My Electro Ciao (Converted Vespa Ciao Moped)

Joined
Dec 21, 2011
Messages
52
Location
Denmark, Nordjylland
I Finally took the time do post my Electro Ciao here (converted Vespa Ciao)
This has been my primary transport for the last 2.5Years, clocking over 8000Km so far.
This has been a constant evolution of better parts, better cooling etc...
ciao004.jpeg
Info:
Motor: C6374-200kv (the old blue one)
Controller: Hobbyking SS Series 90-100A ESC (Which is a lie... it actually pulls 125A..)
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Battery: Headway 16AH cells arranged in 8S2P for 25V 32AH, Range 30KM+ (Longest travel so far just over 31KM)
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Drivetrain is stock, had an axle made for the motor that starts at 10mm as the motor is and goes out in 12mm and then into the stock clutch that the Vespa Ciao uses.
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As you can see i chose to use a 25Pin (Printer/LTP connector) to make the power connection from battery to controller/motor, now this might seem totally insane but has been working for almost 2 years now, it does not get hot or anything even thou it pulls 125A Peak and 30'ish A on average, it is "split" in 2, 12Pins for + and 12Pins for -.
As you can see on the battery case there is a 19Pin socket also, this is for charging, i connect it to my iCharger 208B where it has all the balance pins and power plugs, it has no problem with handling the 13A the charger puts out, and from "empty" it takes 2.5Hours to charge, but for most runs i make it only takes 25-45minuts to charge
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Oh and Top speed is 30'ish Km/h, Danish law on mopeds says speed SHALL be 30Km/t and "bigger" class of 45Km/t.
But it makes up for the low speed by accelerating HARD :)

And a note on cooling, top tip: sand down face of motor to clear paint and expose clear aluminium, use thermal paste between face of motor and aluminium plate, as you can see i have 2 plates, this is not needed, since i got the last cooling done i will do fine with the 1x 6mm plate, the 2x fans helps on cooling but after i got the motor face sanded down they are almost not needed anymore, but less temperature equals more power and efficiency, on those cold nights you can defiantly feel a power boost because of cooler motor, i will get some pictures of the other motor i have when it is sanded down to show what i mean.

EDIT: Sorry for the many changes, just trying to make it look neat.
 
Just Added some more pictures, everything important electrically wise should be covered picture wise now, else ask and i will submit more info :)


EDIT: if you can't see the pictures properly if your using a "low res" screen (Tablet, Netbook, phone) then save them or on netbook right click on picture and open/view in new tab, if anybody have a way of "shrinking" them on this page then please let me know.
 
Nice installation. I am a little surprised that the motor doesn't need reduction gearing but I don't have personal experience with these small outrunners. Is the top speed at the top motor RPM?
 
the rear hub has a lot of reduction. The outrunner spins about the same speed as the original motor.


Cool project! It looks wild without the exhaust!
 
pdf said:
Nice installation. I am a little surprised that the motor doesn't need reduction gearing but I don't have personal experience with these small outrunners. Is the top speed at the top motor RPM?

As john wrote the rear hub/wheel has a gear reduction inside, and since it is running 24-25V the motor runs at 5000RPM and gearing is abit higher then when it was running on gas/petrol/benzin to make it run the LEGAL 30'ish KM/t (20MPH), it has served me very well for almost 3 years now, but im getting more and more excited to build the next one, Suzuki K50 with a rewound 80100 motor, i should be able to squeeze abit more efficiency + less "drag"/transmission losses, the K50 is going to be run directly, sprocket mounted on 80100 to rear sprocket on rear wheel, no clutch, no reduction so less mechanical drag + motor is going to take less then 2000RPM so also less idle current then now.

I am however going to make a video with the ciao before the K50 is done.

EDIT: And as you can see it needs a good going trough, talking about the paint and such, but anyway this has been my first real successful conversion, and been a good learning curve, have made countless upgrades and to begin with not the most elegant solutions, the throttle was just a normal trim pot that was on the right handle and that was how i used it for the first months, after that i made a "pot box" out of lego and used the normal throttle this was until i found the way to put a normal twist throttle (hall effect) in a servo tester, and at that point it was the biggest face-palm in history, can't believe it did not see that.....
 
dr_frost_dk said:
As john wrote the rear hub/wheel has a gear reduction inside, and since it is running 24-25V the motor runs at 5000RPM and gearing is abit higher then when it was running on gas/petrol/benzin to make it run the LEGAL 30'ish KM/t (20MPH), it has served me very well for almost 3 years now, but im getting more and more excited to build the next one, Suzuki K50 with a rewound 80100 motor, i should be able to squeeze abit more efficiency + less "drag"/transmission losses, the K50 is going to be run directly, sprocket mounted on 80100 to rear sprocket on rear wheel, no clutch, no reduction so less mechanical drag + motor is going to take less then 2000RPM so also less idle current then now.

I am however going to make a video with the ciao before the K50 is done.

EDIT: And as you can see it needs a good going trough, talking about the paint and such, but anyway this has been my first real successful conversion, and been a good learning curve, have made countless upgrades and to begin with not the most elegant solutions, the throttle was just a normal trim pot that was on the right handle and that was how i used it for the first months, after that i made a "pot box" out of lego and used the normal throttle this was until i found the way to put a normal twist throttle (hall effect) in a servo tester, and at that point it was the biggest face-palm in history, can't believe it did not see that.....

OK. I thought that was a reduction at the hub but I did know know much about the running speeds of these small motors. I looked that up as well. In all applications I have seen, there is a small gear reduction mounted to the motor, but most applications don't have the reduction at the hub that yours has. I looked up the K50 also. It looks like a nice starting point for a small electric scooter/motorcycle. Looking forward to seeing the progress.
 
Neat use of a sub D 25 way connector! These are usually rated at around 5A per pin (at least the decent ones are), so your 12 pins in parallel should be good for around 60A continuous and maybe two or three times that current for short periods.

Overall it looks a neat conversion and it's nice to know it's been working OK for so long.
 
Jeremy Harris said:
Neat use of a sub D 25 way connector! These are usually rated at around 5A per pin (at least the decent ones are), so your 12 pins in parallel should be good for around 60A continuous and maybe two or three times that current for short periods.

Overall it looks a neat conversion and it's nice to know it's been working OK for so long.

Thanks :), i tried to keep it as neat as possible, the moped could look better paint wise and such, but the whole power system and such i tried to keep under raps.
Back in the days i was looking at EVERY kind of connector i could find and lastly i thought i might try to use the DSUB 25 plug and not a bad choice it seems :), as i wrote no heat at all, but the ciao only uses a continues current of 28-34A so the 60A continues current looks to be right, i also counted on 5A pr pin when i made it, the DSUB was also chosen because it can only plugin one way so next to no way off reversing polarity, since then i have found some connectors i used in the internals of the power system, and these will be used in the next build, only thing is to keep in mind that they have to be set in the right order e.g. one way for POWER SOURCE other way for the POWER RECEIVER.

The plugs i use: http://www.hobbyking.com/hobbyking/store/__20353__HXT_6mm_Gold_Connector_w_Protector_10pcs_set_.html

And i just found some pictures of how it used to look when i was running LiPo, and using the old power plug (not very good....)
Oh and yes it has lights :), front light is still just 2x 10mm 0.5W LEDs that have been trimmed so they don't blind on coming traffic
 

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nice clean setup.. i like it :)
 
Thanks, that's was what i was going for or to put it another way, it had to look as close to gas version and it pulls that off quite good, only real difference is the lack of exhaust, else everything looks pretty much stock (yes the handlebars are from a bicycle and front light is different)

Of course one angle you did not see it from was the right side with side cover removed, it is wire spaghetti town under there :p
 
electric-moped-transmission.jpg
 
If I was to build one..using a little bigger motor, the leaderhobby motor..

should i use a single speed or a variated ciao?

also, since using that kind of "rc" drive, I can run lower volts, say only 48V?

I would want it to do 32-35 on the flat with a 12 mile range.
 
* - Single speed
Im using 25V so if you will be using 48V 32+ (MPH?) should not be any problem, on 22.2V i was able to go 60KPH and better cooling my small motor would do that just fine, cooling on my ciao is not the best since the motor is enclosed, im going on to building my Suzuki DM50 now, but if i was to continue upgrading the ciao i will be using my extra frame and making cooling many times better.
12 Mile range does not require much unless you make it very inefficient, and using vario instead of single speed will impact efficiency much, best will be no cluch and sensored.
 
I thought i would post a few video's of my old ciao as i should soon be put on pension or sold.

[youtube]LXYG4orG4B8[/youtube]
[youtube]HZxa2FGP5JE[/youtube]

And sorry for the pour video angle, only had 3 minutes to make a camera "mount"...

Ill see if i can make some more video's of only me driving so you don't have to hear all the dinosaurs :p
 
Only ciao running, also a good test of the camera im using in low light and no light.

[youtube]RigZGR3KAQw[/youtube]
[youtube]CYlIhOjs2ao[/youtube]
 
How would you suppose this would work with the turnigy 80100, and 36v?
 
- How would you suppose this would work with the turnigy 80100, and 36v?
yes why not, as allways check temperature.

- LOL! A little deja vu in the matrix...nice edit.
Yes that's a very quick edit :p, had to drop something of along the way, and i don´t think that i would be interesting to see me throw something in a postbox hehe.

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This will also be the last video's of the ciao, yesterday the motor broke at the base, it did drive home at -5 km/h and a lot of nasty noise, well luckily im almost done with the DM50 so this is a push to complete the DM50....
And i do not want to use more time on the ciao, it has served it's purpose as R&D for 3.5 years, i have another motor base i can rewind but it is not going to be now, i think ill do it later and throw it on my bycycle.

Im always amazed about the motor that no matter what happens it will just keep going, and there have been some faults, but what to expect from a WHOLE motor that cost 40£, most mopeds you can't even get a cylinder for that money....
 
Great !

When I was 16 years old my first moped was also a Vespa Ciao, the 30 km/h non-helmet version ! Good old times and now in combination with modern brushless motors. cool ! :D
 
Thank you for inspiring me.
I just got almost everything now for my project.
a ciao from early 70's, bosch 100A alternator converted to motor, controller and a lot of 18650 from airboards/hoverboards. (1000 cells)
Hopefully I get around 5-6kw @ 72v. Battery is 20s10p samsung icr18650-22p. ca 1.6kWh. I really hope that I get a range of atleast 50km.
Nice project. Travel to work for free on green energy.
 
Sorry for the VERY late reply, but have been "offline" due to life
Finally changed the pictures


Jojje123 did you make your ciao electric?
 
Hi, i am new here. Thank you for great information. I am on a very similar build for wife . I will be using 6384 150kv bldc, yep150 amp esc and 6s12p 18650 li-ion about 2.9ah each on a vespa ciao. I have some questions that i couldn't find online
1-the motor is a 36v 4500w motor(if it is true) this gives a peak of 125 amps @36v. And in theory 0.288ohm coil resistance. Does it mean that the motor will draw 24/0.288=83. 3 amp @24v resulting around 2000w? Hence VxI=P
2-do you have an advantage using the clutch? I am thinking about using toothed belt without clutch.
3-do you think that your v belt configuration cuts down your efficiency?
4-i have a 6s charger so i am thinking to use 6s on a motor that is capable of 10s. I won't need 4500w any way. Any down sides besides loss of power? I will play with the gearing to get a max speed of 35km/h.
Any help will be appreciated.
RegardsIMG-20180523-WA0011.jpg
 
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