Thrift Stores for Parts

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Jan 10, 2018
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THRIFT STORES
What's worth it? Anything in particular to keep an eye out for?

Yesterday I saw a Razor electric scooter for $15 but it had a SLA battery so I decided against it. I know those diabetes, err I mean mobility scooters generally run SLA too. I figured the motor and related components were probably garbage. Guess I could cannibalize some of the wiring, maybe the throttle.

There were some laptops too, but I'm not sure it's worth the risk of spending $20 for what might be dead 18650s.

I'm happy to put together a guide to add to the wiki to help folks out, with the responses here.
 
GeriatricGeoffrey said:
... Yesterday I saw a Razor electric scooter for $15 but it had a SLA battery so I decided against it. I know those diabetes, err I mean mobility scooters generally run SLA too. I figured the motor and related components were probably garbage. Guess I could cannibalize some of the wiring, maybe the throttle
Being creative helps...

The trike pictured below was built, IIRC, in 2010, pedaled a year, then electrified using yard sale "Razor" parts. The dead SLA's helped reduce to purchase price to a whopping $5. I spent another $150 for three DeWalt 28v lithium packs, which completed the packagge.

Now, almost 9 years, 4 sets of tires, 1 controller, and one motor upgrade later (from 350w to 500w 'brushed' Razor), the trike is still very much alive... and ridden daily. Now fed a pair of 40v lithium Craftsman packs, it regularly sees 25 mph (the local speed limit), w/max of 29 mph.
 
If you want lots of tips on recyclable stuff to build from, you can look thru my build threads such as the DayGLo Avenger, CrazyBike2, Velcro Eclipse, Fusin Test Bike, Delta Tripper, SB Cruiser (my present ride), and the Flatbed Kennel Trailer builds Mk I - IV.

Kind of a lot of reading, but useful if you're repurposing stuff to build from.

Quite a bit of every one of those was built from recycled bits of other things, some of which came from thrift stores (and many of the bits that didn't probably could be found there if you look often enough).


There's a number of others here on the forum at least as good as I am at doing that sort of thing, but one of the ultimate ones is Naeem (numberonebikeslover), though I doubt he has any thrift stores there like we do here.


BTW, unless you don't weigh much, those little kids' razor scooters would probably be overloaded without some upgrades, perhaps a change in gearing (lower top speed but higher torque), though the parts might still be useful as an assist to a pedal bike. I've got one from goodwill that needs new batteries ( already did some repair work on it); there's a thread for it in the standup scooters section, though I haven't done much there yet.

I havea much larger scooter that was donated as parts that I've still got in the shed to work on--but here in AZ (or at least in my area of the valley) they're illegal to ride on streets or sidewalks (even though they sell these in stores, and I don't really see much enforcement of it, they *could* do it anytime). I only picked up the little one because my brother needed something for some of these huge mall parking lots to get from one place to another, that could be carried along in an Uber/Lyft/etc. The bigger one is too big for that, so it's only real use would be for fun on private land if I knew anyone that had a large enough area to ride it around.

But...it's parts *would* make a basic power-assist trailer, or even an assist for a bike (or trike), or a powerchair, etc.
 
GeriatricGeoffrey said:
THRIFT STORES
What's worth it? Anything in particular to keep an eye out for?

Yesterday I saw a Razor electric scooter for $15 but it had a SLA battery so I decided against it. I know those diabetes, err I mean mobility scooters generally run SLA too. I figured the motor and related components were probably garbage. Guess I could cannibalize some of the wiring, maybe the throttle.

There were some laptops too, but I'm not sure it's worth the risk of spending $20 for what might be dead 18650s.

Mobility scooters will have SLA in them and they will almost assuredly be dead. The controllers are useless as they are not modifiable. Sometimes the motors are ok, but they are always brushed and come with an electric brake attached that would be better off removed. The throttles are just a variable resistor with abnormal resistance values. Not really any use in a bike and can be bought for a couple bucks at an electronics supply.

Honestly, if you really wanted a mobility scooter for cheap I would just keep an eye out on craigslist. They come up really cheap and even free quite often, usually with only dead batteries.
 
mettleramiel said:
Sometimes the motors are ok, but they are always brushed
Not for quite a while now--there are some pretty good brushless hubmotors on some of them now (look up my Powerchair BLDC motor thread for one example). :)

If I found a powerchair with those on it for $25 I'd buy it even if I had to skip something else for a bit; it'd be worth it to have two, becuase I could use them for a trike or a powered trailer. (I only have one right now) They mount directly onto the frame, no dropouts/torquearm crap to deal with. Though I'd either have to modify the hubs to accept spoked wheels (have had a number of ideas on that over the years) or else live with the tires that will fit on the wheels they come with.

and come with an electric brake attached that would be better off removed.
That might still be true; I did remove the one off the one I have, but I might keep the ones on there if I got another pair and alter the electric brake to a cable-operated version, because the disc is sealed inside the motor mount housing, so it doesn't get wet or dirty and wont' have the problems associated with those.
 
amberwolf said:
mettleramiel said:
Sometimes the motors are ok, but they are always brushed
Not for quite a while now--there are some pretty good brushless hubmotors on some of them now (look up my Powerchair BLDC motor thread for one example). :)

They are still predominantly brushed. In fact, Invacare, one of the biggest powerchair manufacturerers discontinued their brushless motors years ago. Some of the biggest players, Permobil, Pride, Invacare, Shoprider and Sunrise, none have a brushless option.

Power chairs are so far behind. There's only one major player with a lithium battery option and it's only for their smallest model. When you get a chair, the chargers often have a flooded or sla option.
 
mettleramiel said:
Sometimes the motors are ok, but they are always brushed
Indeed... But they're also a fraction of the cost of BLDC. And least you forget, that li-ion battery purchase is also a requirement for current BLDC projects. I built the trike pictured below in 2008. The only purchased items (beyond the initial $25 scooter purchase) were 28v Milwaukee li-ion tool pack batteries and a suitable controller. I managed to trim 80 lbs. from the OEM scooter's 190+ lbs. My 90 YO Father rode that trike for 5 years.
 
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