Ok, I've did a mistake. I ignored my "If it ain't broken, don't fix it" rule and now my bike is giving me headaches.
I have a direct drive rear hub motor. Last time I rode it was few months ago and it was working perfectly fine. In the meantime I've did following:
Upgraded to new battery, placed silicone cooling pads between heatsink and mosfets in the controller because it had kapton tape in between (tested for leaks between drains and all good), shunt mod with very little solder just for slight "punch"... Opened up motor in order to replace phase wires since they are pretty thin but one of the bearings just didn't want to let go so I've gave up, greased everything up with urea grease and closed it down. Instead I've shortened wires since they were waaay longer than I need.
Now, the bike rides very smooth in most throttle / load situations but will start to be loud under certain load and throttle positions. It's sort of a higher frequency grinding / disk hissing sound. I have to note that bike now has quite more punch than before. I don't feel it's "sputtering" or hesitating when the noise occurs but maybe sliiiiighlty like it's not giving it's full potential. Basically indication of problems with hall sensors.
Another thing is, from dead stop with very little throttle, motor doesn't start as smooth as it did. There is a "dead" spot. With wheel in the air and holding it with my hand, if I give minimum throttle I can provoke it to completely lock and it won't move even if I gradually increase to full throttle. After few sec controller just cuts power completely. It will sometimes even move backwards for a brief sec when I try. Another reason to suspect halls.
I've unplugged hall sensors and there is no difference whatsoever. Rides identically.
My multimeter recently died so I just "repurposed" usb tester I have sitting around and I've tested hall sensors. There is 5V (4.5) from controller and there was no output whatsoever from halls. I was testing between ground and hall's output pins as per most of internet. Seemed like all 3 are dead which I found weird. They were hard to read but I could see "T41" on one of them. One of them got leg detached as soon as I've touched it so it was time for replacement in any case. I've ordered Uxcell U18 bipolar latching halls as those were the only thing locally available. Changed all 3 and still no output. I've then realized my usb tester won't work on reverse polarity so this time I tested between postive and drains and all 3 work fine as I'm moving the motor by hand. I've put everything together and no change whatsoever. Thought maybe colling pads / mosfets are acting up so I removed heatsink entirely but still fails the "low throttle hold by hand dead spot" test. Tested halls on the controller PCB itself and there is signal up to that point.
While taking controller apart for millionth time, my throttle wires detached from controller PCB. I lightly pulled other wires and few more detached as well, mostly connectors for stuff I don't use like regen. I could see hall wires don't look too sturdy either so I've resoldered most of important wires to PCB. Still same thing, no changes in how motor behaves.
No other conclusion but that something in controller related to hall sensors gave up. I could only trace hall paths to controller and then I'm lost. Is there any component in the controller related to hall sensors I could check before I pronounce it half dead? Thanks.
I have a direct drive rear hub motor. Last time I rode it was few months ago and it was working perfectly fine. In the meantime I've did following:
Upgraded to new battery, placed silicone cooling pads between heatsink and mosfets in the controller because it had kapton tape in between (tested for leaks between drains and all good), shunt mod with very little solder just for slight "punch"... Opened up motor in order to replace phase wires since they are pretty thin but one of the bearings just didn't want to let go so I've gave up, greased everything up with urea grease and closed it down. Instead I've shortened wires since they were waaay longer than I need.
Now, the bike rides very smooth in most throttle / load situations but will start to be loud under certain load and throttle positions. It's sort of a higher frequency grinding / disk hissing sound. I have to note that bike now has quite more punch than before. I don't feel it's "sputtering" or hesitating when the noise occurs but maybe sliiiiighlty like it's not giving it's full potential. Basically indication of problems with hall sensors.
Another thing is, from dead stop with very little throttle, motor doesn't start as smooth as it did. There is a "dead" spot. With wheel in the air and holding it with my hand, if I give minimum throttle I can provoke it to completely lock and it won't move even if I gradually increase to full throttle. After few sec controller just cuts power completely. It will sometimes even move backwards for a brief sec when I try. Another reason to suspect halls.
I've unplugged hall sensors and there is no difference whatsoever. Rides identically.
My multimeter recently died so I just "repurposed" usb tester I have sitting around and I've tested hall sensors. There is 5V (4.5) from controller and there was no output whatsoever from halls. I was testing between ground and hall's output pins as per most of internet. Seemed like all 3 are dead which I found weird. They were hard to read but I could see "T41" on one of them. One of them got leg detached as soon as I've touched it so it was time for replacement in any case. I've ordered Uxcell U18 bipolar latching halls as those were the only thing locally available. Changed all 3 and still no output. I've then realized my usb tester won't work on reverse polarity so this time I tested between postive and drains and all 3 work fine as I'm moving the motor by hand. I've put everything together and no change whatsoever. Thought maybe colling pads / mosfets are acting up so I removed heatsink entirely but still fails the "low throttle hold by hand dead spot" test. Tested halls on the controller PCB itself and there is signal up to that point.
While taking controller apart for millionth time, my throttle wires detached from controller PCB. I lightly pulled other wires and few more detached as well, mostly connectors for stuff I don't use like regen. I could see hall wires don't look too sturdy either so I've resoldered most of important wires to PCB. Still same thing, no changes in how motor behaves.
No other conclusion but that something in controller related to hall sensors gave up. I could only trace hall paths to controller and then I'm lost. Is there any component in the controller related to hall sensors I could check before I pronounce it half dead? Thanks.