Hi Bill,
Fun build thread.
The motor in the early pics(the shiny one), is definitely an Ezee geared motor.
FYI, it's a 400W(rated) motor that is very closely related to the BMC V1 series, which is also rated at 400 Watts. It employs white nylon gears which are still available from a couple of sources. The clutch ASM is getting rare and I only know of a couple of sources that still have them.
I mention this because you are definitely over-Amping yours(I'm assuming the black motor is the same, just painted). The general consensus is they are reliable up to 1200Watts, ,maybe 1500W if one is careful. The Achilles Heel are the nylon gears, which if the motor gets hot enough, can turn to mush. You are probably ok in the cooler climes of the Great White North, but combine a warm day, a long hill and 2K Watts and you will likely do them in. You might want to tone down that controller, or a least limit it via the C.A. It's unclear whether or not the composite gears from later versions of the BMC geared will fit or not, as I don't know of anyone who has tried. Perhaps one of the BMC experts like Coghog or Illia from Ebke SF would know.
The Ezee has a couple of known problems(bad solder joints at the Hall wire/PCB junction being the most common), but it is considered to be a high quality motor. It is also, I believe, manufacturered in Taiwan, not China.
I don't see, nor do you mention any torque arms? If there aren't any, you definitely need to get at least one on there.
I have a couple of Ezee motors sitting here and am looking into installing one on my GT Idrive. It uses bolt-on dropouts, like your Norco and after trying several "after-market" torque arms, and I'm at the point where I'm resigned to fab'ing some steel bolt-on drop-outs.
And I agree, you should have gone with Lipo, much more compact.