I find quality ebikes being dumped for a few dollars on Craigslist. Reason? Battery failure and owner's not willing spend $700 for another proprietary battery that will likely fail much sooner than advertised.
I bought a 2014 Izip E3 Dash last weekend. Nice bike, bad battery, very cheap price. Rather than replacing the 48v8.7ah (really 46.8v) battery, I built a simple tool mount for 3 Makita mount batteries. The mount fits nicely in the Izip's battery slot. Since Makitas are actually 18v (5*3.6v), 3 in series is 54V. The Izip and all 48v bikes I've tested work fine (better) at the higher voltage. I'd hoped for increased top speed using throttle mode. It doesn't, but the current is reduced 15% at the 20 mph top speed so the range using 3, 10.5 ah batteries is nearly double the OEM battery. As with any aftermarket battery, the BMS will not report the battery charge state to the display, but voltage based capacity displays are not acceptable to me anyway. I use a Watt meter which displays volts,amps,watts and keeps a true record of ah and wh consumed. Since 3 are in wired in series, it is important that all 3 be in the same state of charge. The LED voltmeter on each battery gives a quick check to help prevent that error.
I use high quality batteries built with 15 LG MJ1 cells (10.5ah), but the genuine Makita or very inexpensive clones will work as well. 3 batteries 10.5ah batteries is 25% smaller, 15% lighter, 39% more watt hours than the OEM Izip battery. The batteries charge off the bike in an hour or so on inexpensive Makita chargers. Long trip? Pack 3 extra. I've used used this system for the last 3 years; thousand of miles on singles and tandems with only one battery failure. That was a ebay, chinese clone. I've previously posted pictures of custom builds using these batteries and buses and usually get flamed. It seem most think tool batteries are not for serious ebikers.
I can make a few extra mounts and I have some 10.5ah batteries, I anyone is interested, pm.
I bought a 2014 Izip E3 Dash last weekend. Nice bike, bad battery, very cheap price. Rather than replacing the 48v8.7ah (really 46.8v) battery, I built a simple tool mount for 3 Makita mount batteries. The mount fits nicely in the Izip's battery slot. Since Makitas are actually 18v (5*3.6v), 3 in series is 54V. The Izip and all 48v bikes I've tested work fine (better) at the higher voltage. I'd hoped for increased top speed using throttle mode. It doesn't, but the current is reduced 15% at the 20 mph top speed so the range using 3, 10.5 ah batteries is nearly double the OEM battery. As with any aftermarket battery, the BMS will not report the battery charge state to the display, but voltage based capacity displays are not acceptable to me anyway. I use a Watt meter which displays volts,amps,watts and keeps a true record of ah and wh consumed. Since 3 are in wired in series, it is important that all 3 be in the same state of charge. The LED voltmeter on each battery gives a quick check to help prevent that error.
I use high quality batteries built with 15 LG MJ1 cells (10.5ah), but the genuine Makita or very inexpensive clones will work as well. 3 batteries 10.5ah batteries is 25% smaller, 15% lighter, 39% more watt hours than the OEM Izip battery. The batteries charge off the bike in an hour or so on inexpensive Makita chargers. Long trip? Pack 3 extra. I've used used this system for the last 3 years; thousand of miles on singles and tandems with only one battery failure. That was a ebay, chinese clone. I've previously posted pictures of custom builds using these batteries and buses and usually get flamed. It seem most think tool batteries are not for serious ebikers.
I can make a few extra mounts and I have some 10.5ah batteries, I anyone is interested, pm.