Hubmonster 94% efficient 7kw NO LONGER FOR SALE

[xenodius]

Get ready to be torn some more. There's a 3rd motor, the MidMonster, also a 6 phase beauty, but with a built on 10" alloy rim. In fact the entire rotor except the magnet backing rim is AL, making the motor only 12kg including the rim. It too has a disc brake mount for easy mid-drive use though it is a bit width challenged. It's not quite as powerful or as efficient as Hubmonster, but it's a great motor smack in between MiniMonster and HubMonster.

Now you need 3:
-an offroad Hanebrink-like bike with a hubmotor using the 2 speed mini that's very light and pedalable
-a mid drive high efficiency trike with power and pedals.
-a faired road rocket with power and speed. Sure it has pedals for legal reasons, but an electronic chain, so the pedals turn a regening small motor, and while it's not a lot of power when riding hard, the vehicle is so efficient thru the air and at the motor that a hundred watts of recharge along with 50-100W continuous charge from the sun does add meaningful range.

I'm so slow at building that someone needs to do these things. It might as well be you. Everyone needs multiple ebikes in the stable anyway. 8)

John

You're pretty much spot on, and reading my mind! Short term, I'm in this for practicality. I want a low-maintenance vehicle that performs well... I don't mind modding or improving, but no oil or tranny fluid changes. =) I want to build it, then just feed it some juice now and then. I do like the simplicity of pedaling a dynamo! There's sort of complex simplicity to it. It'd last forever. While it legally might not qualify, I don't think any cops around here would give me any trouble. But... in the long term, I want an offroader bike with fat tires, and a couple trikes =) But I might end up with the MiniMonster on one of each, and then have one awesome, beastly, and plenty powerful faired trike with at least 8kwhr of cells =) That'll be the interstate machine.

I believe if I was crapping money I could buy two Maxcontrollers and run the Hubmonster up to 28kw peak! =) I wonder what exactly the efficiency improvement would be with a sinusoidal controller on a 6-phase motor? Either way I'd need great traction for that much power =)

You heard about spray-on solar panels? Not here yet but they'd be perfect for a small faired EV: http://www.nsf.gov/news/special_reports/science_nation/sprayonsolar.jsp

 

[John in CR]

The problem with spray-on will be just like thin film is now, not efficient enough. We're surface area limited and need efficiency in the conversion. The fairing needs a material anyway, and it just so happens that I'm about to start selling solar panel modules that are good efficiency, somewhat flexible into a curve, lightweight, and rigid and strong. The rigidity and strength comes from most of the 2.4mm thickness consisting of fiberglass board much like the boards in pcb's. They're smooth on both sides with the cell waterproofed in an EVA sandwich and a layer of PET on the face for toughness. To me they're ideal for folding portable solar panels or battery charging fairings. Join them with something like kevlar roving and you're home free.

Each is 16V nominal, so they sum nicely for direct charging our battery packs with only a simple HVC required. Other than 2 overcast days I've been running my bikes off of DIY solar power since the first day of winter, and soon the packs of all my bikes will be paralleled when parked and handling all of our lighting needs with high power LEDs, another product line in the pipeline. The solar power will come from panels that easily fold up and fit in a backpack for power anywhere with sunlight, though I will go to some permanent-ish panels as we hang more household power on the solar system.

2013 is going to be a big year.

John


John

 

[John in CR]

Yeah they didn't do that globalization job quite well enough! :lol:
I think Russia is a story all to itself when it comes to... Well pretty much everything.
I'm a bit lazy to read through the details again so I'll just ask you. How much would a hub + rim weigh? (Implicitly asking how much it would cost to ship at 12$)
Cheers

I was correct on the per kg at $12, but I managed to get all the thumbs off of the scale, and shipping weight with rim is 20kg, so $240usd to Copenhagen.

 

[xenodius]

John, when I build a fairing, I'll definitely be in the market for those! I mean seriously, the dream EV of the world is one that runs on solar power alone. The crazy thing is, for many needs that is possible! Even if you only get 200 or 250 watts out of a full solar fairing, that may still be enough to charge up while you're at work. At low city speeds, especially on an aero trike with regen... 20 wh is easy. If you could actually squeeze 200 watts for 8 hours, that's like 80 miles worth of charge. Talk about awesome. Even if you assume 60wh/mile, with a hypothetical 200 watt source you end up with 25+ miles after 8 hours. That's almost enough to be a stand-alone go-machine. =) And I think 200 watts is doable. If these are very small panels and I feel it's worth it, I may make ridges: /\/\/\ with them to maximize surface area. Parallel to wind-flow, of course, so the wind will run through them as channels. I expect I'll have a 5A charger built-in onboard, as well.

I probably won't rely on batteries for home power-- I don't know about CR, but as I understand it here if you generate electricity the utility company is legally obligated to pay you for it. So I'd generate as much as I can and draw whatever I need. =) Less battery wear and more simplicity that way.

I hope to eventually have an aquaponic garden, all EV's, LED bulbs, etc. Right now it's not a concern as we are in a tiny apartment with a total of 4 lightbulbs anyway, and we need the heat almost all the time... but one day. =)

 

[John in CR]

We're definitely on similar pages. You should move to Costa Rica, no heat and no A/C required where I am at 1km elevation. When I do mine I want it to be a long haul cruiser, so my plan is to have solar cells on the faring, but that will be difficult to get much area with a good angle to the sun without creating a dangerous in the wind wing or sail. Then the tailbox would be a foldout/down deal that encloses substantial slide out or fold up panel area. Simply schedule long midday stops during prime sun and cross country 100-150 mile days become a piece of cake, maybe even 200 if you accept low speeds and most of the day in that recumbent comfort saddle. Low speed might be tough though since you're likely to need really good air flow inside with that black solar absorbent shell and over 80% of that solar power turned into heat or reflected.

It's so readily achievable that I can taste it, because I know I can pull it off with my skills that are so far behind my ideas.

John

 

[xenodius]

I hope I can live in a place like that. My dad has worked on all kinds of commercial HVAC systems for the last 30 years. He has a bunch of retired Automated Logic modules sitting in a shed at home... used one of them and set up an 'economizer' that automatically cycles with the cool night air during the summer. Combined with 6" cellulose walls all around, they have almost no HVAC expenditures for their 3500 sq.ft. home, certainly no A/C expenditures, and everything is electronically filtered which means virtually no dust. Most of their HVAC energy use is spent maintaining humidity! 0.o Either way, it's pretty awesome. I put a lot of work into helping them build that home, and after seeing all the shortcuts made on the original 1200sf portion, I am apalled at inspection and construction standards and I don't think I'll ever be able to buy a home outright without renovating it myself. Huge unsealed holes in ductwork, leaky and/or uninsulated pipes, terrible windproofing, you name it...

Having vents that you can open on your fairing would eliminate most of that heat trouble, I think. =)

John, I love your thinking, especially with the fold-out tailbox, that's a truly brilliant idea. I think I'd be totally up to taking an interstate trip in a vehicle like that. However, I would probably break down from time to time and charge it up from the grid, especially on those shady days. I've been looking at sinopoly prismatics for larger capacities... think of the distance you could cover on a charge with a set of 100ah cells! Even just 72v60ah will go very far.

 

[John in CR]

I would probably break down from time to time and charge it up from the grid, especially on those shady days.

Of course we'd carry a plug in charger. No reason to be hard headed about it. Maybe there's weather coming in that you'd want to stay ahead of, or need to get extra mileage that day, or it's just too hot to not be rolling or nothing good to do at that stop and don't want to wait on a solar charge, or it's windy and you just don't feel like messing with staking down the panels. For me it's more the point that I can, not that I do. Using less than 50 cents in electricity to go 100 miles or harvesting that electricity for free from the sun certainly doesn't make any real difference, but the ability to skip plugging in or charge when there is no plug is priceless, just like the ability of my ebike to go 65mph. I don't even like going that fast and only did so twice in 6 months. 8) Now flying past cars on a 2 mile highway climb and never dropping below 50mph, I like.

I've been looking at sinopoly prismatics for larger capacities... think of the distance you could cover on a charge with a set of 100ah cells! Even just 72v60ah will go very far.

or imagine the speed we can go a given distance. 8)

 

[John in CR]

John, could you please post actual drawings/spec sheet for this motor when you have the moment. It will be helpful in designing my swingarm on my cramped wannabe motorcycle.. And figuring out the sprocket stuff, clearances, etc.

If I had that it would already be posted. It's a Japanese design and Japanese supplied stator steel. The factory assembles the parts and installs them on the scooters assembled in another building. The dropouts appear to be at just over 180mm, and there's at least 15mm of flexibility to go narrower on each side so it could fairly easily be reduced to around 150mm by cutting new flats on the wire side and shortening the disc brake mount and cutting new flats on the brake side. Don't forget the wide tire.

With scooter motors you don't want to do dropouts until you have the motor in hand, because it is quite common that the axle flats are on slightly different planes. I believe it's for tighter fits. I first noticed it a few years ago when I made some thick clamping dropouts, and was going to weld them on clamped to the motor to get my wheel perfectly aligned, but only I made them identical and one wouldn't sit flush on the swingarm. I'm thinking "These Chinese yahoos didn't machine the axle properly.", but I checked and all 5 motors were identical. My original Hubmonster has the same thing, and while the dropout width is the same, after grinding my SuperV's clamping dropouts big enough to fit HubmonsterHE, there was still no way it would go in. I grinded what I felt was way too much, and still no. Then I remembered about the different planes. I fought with it a while and finally hit the axle with the grinder to bulldog that baby on. The dropouts are well over 1" wide, and cover the entire flats, so there's no way to tell if HE's are on identical planes. Plus, since I hit the axle with the grinder I couldn't tell definitively anyway. The HE's may just be on a different plane than the other brand, but still not on the same plane.

Because of this, don't make dropouts deeper than necessary and taper them slightly more open at the entrance. That's because deep dropouts make wheels difficult to get on and off if the flats are on different planes. 2 of my bikes take some effort and wiggling around to get the hubmotor on an off. Maybe that's the reason, eg in the event of an axle spinout the motor can't climb out of the dropouts.

John

 

[hillzofvalp]

K. Just thinking about it... My Honda is Japanese... This is Japanese.. Maybe it was meant to be!

I'll try to get a drawing posted up of what you described. You can tell if they are off parallel by clamping one sides flat on a machined block/parallel and the running the matching parallel on the other one on a flat surface

 

[John in CR]

If you're sticking with the dual shocks on the rear, don't forget they need to be parallel, so that's likely to determine your swingarm width to a large extent. More than likely a bigger consideration is the tire width. At least that's a huge issue with a bike frame.

 

[Boeckstyns]

Yeah they didn't do that globalization job quite well enough! :lol:
I think Russia is a story all to itself when it comes to... Well pretty much everything.
I'm a bit lazy to read through the details again so I'll just ask you. How much would a hub + rim weigh? (Implicitly asking how much it would cost to ship at 12$)
Cheers

I was correct on the per kg at $12, but I managed to get all the thumbs off of the scale, and shipping weight with rim is 20kg, so $240usd to Copenhagen.

Thanx a bunch for the info John. I'll get back to you when I make up my mind about which way to go for my high power build.
Cheers

 

[ions82]

John, could you please post actual drawings/spec sheet for this motor when you have the moment. It will be helpful in designing my swingarm on my cramped wannabe motorcycle.. And figuring out the sprocket stuff, clearances, etc.

With scooter motors you don't want to do dropouts until you have the motor in hand...

I'm also in the same boat. As soon as I saw this motor/wheel, I started making drawings based around it. I want to build something that is, essentially, a *relatively* lightweight scooter that handles and performs well. My plan is to use a DH bicycle fork and brakes, but I will fabricate the frame and swingarm myself (using chromoly tubing.) My plan is to use modular dropouts that can be changed out in the future (should a different motor be used.) Reading that the flats on the Hubmonster may not be on the same plane, modular dropouts make even more sense.

I've also been designing the frame to accommodate a Pelican case that will hold batteries, BMS, parallel harnesses, etc... I made a quick-release interface for a Pelican case with the battery setup on my first e-bike (Electra Townie). I really like being able to take the battery off the bike in order to charge it up and keep an eye on all the cells. Although, a pack that is made up of 12-16 8,000 MAh LiPo packs is going to be pretty hefty. Lifting that thing on and off the bike might get old quickly. However, it would still make it very easy to accurately charge, asses, and service the battery pack.

Anyway, will these motors be readily available in the future? I'm not sure how long it will take me to save up for one (and to build a frame once the design is finalized.) I don't want to start (or finish) building the frame and then find out the hub/wheel is no longer available. It looks like a fantastic piece of equipment!

 

[John in CR]

Yes this motor is in current production and has been for several years, so I will be selling them until a better motor becomes available. Long term volume production along with stiff competition is why it's so reasonably priced despite being the best high power hubbie available. To introduce a better motor with this power and Kv would cost a lot in R&D, and no doubt would command a price of double or triple. There's almost no risk that it won't be available when you are. The only risk in waiting is one of exchange rate change.

John

 

[hillzofvalp]

how thick is the "spoke" of the rim?

Could you post more video of this thing in action?

 

[John in CR]

how thick is the "spoke" of the rim?

I can't get my caliper off with the measurement locked and can't see it with it on. One of the kids or wife "borrowed" my small crescent wrench, so it's MIA and I can't even copy and measure. It looks like 6mm to me. Don't go comparing to some mystery metal ebike spokeless rim though. This would be considered a high speed motorcycle rim by the Chinese. Here's a pic where you can kinda judge the thickness. Notice how I used longer than necessary bolts, so I could manually balance the wheel with extra nuts and washers after the tire was mounted. The walking distance shop didn't have a wheel balancing machine.

Could you post more video of this thing in action?

More? I didn't get the motor until after my son left, so the videos posted of my SuperV are with the motor I originally called Hubmonster, which is a 3 phase large diameter scooter hubbie with built on rim that I ventilated to run at high power. Those videos are at an almost identical power input, so comparable acceleration out of the hole though Hubmonster HE, the 6 phase I'm selling, pulls harder at the top end because it is faster. I did take a couple of clips with my GoPro, but it looks so much slower than actual that I'm not motivated to learn how edit and post to youtube.

Tips are welcome, because the motor is already handicapped by all my weight, so I don't want to further handicap it with poor video. I put it on my helmet facing reward, which was better, but I think mounted high like that reduces perception of speed. Sure I quickly leave traffic behind, but traffic looks like it's crawling.

John

 

[hillzofvalp]

oh my goodness..... that is one amazing looking wheel. You think this thing needs air cooling at 20kW? What is the continuous wattage at 70mph for your bike?

 

[John in CR]

oh my god..... that is one sexy wheel. You think this thing needs air cooling at 20kW? What is the continous Wattage at 70mph for you?

I'd say it all depends on your load and how you use it. A lighter all up load than mine and avoiding low speed stop-n-go traffic, then probably not, since the motor will spend even less time accelerating. Other factors like ambient temps and bike shape play a role too. With a heavier load like yours, then I wouldn't want to speculate. More power limits + heavier load = more heat generated, and whether the motor shell + aluminum rim are sufficient to dissipate the greater heat can only be determined thru experimentation.

I never went 70, only 65mph, twice. The second time was to confirm it wasn't wind or grade aided. I was in too much of a tuck to see the CA, so I don't know the power usage. I've been meaning to check it, but I haven't needed to go on the highway recently, and on other roads I just can't spend enough time at WOT for a stable reading and safely peak at the CA. I forget all else other than my destination when I climb on the bike. It's 100% focus on the road while in motion.

John

 

[Jozzer]

Hmm, seems I have one of these motors in a scooter that someone bought in for evaluation 3 years ago and is still in the workshop.
The controller fitted too the machine has been very unreliable (I'm about to fit the thrird controller, and the scoot has only done 200 miles - seems to be 2 controllers built into one unit), but the motor itself has always run nicely.

 

[John in CR]

Hmm, seems I have one of these motors in a scooter that someone bought in for evaluation 3 years ago and is still in the workshop.
The controller fitted too the machine has been very unreliable (I'm about to fit the thrird controller, and the scoot has only done 200 miles - seems to be 2 controllers built into one unit), but the motor itself has always run nicely.

That's why I don't deal in the factory controllers. Free that motor of it's 300lb scooter load and unleash its real potential. Also, they say the controller gets good airflow in its in-body location, but some 2W fans blowing extra air over it couldn't hurt.

PM me if you need help wiring up your own controller solution.

John

 

[gensem]

Anyone (aside John) running this motor already?

 

[John in CR]

Anyone (aside John) running this motor already?

Not unless someone scavenged one from a scooter, and I'm sure we would have heard about it. Yours is in the first batch air shipped. Starting to eye that prize money?

John

 

[gensem]

Not unless someone scavenged one from a scooter, and I'm sure we would have heard about it. Yours is in the first batch air shipped. Starting to eye that prize money?

John

Hardly John... im still short of batteries, controllers and mechanical mods on the borg frame...
Unless a miracle happens I dont see my motor running in under three months.

 

[hillzofvalp]

I think I may join the race shortly. I could have hub motor installation done by april.. John, negotiate with me and your son.

 

[John in CR]

The crates are sealed up and heading for the dock on Monday, so orders for a free ride across the pond are officially cut off and I'll be billing those who placed orders on Monday. The first batch of air shipment orders are starting to hit people's doorsteps, so race begins for prizes. Hopefully the fence sitters won't have to wait too long to see just how much I undersell the potential of this motor.

On a separate note, the cast steel must have a lot to do with HubmonsterHE's near silence, because in testing we've been able to hear the Mid-Monster on takeoff.

We'll also have an announcement soon regarding a unique opportunity for those looking to go mid-drive,

John

 

[gensem]

Mine should arrive tomorrow, fedex already called me.
I was taking some measurements from my old cromotor (v1) and the motor laced to a 17" moped wheel with a 2.75 tire weights 15kg. OD is about 22"
HubmonsterHE should weight 20kg with a 130/60 tire, only 5 kilos more for twice the power.
Cant wait to get my hands on it... even tho I dont have any batteries to run it right now.