like to emulate.

Like many others I've been lurking here trying to learn enough to be able to make a decision on kit to go for, any more info on your bikes performance and setup would be great,

I live down in Guernsey, where our maximum legal speed limit is 35mph (please don't laugh!) and only 25mph on many roads too. So your 50mph is overkill for me.

I would be very interested to know how the HS motor handles hills. Guernsey is shaped like a wedge of cheese and I'm at the thick end, so every trip is downhill from my house and uphill on the way home. We're only talking an elevation of approx 100metres but hill-climbing ability would be more important to me than top-speed. So mabye the HT would be better for me.

Once again, nice one.

Kudos

[dogman]

You want the ht. Speed winding motors used with less volts and big diameter wheels don't climb as well as slow windings with the same setup. Ht, plus 48v 35 amp controller should be a decent choice, plus a good strong battery as he used. Your battery can be a bit smaller. I was thinking you had an ES guy on your island, but Niel P is from Jersey. Similar problems, but he just went for speed anyway. Might look at his threads.

[sn0wchyld]

Hi all,
.......




....

Stunning mate, just stunning. Love the paint job. What type of paint/colour did you use? that thing must handle beautifully with all the weight that low.

[kudos]

You want the ht. Speed winding motors used with less volts and big diameter wheels don't climb as well as slow windings with the same setup. Ht, plus 48v 35 amp controller should be a decent choice, plus a good strong battery as he used. Your battery can be a bit smaller. I was thinking you had an ES guy on your island, but Niel P is from Jersey. Similar problems, but he just went for speed anyway. Might look at his threads.

Thanks for info dogman, really appreciated.

I didn't know there was another Channel Islander on ES, I will indeed look up his posts. We have the same terrain.

Can someone point me in the direction of where to learn about lipo batteries with regard to ebikes, I don't know what the 's' and 'P' stand for (serial & parallel?), how they are connected and charged etc.

Scratch that - I just found the info in a sticky....

Cheers,
Kudos

[oatnet]

Nice, Clean, elegant build.

How deep are the dropouts on it? I did a build on a similar frame layout (specialized enduro comp 130); while I really like the bike, the dropouts were really short. I'm looking for a similar frame with deeper dropouts for a future project.

-JD

[Ypedal]

if it's a solid axle ( clyte for example.. dont to it with 9C type hollow axles ) you can dremel out the threads and a bit more on top of the axle to make it go deeper into the dropouts !!

[Beavinator]

That's one of the nicest bikes I've seen in a while! Very clean looking! You did an awesome job on this one.

[Spacey]

Nice build Jimbo, have to hit you up for a ride someday

Looks like you won't be up for swapping motors then lol, I 'm thinking of swapping my HS3540 for an HT3540 as I just don't need the top speed but could do with some more torque.

Get some of those torque arms from Doc Bass on this forum, I've got them on my Greyborg. Watch the regen with these motors as the axle is more 'round' than it should be for staying tight in dropouts.

[Jimbo]

A few more piccies i've taken so far.
















So far she is holding up reasonably well, a few niggles needed sorting, nothing horrendous though.

The on / off switch on the controller is really cheap and nasty, add to that the fact that i've put it in probably the worst place for catching crap and it didn't take long to pack up. Now replaced with a nice IP67 jobbie. I've added some ALI plate over the controller as well to protect it from stones and such.

The anderson connectors are proving to be a bit crap - getting harder and harder to connect / disconnect. I want a nice big connector with all the balance leads and everything in so its super easy to charge.....not having much luck finding a connector with 24 pins for balancing + 8 pins in 10 gauge for the power. Maybe i need to sort myself out with a decent bulk charger.

The battery boxes are bolted to a formed aluminium top hat section i poached from the skip at work - aerospace grade 2024....nice. Had to replace the original zip ties with some mac daddy size ones as routing them through the rather sharp holes in the tinwork isnt great, but so far i've hammered it as hard as i can and its been fine. Added some kevlar frame protection so i dont rub the paint as well.

Overtook a mate in his car on the way to work the other day - the look of his face was priceless. Funny thing is im pedaling more and more as well though. Partly to keep the range up which is about 25 pedaling, 15 if i ride it like a motorbike, but also as i kinda enjoy the workout of hacking 32KG of iron around....must be mad.

Top speed so far 54. Down a big hill mind, and the Sat nav said it was actually 51.

Bring the Hoon!

[ohzee]

That is one nice looking bike. I also love the way you have the batteries / controller on her.
Early next year I am going to be upgrading my bike count. Gonna add this model to my list
when shopping. Thanks for the pic any videos of you opening her up ?

[Garrick_s]

VERY nice.
I have looked at the "Big Hits" too but passed due to limited frame space.
I like what you did.
Maybe move the controller to that small opening in the frame? will it fit? (looks like it would)

My questions to you are....
Who laced the rear wheel / hub for you?
What gauge spokes did you use?
What brand/type of rim did you choose?

Did Crystalyte do it all for you?

Good job and good idea wearing MX gear
I know I do.

[kudos]

Jimbo,

Have you had much of a play around with the APM display to limit current/speed etc ? Any good?

Off the back of your build I've ordered the same kit from Crystayte-europe, only I've gone for the 36V/48V Controller for now.

I can see this new hobby could be expensive

Kudos

[nechaus]

Great job.

looks so damm nice, well done, well done!!!

If thats your first ebike build you have put me to shame haha

[kudos]

Jimbo,

Two quick questions about your LiPo setup.

I see you're using 4 x 4500mah 10S1P bricks arranged in a 20S4P configuration (I think! I'm a LiPo noob)

What discharge C rate did you go for?

I see you can get:
25-50C
35-70C
45-90C

Also what charger/balancer do you use?

Cheers,
Kudos

[Jimbo]

Hey all,

Garrick,
Yes i did want to put the controller in the frame, but its just a bit too big, grrrr. I was gonna mount it on the triple crown on the front forks....seemed a bit crap though.
I bought the kit ready to go from Crystalyte. The motor was in the hub, all i did was wack a tyre on it and bolt it into the frame. Even the torque arm just bolted straight on, very easy indeed. The wheel is holding up well so far, no idea of spoke gauge but it seems robust enough.

Kudos,
Yeah you can program the amp draw on the controller - i set it to 10A for a bit just to see what it was like - lame - its been set on the full 50 ever since. I have run the batteries completely flat once, and the display / controller does limit current draw towards the end of the battery life, which is good to know. You can program the voltage cut-off as well - nice if you upgrade batteries.
You are nearly right about the batteries - 4 x 4500AH 10S1P bricks connected up to give 20s2P - 84V at 9AH fully charged. I got the 25-50C discharge rate since i can only pull 50A through the controller = just over 5C for a 9AH pack. didn't seem worth spending the extra on the higher C rating.
I'm using a JP EN.ER.G quad pro charger. It does 4 packs of up to 6S at once, so i charge one 20s1p pack and then the other after. takes about an hour and a half for each 20s1p pack. Not great but it does the job - some decent bulk charging is next on the upgrade list.

Good luck with the build!