rewiring a bionx hub motor after removing the controller

hrottier

1 µW
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Apr 15, 2018
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Madison, Wisconsin
Greetings:
I am wondering if anyone could advise me on how to wire my bionx hub motor after removing the controller. I have read some links here on using an external controller with this hub and so I decided to take mine apart. So after opening the hub motor I am faced with several questions. There are two black wires that go to the winding and 2 red wires that go to the windings and several white wires. I am assuming the two black wires along with the black lead that comes into the hub get tied together and the same for the red wires. I am not sure how to deal with the white wires. I am also confused by how to reconnect the hall sensors.
I also have a question about the 22 magnets and there configuration. In my eagerness, I did not mark them when I took them out to clean. Does anyone know their sequence as to putting them back in. Would it be positive/negative/positive/negative, or perhaps 2 positive/2 negative/ 2 positive/2negative.
I would appreciate any help given.
Harold
 
hrottier said:
There are two black wires that go to the winding and 2 red wires that go to the windings and several white wires. I am assuming the two black wires along with the black lead that comes into the hub get tied together and the same for the red wires. I am not sure how to deal with the white wires. I am also confused by how to reconnect the hall sensors.

As far as tying wires together--if they werent tied together before, you definitely wouldnt tie them together now. Each wire has a purpose, and you need to know what each one does before you hook it up to anything. If you didnt mark down waht they were before, or take pictures you can trace them from, then youll have to research other peoples threads, posts, and webpages to find someone that has documented your model of motor and what each wire does and where it goes. Or trace or measure where each wire goes, and note it down here so someone might be able to help figure out what it would hook up to on the new controller. Otherwise youre just guessing, which can lead to sparks, melting, and disappointment, depending on how you experiment with it and what you hook them up to. ;)

Assuming it is a brushless motor like the others posted about here on ES (you can look up BionX in thread titles for the various threads about these here), then there should be three phase wires, usually thicker than the others. To see which is which, follow them to the internal controllers board, and note down which wire goes to which marked pad, and what the pad markings are. Probably something like MOT-A / B / C; those have been seen on at least some of their boards.

The hall wires would usually have a power and a ground, and then one signal wire for each hall. Since its an internal controller, they might nto have combined the power and ground from all three halls into one pair, so youd need to do that to run them out the cable exit and to your external controller. Which wire goes where youd again have to look at your original setup for where they went on the internal controller, and what the markings on that board show.

Most external controllers will use 5v for the hall power, but I dont know what hte Bionx uses, so youd have to check that. if its not 5V you may have to either change the halls out or provide whatever voltage they need with an external power supply or separate battery.

Theres also going to be various other wires that went to the contorller from other parts of the Bionx system that you wont be using with the external controller, basically anything other than the 3 phase and 5 (or 9) hall wires. The leftovers youd just leave unconnected and tied out of the way so they dont catch on anything rotating, or short anything out.

I dont know if you can use any of the other Bionx parts (throttle, pedal sensors, displays, etc) with an external controller--probably not. If you look at other Bionx threads where they replaced their controller externally, they may give info on that part. Otherwise you might have to assume all of the Bionx stuff otehr than the motor is now useless and would need to be replaced with new ones that come with or are compatible with the external controller youre adding. Also, the battery may or may not work with the new controller, unless you bypass the BMS. Some of them seem to require signals from the controller and/or display to function.


Dunno about the magnet thing, but most of the motors Ive worked with use alternating pole setups. Youll need to be sure to glue them in with a suitable epoxy that can handle whatever temperatures you expect the motor to reach inside. There are threads that talk about magnet / motor repair that also discuss different glues, but I dont have any direct links.
 
Considering that some more powerful motors can be purchased brand new for 100$, I am not sure that an old Bionix is worth the trouble, if it is not going to retain its only valuable quality of torque sensing system.
 
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