50cc auto scooter conversion to electric (with video)

I am learning a ton on this thread. Thanks guys! I think the Agni Motor is 4000 rpm max.
 
Jay64 said:
I am learning a ton on this thread. Thanks guys! I think the Agni Motor is 4000 rpm max.
I think you would be fine if you used heavier than stock weights. That isn't to much different than the rpm most scooters run at with stock weights. You might have better luck with a maxi scooter. A 50cc scooter wouldn't do much more than 40mph at 4,000 rpm but my piaggio bv250 would probably do about 75 mph at 4,000 rpm with heavy weights. Maybe more than that. With the stock weights I could cruise at 85mph with a low rpm but I put in lighter weights for better accelleration. I can beat most harleys to 60mph now but I top out at about eighty.
 
maydaverave said:
Jay64 said:
I am learning a ton on this thread. Thanks guys! I think the Agni Motor is 4000 rpm max.
I think you would be fine if you used heavier than stock weights. That isn't to much different than the rpm most scooters run at with stock weights. You might have better luck with a maxi scooter. A 50cc scooter wouldn't do much more than 40mph at 4,000 rpm but my piaggio bv250 would probably do about 75 mph at 4,000 rpm with heavy weights. Maybe more than that. With the stock weights I could cruise at 85mph with a low rpm but I put in lighter weights for better accelleration. I can beat most harleys to 60mph now but I top out at about eighty.

:oops: all this time I have been thinking gas motors as regards rpm ( around 10krpm (50cc)), but my elecy motor max's out currently at 8.2krpm so the weights will need to be heavier over stock :roll: , My current scoot a x9 500 the rollers are more like 35-40g ( but this scoot has so much more engine power available to be able to push out the heavier rollers ( I think peak bhp is around 34 at the crank for the x9)) and all start engaging at around a 2krpm motor speed, the motor red lines at 8krpm with a max speed of 100+'ish mph ( and beyond the red line can be pushed upto a speed of around 110+ish mph) not that I have ever tried this :wink: .
 
maydaverave said:
Jay64 said:
I am learning a ton on this thread. Thanks guys! I think the Agni Motor is 4000 rpm max.
I think you would be fine if you used heavier than stock weights. That isn't to much different than the rpm most scooters run at with stock weights. You might have better luck with a maxi scooter. A 50cc scooter wouldn't do much more than 40mph at 4,000 rpm but my piaggio bv250 would probably do about 75 mph at 4,000 rpm with heavy weights. Maybe more than that. With the stock weights I could cruise at 85mph with a low rpm but I put in lighter weights for better accelleration. I can beat most harleys to 60mph now but I top out at about eighty.

Well, I already have a specific scooter sitting in my shop, so that is what I'm going to be using. I will try to find out the make and model. I just wanted to use the Agni because every one is saying how good of a motor it is for motorcycle conversions. But if there is a better motor for a scooter, then I'll try that. But if the Agni doesn't have enough top speed, wouldn't it still have crazy acceleration? Most roads to my work have a top speed of 35 MPH. And if I can get out of the light crazy fast I'll be at the next light before they catch up. Anyone know what is the best outrunner motor out there?
 
Hi Jay,
You could gear up the output of the agni x2 before you connect to the crank (8krpm ?) or yes you could play around with the gearing and make it runwell on 4krpm, my only concern would be such a powerfull motor and a limited rpm range may cause issues with the drive train i.e I think you may snap the belt under very hard acceleration but you could work your way up to that point to try. A outrunner with the biggest power output for a very reasonable price is http://www.hobbycity.com/hobbyking/...0-100-A_180Kv_Brushless_Outrunner_(eq:_70-55) Produces 7kw at 44v, This is slightly larger than the one i'm using ( mine is only 6kw ) if you want to get a ( i think these motors are amazing for the price ) motor to start with maybe a good choice would be a smaller output one but with a higher kv value something like http://www.hobbycity.com/hobbyking/...AerodriveXp_160_SK_Series_63-64_230Kv_/_3150W even this one will give a small scoot very fast acceleration if you only need to go 30-35mph. if you use something like this and run it on 44v I would say you will not need to adjust anything with the gearing it will just work well straight out the box so to speak, and see how you get on then if you want more power/speed double up on the motors ( which will make it about 6.3kw ) and play around with the gearing. :D , If you put a sprocket onto the crank this will make it so much easier to change motors to test with, if you have access to motors, then you can throw them on and give them a go.
 
Hello gwhy!

Did you added more epoxy glue on your magnet of your motor? I recently got a motor from hobbyking and people said to be carefull with the magnet because some user had magnet falling off.
I took mine appart and did not trust the manufacturing so I will add more glue to be 100% sure they won't come off.

I would recommend that you have a look and glue down the magnet. Some people say that they did improve on magnet glue but I don't trust a 99$ motor.
 
Robomaniac said:
Hello gwhy!

Did you added more epoxy glue on your magnet of your motor? I recently got a motor from hobbyking and people said to be carefull with the magnet because some user had magnet falling off.
I took mine appart and did not trust the manufacturing so I will add more glue to be 100% sure they won't come off.

I would recommend that you have a look and glue down the magnet. Some people say that they did improve on magnet glue but I don't trust a 99$ motor.

Hi
Yes I added more epoxy just to be on the safe side from new due to what some people have said also. All in all Its not a bad motor my only gripe with it is it draws a fair bit of no load current so it tends to get warm.
 
gwhy! said:
Hi Jay,
A outrunner with the biggest power output for a very reasonable price is http://www.hobbycity.com/hobbyking/...0-100-A_180Kv_Brushless_Outrunner_(eq:_70-55) Produces 7kw at 44v, This is slightly larger than the one i'm using ( mine is only 6kw )

Wow, only $100??? That is an incredible price. I can definately play around with those.

I was talking to a buddy last night that is a mechanic at a harley shop. I was talking about this project and the fact that I wanted to try to do it. He flat out insisted that this would not work. Even after I told him that you had already got yours running, he didn't believe it. Now I got a new challenge. I definately gotta prove him wrong on this one.
 
Like others have said it's great to see someone experimenting with a scooter conversion. I've been tempted a few times but was put off by the fact I don't know much about scooters, particularly the details of the CVT drive and how it would work with an electric motor. After seeing your excellent photos it's all a lot clearer and I've already started scouting locally for dead scooters :D Any recommendations gwhy? I'm looking for a model that's well-built and popular so that I can get spares easily. The Peugeot Speedfight seems fairly common?

The RC motors seem an ideal choice as it looks as if it would be fairly easy to mount one in place of the piston and run a 1:1 drive to the crankshaft as you suggested early on. The efficiency may not be brilliant, but the low voltage means all you need is four 12V lead acid batteries plus a cheap motor and controller for a relatively inexpensive conversion.

By the way, whereabouts are you in the UK gwhy?
 
gwhy! said:
it draws a fair bit of no load current so it tends to get warm.

Yes, I saw that your motot is in a small space, you would probalby need to give it more room to breath and get natural air. I will added a fan connected to the other side of the motor to push air in ( push or pull, not sure )
 
I've been wondering: is it more economical and easy to do this, or take one of those underpowered electric scooters with brushless hubs and overvolt them?
 
Malcolm said:
Like others have said it's great to see someone experimenting with a scooter conversion. I've been tempted a few times but was put off by the fact I don't know much about scooters, particularly the details of the CVT drive and how it would work with an electric motor. After seeing your excellent photos it's all a lot clearer and I've already started scouting locally for dead scooters :D Any recommendations gwhy? I'm looking for a model that's well-built and popular so that I can get spares easily. The Peugeot Speedfight seems fairly common?

The RC motors seem an ideal choice as it looks as if it would be fairly easy to mount one in place of the piston and run a 1:1 drive to the crankshaft as you suggested early on. The efficiency may not be brilliant, but the low voltage means all you need is four 12V lead acid batteries plus a cheap motor and controller for a relatively inexpensive conversion.

By the way, whereabouts are you in the UK gwhy?

Hi Malcolm,
Any peugeot, gillra, piaggio, yamaha 50cc scoot will be a good choice and all easy to get spares and bits for. You can pick up very cheap non-runners of the chinese scoots and they are a lot lighter in weight than the bigger named brands. It would as you say be a very easy and cheap conversion ( Im still not totally sure about the efficency thing yet ) but the performance can be very good.

Im in Bristol 8)
 
One probably I am having is there are no markings at all on the scoot. Not only do I not know the model, but I don'tt even know the make.
 
Jay64 said:
One probably I am having is there are no markings at all on the scoot. Not only do I not know the model, but I don'tt even know the make.

Hi Jay,
I wouldnt worry to much about what make it is at this stage when you take the crank out post a picture of it up on here and I may be able to help with the make or a picture of the scoot ( there is only 3 or 4 different types of cranks used on 50cc upto 125cc 2 strokers), rollers are bought by size/weight so you will not need the scoot model for this ( just measure the exsiting roller size ).

update:
I took my scoot up and down my driveway :wink: which is a 10% grade hill it had absoluty no problem pulling away on it and accelerated up it with ease also which was good and still only peaked 2.6kw. top speed rolling load was not so good :D I removed some of the rollers (to simulate lighter rollers) wait for it... a massive.... top speed of...... 15MPH :roll: :lol: this is not a bad thing it just confirms what maydaverave has already said about using heavy rollers, so this is the direction to go in. So with 7.5g rollers top speed is very poor so it looks like the weight will need to be at least doubled to start getting a sensible top speed. The rollers that I am waiting for are just the roller shells so I can make my own inserts for different weights and I think I will be aiming for about 11 - 12 g as a starting point.
 
fizzit said:
I've been wondering: is it more economical and easy to do this, or take one of those underpowered electric scooters with brushless hubs and overvolt them?

I would have thought it may work out cheaper doing this as a cheap reasonable condition non-running scoot can be bought for as little as 50 uk pounds ( I paid a little over the top for my one because i could not wait , if I had the patience to wait another 2 days I could have bought 2 scoots for the same price (a runner with no mot and another complete scoot for spares). The motor and esc works out about 100 uk pounds then the batterys are what ever you decide you want to pay.
 
gwhy! said:
Jay64 said:
wait for it... a massive.... top speed of...... 15MPH :roll: :lol:

Like you said earlier, you don't have good battery, you said you have voltage drop. The moment you get good battery you should be able to get better speed. (I hope!)
I hope you will get more then 30Mph, if you do, then I will make my own scooter convertion like you :p
 
Heh, this is the opposite problem to what most people worry about. Too little kv. Much easier problem to fix than the too much kv problem for sure!
 
Robomaniac said:
gwhy! said:
Jay64 said:
wait for it... a massive.... top speed of...... 15MPH :roll: :lol:

Like you said earlier, you don't have good battery, you said you have voltage drop. The moment you get good battery you should be able to get better speed. (I hope!)
I hope you will get more then 30Mph, if you do, then I will make my own scooter convertion like you :p
vanilla ice said:
Heh, this is the opposite problem to what most people worry about. Too little kv. Much easier problem to fix than the too much kv problem for sure!


upping the roller weight will help loads, Once rolling under load it didnt ramp up the variator pulley so it was stuck in a very high gear ratio also the rpm of the motor is a bit low ( again this can be sorted by upping the voltage ), so the combination of both these things is why the low speed. I have made some brass inserts for the rollers now and will be trying these out soon, im hoping they will not be to heavy, total weight of each roller will now be about 15g.
 
I don't mean to hijack your thread, but I'm still not far enough along to start my own actual build thread. Got some pics of the scooter. Looks like there is a lot of room under the bottom frame for a lot of lithium batteries. :D
 

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No Worries Jay,
It looks like you have a lot more room on your scoot for bats and to mount a motor where the cylinder used to be. Its a 4 stroker ( I wonder if you can connect a motor to the timing sprocket on the crank via the timing chain and cut off the con rod :?: ), Sorry I dont recognise the frame ( it reminds me of a small suzuki I had a look at once) but all the transmission looks standard so you should not have any problems getting tuning parts ( you may be able to find the make of the scoot out with a little bit of detective work by matching up the crank with the pictures of cranks on ebay ).
Edit:
I have been doing a bit of hunting around the net and it looks like its one of those chinese scoot's, this should be a starting point for you.
 
Pretty much all the chinese scoots use the same motor, a clone of an old honda motor. I think they are called gy6 motors? Parts are plentiful and cheap.
 
Yea. It is definately a Chinese brand of some sort.
 
Update:
I fitted the the modified rollers ( they are now 17.5g ) into the scoot and took it up and down my driveway again :wink: which is a 10% grade hill. It was much better :D acceleration is brisk upto 20mph then creeps upto 25ish so the rollers still need to be a little heavier ( I will try and make them the max weight I can which I think with brass will be about 20g ). Here is a power info of my 1 mile ride up and down my drive :wink: , the voltage really do sag a lot with my cheapo batterys so I think with a decent battery the top speed will be about 30-35 so the rollers still needs to be weighted enough for that extra travel up the variator ( another ~10mph ) as the no load speed of the back wheel is around 40-45mph.
View attachment 17.5g rollers.jpg
This was mainly with wot launches and one of those was up the 10% hill, so all in all it works a treat. :mrgreen:
 
My main question is: was it going 20 mph UP the hill or DOWN the hill? :lol:
 
Jay64 said:
My main question is: was it going 20 mph UP the hill or DOWN the hill? :lol:

Thats a tuffy :D ok here we go.... It goes up the hill as fast as it goes down the hill :wink: .

But seriously from the bottom of my driveway pointing up it accelerates as if it was on the flat.. and I think thats why this sort of setup will come into its own as it didn't ever peak over 2.6kw, even if it was a 25% hill that 2.6kw will not change ( but the acceleration will suffer ) spose its a bit like a mechanical current limit but will give you a hell of a lot more top end speed.
 
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