Greyborg Cromotor Hubzilla motors, Sold Out

[zombiess]

I worry somewhat about the 14mm vs 16mm axle change. Seeing how some high powered crystalytes' axles have failed, I wonder if a 16mm would be more appropriate. what do you think?

Sorry zombiess, i hate throwing anything negative into a for sale thread, but i completely agree with hillsofvalp here.
This motor could easily put out 200ft-lb or more. A 14mm axle is going to be a weak spot for this motor.

I hope 16mm axles can be offered as an option, or aftermarket part.
A wider torque plate/arm won't help, the failure on high powered crystalytes occurred where the axle meets the bike's dropouts, not afterwards.

Prove my skepticism wrong, please!

Not sure exactly how to prove what you want. I sure as hell am not going to try and purposely destroy an axle on a motor I have to sell to get my money back because of pure speculation. If you are interested in seeing what happens, just wait until my drag bike is finished which will hopefully be before the Grange race. Not sure if it's going to wheelie or not with the long swing arm (20" longer than stock, 58" axle to axle), but if it can take a WOT hit from a dead stop it's going to produce 350 ft/lbs of torque on the 14mm axle. This is dumping 21KW into the controller. I'm not worried about it and I doubt anyone else will be trying to do something this crazy with one of these motors. Then again, I have more to prove than anyone else, especially since I'm the only person posting videos and examples of what they can do. I wonder what happened to the other 19 motors sold to USA customers, I've only seen one video so far besides mine.

Comparing this to a Crystalyte is also silly. The only thing in common is that they have 14mm axles and are 3 phase BLDC motors. Without any context such as how the other motors were installed, what kind of materials were used, weight, torque /etc/etc /etc it means nothing. Worrying about a 14mm axle on this motor because someone with a Crystalyte broke their 14mm axle is like worrying that this motor will have wiring issues because a bunch of Crystalyte motors did. Doesn't make any sense unless something happens, then it needs to be studied to see why it failed. I could probably break my 16mm axle by just installing my motor improperly. If installed without the flat parts flush against a torque arm/plate you can create a shear that will cut an axle if the metal is hard enough and has play in the dropout/torque arm/plate. I've heard stories of Ampedbikes torque arms cutting into axles, yet I use them on several bikes with high powered 9 continent setups and they don't even hurt the threads because they are installed correctly. 9C axles are also 14mm on most motors and one end is hollow and thin, yet I haven't read of them breaking. You must have proper context and knowledge before making generalized statements such as "A 14mm axle is going to be a weak spot for this motor" unless you've done a conclusive proper destructive test or at least an stress analysis after knowing the material and forces in play as well as the mounting method.

I can tell you that when I got my motor and realized it has 16mm axles it was a real pain in the ass to figure out how to get torque arms on it. If I didn't have access to fabricators my motor would have been sitting unused for a lot longer because I can't fabricate with metal.

Sometimes I wonder if people on this forum are building motorcycles or bicycles? I'm doing crazy stuff because I'm proving what it's capable of, but when I ride I rarely exceed 35 mph and I sure don't try to go WOT from a dead stop with the power I have, it will flip me over backwards before I know what happened.

Greyborgs goal which has been stated many times is to have a motor that can withstand hard use, hill climbing and makes a great commuter. If you want to get extreme, then you need to be willing to make extreme mods and also pay the price if you make an illegal electric bicycle. Most people wanted longer axles, including me and I'm guessing the factory couldn't supply longer axles in 16mm so this is what we have. The first batch that was sold had some pretty short axles which made installations tricky on some bikes (including mine). Even now one side of my motor uses a nut that's half the size of the stock one in order to fit with all the threads. A 14mm axle is going to work fine unless you want to do something really extreme and at that point you should probably purchase a motor that uses another type of axle.

Any images of new frames?

Sent using Endless-Sphere Mobile app

Will be in a separate thread when info is ready.

***********************************************************
Added another video to the front page of a friend riding my bike doing some high speed flybys while I was taking video. Bike really moves.

[hillzofvalp]

We can look at it more positively in the respect that the axle will have no hollow center of axle channel (didn't crystalytes have that?). If you are willing to provide your 16mm version to anyone, such as me, let me know, cause i have ginormous dropouts. I'm still going to get whatever you offer.

Any thoughts re: Justin?

[nicobie]

You must have proper context and knowledge before making generalized statements such as "A 14mm axle is going to be a weak spot for this motor" unless you've done a conclusive proper destructive test or at least an stress analysis after knowing the material and forces in play as well as the mounting method.

Ain't that the truth!

A person has to be careful reading some posts as there is a lot of speculation and unsupported opinions in a bunch of these threads.

[zombiess]

You must have proper context and knowledge before making generalized statements such as "A 14mm axle is going to be a weak spot for this motor" unless you've done a conclusive proper destructive test or at least an stress analysis after knowing the material and forces in play as well as the mounting method.

Ain't that the truth!

A person has to be careful reading some posts as there is a lot of speculation and unsupported opinions in a bunch of these threads.

Well here is one that isn't speculation as I received word from Greyborg and HAL9000v2.0 who is an engineer and says these are perfectly fine just as I said. The 14mm axles with 10mm flats have a engineered rating of 5000 kg load.

[auraslip]

I think some people saw docs torque arm cut into his x5 axle and assumed that the mild steel these axles are made with just can't handle the power we put through them. Of course the problem is that a 1/4" of hard steel vs. 1/4" of mild axle steel is gonna fail. If you spread the load along the axle you won't have a problem with the drop outs cutting into the axle.

[chroot]

@Zombiess check this out the review. viewtopic.php?f=4&t=37725

[zombiess]

@Zombiess check this out the review. viewtopic.php?f=4&t=37725

Looks like a tamer more controllable version of my race bike but with more amps. I'm guessing they are running 24 or 26" wheels. I love these motors, but on my 20.2" wheels it can get sketchy with the power turned up. Crazy amounts of power. This is why I back accountant about not making any more powerful than this one. Want to go faster, just up the volts.

Thanks for the link. These motors are probably the king of bicycle hub motors unless someone comes out with something even more ridiculous. Best part is you turn down the amps and run 72V and you have a super solid fast reliable commuter or you can do what these guys did and crank the volts and amps up and get silly.

[hillzofvalp]

Gosh though... What kind of range do people horsing around get with these settings? 7-10 miles maybe with 1kWh? I'm just saying. I want it. I also want higher energy density chemistries.

I can't wait to post results of this motor at 66V in a 29" wheel--- I would bet with the same settings (55A/120A) it will be nearly the same range, given how inefficient it is to overpower a 9C

P.s. I wish you had motors this week cause my gf is in Vegas!

[Deutch420]

I'm confused. 125 volts at 200 amps and he only gets a maximum draw of 9kw according to the CA. ???? 125v at 200amps should provide up tp 25kw, no?
Also, holy voltage sag Batman! He goes from 125v down to 103v wile consuming 9kw. A lot of sag. I wonder how much sag he would see if he pulled 25kw. Lol. Why 22v of sag under wot when hes only hitting it with 70 or sk amps? (125v @ 70amps = 9kw which is what the CA displays under wot). Also, 30s pack, charged fully to 4.2 is 126v. Of tjat 126 volts u can consume 21v (if hot off the charger) (.7v x 30 = 21. (4.2 - 3.5v)). So with that said, shouldnt his LVC be set to 105v ish? Appears his voltage sag is so bad that even at a full charge , when he goes wot he is a few volts below where his LVC should be. Is it safe to go wot when ur voltage sag brings you down to 3.4v?

[zombiess]

I'm confused. 125 volts at 200 amps and he only gets a maximum draw of 9kw according to the CA. ???? 125v at 200amps should provide up tp 25kw, no?
Also, holy voltage sag Batman! He goes from 125v down to 103v wile consuming 9kw. A lot of sag. I wonder how much sag he would see if he pulled 25kw. Lol. Why 22v of sag under wot when hes only hitting it with 70 or sk amps? (125v @ 70amps = 9kw which is what the CA displays under wot)

My guess is he is using a Kelly controller and quoting the phase amp settings he is running, not the battery amp setting like the Xie Chang boards. Based on his voltage sag and KW he's pulling close to 90-100A out of the battery 10KW/104V = 96A which it doesn't like at all! Notice when he lets off the voltage pops right back up into the mid 120's? Batteries must be really high resistance.

[zombiess]

Sorry guys, I thought I was going to be able to drop the price down a little but I'm going to officially have to lock in the price at $595 Just too many middle men taking percentages and the shipping is costing more than expected.

[Alan B]

Still a good price for this special motor. The savings on shipping alone ordering stateside will be worthwhile.

Of course I ordered mine the hard way, but it is here, but I'm waiting for rims.

And time to get the frame all put together. But the parts are piling up.

[zombiess]

Still a good price for this special motor. The savings on shipping alone ordering stateside will be worthwhile.

Of course I ordered mine the hard way, but it is here, but I'm waiting for rims.

And time to get the frame all put together. But the parts are piling up.

I've already got some shipping quotes from FedEx Ground, to NY, NY from Las Vegas, it's a little less than $50 and 5 days.
To San Francisco it's under $30 and arrives in 1-2 days.

Much cheaper than the $845 total I paid for my motor. You should see the shipping bill I have to pay just to get the motors to me here, over 1000lbs coming Air Freight + what ever customs is going to want so I can get these out to everyone as fast as possible.

[oatnet]

Much cheaper than the $845 total I paid for my motor.

You should have asked me to sweeten up Accountant for you. Mine only cost $665.16, although my bank charged me $30 for an international money order, so $695 total with shipping and payment.

I assume PayPal fees are on top of the $595 price? So final cost to someone in vegas would be right around $665.00?

-JD

[zombiess]

Much cheaper than the $845 total I paid for my motor.

You should have asked me to sweeten up Accountant for you. Mine only cost $665.16, although my bank charged me $30 for an international money order, so $695 total with shipping and payment.

I assume PayPal fees are on top of the $595 price? So final cost to someone in vegas would be right around $665.00?

-JD

I'm not charging paypal fees. Price listed is price paid + shipping cost. Price to someone in Vegas would be $595 and hopefully they would pick it up to save themselves shipping.

I think that's what I paid but now you have me questioning my memory. Gotta go look at the old invoice. Bank charged me $45 for the transfer. I just remember kinda choking on the number a little since I'm usually pretty tight fisted and this was a gamble for me at time.

*edit* found the old invoice, it was 527 Euros shipped (about $695 USD) + my bank got me for $45 for the wire transfer + money conversion.

[hillzofvalp]

Zombiess, I ran into some extra funds so I should be on time with the majority of others preordering. My 9C is beginning to blacken . I cannot wait for this beast on my boat of a 29er! I might be able to take on my friends dual AC motorcycle with 4kWh of lipo amongst the roads of this campus town (not). Really need to find some good rubber for this thing

[justin_le]

I know they are standup guys, but having the motor data in the simulator woulda be awesome.

Hey guys, I've done enough testing of the 205mm dia 23 pole motors now that I could probably generate a pretty accurate set of motor parameters for the simulator without even seeing or dyno testing one.

I am guessing that this is the same stator lamination pattern as the 9C hubs but with a 50mm wide lamination stack and magnet width, instead of the 24, 27, or 35mm which are normally used in ebike hubs?
If that's the case, then I would only need to know

a) The exact KV value in RPM/V
b) The full throttle / no load current draw at 2 different voltages, (like no load current at 24V and no load current at 48V)
c) The room temperature winding resistance, found by putting a 10A through the windings with a regulated DC power supply and then measuring the voltage drop across the leads
d) The number of winding turns per pole (so I can calculated/estimate the phase inductance)
e) Total weight of the hub (used in the thermal modelling)

If you can get me this info, then I'd be game to try getting a proto version up on the simulator, and then let you guys tell me if it seems to match pretty well to the real world performance. Then later on when we can get one in our hands to dyno test, we'll put the actual data up with what was "predicted" and see how close or far it was. It would be a fun public testing of methodologies.

-Justin

[Accountant]

Once more time ;


It is about using different materials, not about the windings.


Cromotor is different than 2X NC, it just looks simmilar from outside, and that are all simmilarities.

[hillzofvalp]

Then we can probably safely assume the simulator is true for at least the above approximations, maybe more. Getting at least a ball park graph would be very useful

[teklektik]

Once more time ;
It is about using different materials, not about the windings.
Cromotor is different than 2X NC, it just looks simmilar from outside, and that are all simmilarities.

Accountant-

So work with us here - your cost for motors is inconsequential from a business perspective and not having this motor in Justin's simulator is cutting into your sales. Get a couple to Justin for testing and eliminate the mystery.

This thread is about wheelies, custom controllers, flipping the bike, taming the beast, going 60+mph and oh, yeah, it's good for commuters, too. Your sales plan calls for data on non-mega-controllers and lower voltages to come from customer anecdotes. Commuters, grocery-getters, and family car replacements are undoubtedly your largest potential market demographic and are largely being ignored. Many folks are looking for a high torque workhorse for multi-purpose daily use and aren't focused on a warp speed drag bike (e.g. V6 mini-van...).

The ebikes.ca simulator is the Underwood Labs, the JD Powers of bike motors. It's the place folks go for 'What if?'. The comparative nature of this simulator cannot be matched by dedicated product or build-specific simulation or test results. Eventually, some information will leak out from customer reports about your motor but the value will be build-specific and the test procedures nowhere close to those of Justin's. 'What if?' design questions will still be guesswork.

At some point, sales may ramp up, but you certainly must realize that there is no proprietary technology involved in producing this motor. If it garners a respectable market share and there is money to be made, imitators will arise without difficulty. I would think that you would like to achieve as much product visibility, market penetration, and customer support/loyalty as soon as possible. That means aggressively enabling sales, not a vague plan of word-of-mouth tales by customers. You shot yourself in the foot when you released information of another (possibly better) commuter motor (also with no specs), which further clouded the picture and undoubtedly killed some sales of this motor.

So - take the mystery out of this motor. Justin is offering to help you - help him to help us and work with him. Get it tested.

From ebikes.ca simulator page

Can you add motor XXX or YYY to the list?
Doing a full characterization of a hub motor takes a lot of our time and also requires destructive testing to understand the thermal limits. To add a new motor we require

• a) that it is readily available as a motor only and without an integrated controller (so no BionX), and
• b) that we are given for keeping two samples of said motor, one for destructive test and the other to keep on hand as reference should we ever need to repeat tests, and
• c) that it is sufficiently popular amongst DIY ebike conversions to be of value to have listed.

[zombiess]

Maybe some of you other guys might like this data I sent to Justin.

A) Measured the KV in this video with tube and tire on a sensorless controller at 50.2V and got 9.33kV@50.2V with wheel and tire. It's rated at 9.5kV so without spinning the motor itself and then measuring the voltage generated I guess this is as close as we'll get.

B) 125V is 2.2A with my 20" bmx wheel with 16" moped tire/tube, in the video above I believe we were around 1.3A at 50V in that video.

C) Just used 4 wire Kelvin method to measure it at 74mOhm, this is excluding the phase wires which I measured separately and then subtracted from the total (80mOhm measured, then measured and equal length of the same wire at 3mOhm and multiplied times 2 since there are two phase wires). I checked all phases. Motor is 18x4 winds but I don't know the exact wire gauge.

D) standard version is 4 winds

E) motor is 22.4lbs / 10.18Kg

OH, and here is the esim file to use in SWBlutos simulator which I posted a while ago which works pretty good. I just updated it with the correct winding resistance. I had it at 60mOhm because that's where I had estimated it would be, turns out I was close. This file has it updated to 74mOhm
http://dynamic.opticalanarchy.com:8080/zombie/bike/greyborg/hubzilla.esim

This thread is about wheelies, custom controllers, flipping the bike, taming the beast, going 60+mph and oh, yeah, it's good for commuters, too. Your sales plan calls for data on non-mega-controllers and lower voltages to come from customer anecdotes. Commuters, grocery-getters, and family car replacements are undoubtedly your largest potential market demographic and are largely being ignored. Many folks are looking for a high torque workhorse for multi-purpose daily use and aren't focused on a warp speed drag bike (e.g. V6 mini-van...).

teklektik, most of the people buying this motor want it because they are after high power, plain and simple. If I ride it like a normal commuter averaging 20mph with a top speed of 40mph (stop and go a few times) for a about 3.5 miles of a 10 mile commute I average about 55WH/Mile and I'm not trying to save battery at all, see blow post for a comparison I did. Right around the same as I did on my 9C 2806 in a 20" setup except this motor never gets hot on the commute.

Many people don't understand the graphs the simulators produce anyways from reading many posts on here and assume if you ride at less than 100% throttle you get bad efficiency from a hub motor which isn't the case. It would be nice to have this motor in Justin's simulator, but people have to understand what they are looking at for it to be useful to them, so anecdotal information and actual data points provided by users can be just as relevant if not more relevant to an average user, especially those who climb hills which is where this motor really shines.

As for commuting here is what I posted back on page 6 comparing to my 9C 8x8 in a 26" mountain bike that's lighter and rolls easier.

I did a test ride to compare my two bikes and their efficiencies. The first bike is my 26" Diamondback Recoil Comp full suspension mountain bike running Kenda Kommuter 26x2.0 tires, Slime inner tubes, anti puncture strip, inflated to 70 psi. Controller is a Lyen 12 FET with the traces beefed up by myself. Battery pack it runs is 24S2P 5AH 20-30C Turnigy LiPo, hot off the charged at 4.16V per cell. Motor is a 9C 2808/8x8 purchased from Methods. Controller is a Lyen EB212 12FET IRFB4110 with settings programmed for a maximum of 60A battery and 150A phase. Shunt is properly calibrated but the wheel size might be off by just a tiny bit, need to double check it using GPS to make sure.

The second bike is my race bike running the 9.3kV Hubzilla motor in 20" BMX wheels with Perelli ML75 tires which measure out to be around 20.2" tall. Rear is 16x2.75" front is 16x2.5" both running extra thick moped inner tubes inflated to 35 PSI. Battery pack it runs is a 30S2P 6AH 25-50C Turnigy LiPo NanoTech charged to 4.16V per cell hot off the charger. Motor is a Greyborg Hubzilla. Controller is a Lyen EB318 18 FET IRFB4115 with setting programmed for 75A battery, 115A phase. Shunt is modded to around 0.5 mOhm and calibrated as close as I've been able to get it and should be within less than 2% error. Speed and GPS match up exactly.

The path I took consisted of several bike trails and on road section. Speed varied between 20mph and up to 40mph for a short stretch. Majority of the riding was done around 20mph legal ebike speed but some short on road sections were safer to run at 30-40mph. No pedal was allowed as this was purely a bike to bike comparison. The results kind of surprised me.

Total course distance is 12.9 miles.
First up was the 9C 8x8 in it's 26" wheel.
averaged 43.6 WH/Mi
Average speed 21.2 MPH
Time 36 minutes 08 seconds

Next up was the Hubzilla in it's 20" BMX wheel.
averaged 47.7 WH/Mi
Average speed 19.5 MPH
Time 39 minutes 17 seconds (caught a red light).

Not the most scientific study and is a bit apples to oranges but figured I'd post it anyways since it surprised me how well the Hubzilla did. The race bike is about 10lbs heavier than the Diamondback, and I was carrying a backpack with a few lbs of tools since I had just make changes to the bike and wanted to make sure I didn't get stranded. I had noted my speeds on every section on the first ride and then tried to match them on the second ride and think i did a pretty good job.

I would like to swap my 9C 2806 back into the race bike and do the same route again, but they've started construction on the trails (of course they start construction just as our weather gets nice for riding. Signs say trails will be open in Summer which is great, nothing like riding in 110+ F heat.)

[teklektik]

teklektik, most of the people buying this motor want it because they are after high power, plain and simple.

My point exactly.

Not the most scientific study and is a bit apples to oranges but figured I'd post it anyways...

My point exactly.

In the end, Greyborg will market and sell (not the same thing) this product as they see fit. That does not diminish the intrinsic utility and value of Justin's simulator nor the applicability of the product to other largely undeveloped markets.

[gensem]

+1 on the simulator, its going to be really good for greyb.org business.

[zombiess]

+1 on the simulator, its going to be really good for greyb.org business.

Justin has the info so it's up to him if he wants to add it.

[gensem]

Justin has the info so it's up to him if he wants to add it.

He asked for the info and thats probably because he wants to add it... but i was actually speaking of a real hub motor on his hands to have factual data.