E-Bike, E-scooter, E-moto

[cuidate]

I am brand new to all of this and had it dumped on me as a result of having a Cuban wife and baby who still live there. On April 1st of this year Cubans were allowed, for the first time ever, to buy a form of transportation other than a pedal bicycle. Their only option was an electric scooter from China manufactured by a company called Haichuan.

http://www.cubanet.org/CNews/y08/may08/14cronica1.html

It's not the "you can pedal if you want to" sort of a "bike" but more a moped/scooter sort of a thing. It's the battteries or nothing. Lead-acid, 3-12V (36V), 8A batteries at 30+ lbs.

Well her lead-acid batteries faded fast after ten days and she was able to get them replaced but the warranty doesn't "restart". Because her having this kind of mobility there is so important to us both I really wanted to find a way to make it work. Towards that end I have purchased a set of NIMH 36V, 10A batteries @ 12 lbs, that come in a nice little pouch with a recharger.

http://www.batteryspace.com/index.asp?PageAction=VIEWPROD&ProdID=3025

I'm going down on Monday and I'm kind of flying blind on this stuff. I've been an electrical contractor for 30 years but have very little experience with DC voltage.

I guess what I'm looking for here is some "great idea, mate" and/or some, "that should work fine" s. I will accept, however, some "you are totally f**ked, dude" s, if those apply. I'd would also like to know if the difference between the 8A and 10A will make a noticeable difference in power.

Thanks for listening. I await your responses with all of my fingers crossed.

 

[safe]

I'd would also like to know if the difference between the 8A and 10A will make a noticeable difference in power.

"That should work fine."

Good pick... and SLA batteries tend to give about half of their rated Ah because of something called the "Peukert Effect" that means that fast drained SLA batteries lose energy because of the fast drain rate.

The new pack should be fine... you need a charger that is specific to the chemistry you are using... so don't try to charge it with an SLA charger... but other than that it sounds like you got it right. (they include the replacement charger)

 

[Toshi]

Good luck. Without actual knowledge of the scooter your wife has or the batteries in question all we can do is speculate. In theory a 10 Ah (Amp-hour, A by itself is just Amps, not a measure of capacity) NiMH should outperform a 8 Ah SLA battery by a margin greater than 10/8, but only experimentation will yield the truth.

 

[curious]

Unfortunately you may not like the answer - for non-pedaled scooter 36V 10Ah pack is very undersized. This makes it more of a toy than a mean of transportation. For practical purposes you may be better off buying your wife a quality bicycle with a child seat or trailer.

If you really want to continue experimenting with electrics for the fun of it consider the following:
- get the largest capacity pack that can fit the scooter (quality SLA or NiMH);
- remember that NiMH will require a dedicated charger - do not attempt to use original SLA charger on it;
- at a *very* minimum add an accurate voltmeter to the scooter, over-discharging the battery (SLA or NiMH) kills it, if the voltage drops below chemistry specific minimum under load and it happens in the middle of the road you basically have two choices (i) push the scooter home by hand or (ii) prepare to replace the battery.

 

[SniperGaulois]

maybe check the dimensions of the hub motor to see if it would fit on a pedal bike. if not get/make some kind of tricycle and use the wheel as a front or back wheel, best something light... upping the amps may make the controller overheat very fast. that said lead acid is fantastic for doing 10-15 km every day.

 

[Drunkskunk]

The good news is your battery should double her range over the SLA.

The bad news is the ones from batteryspace.com have trouble with putting out high amps, and you might want to run 2 packs in parrallel to help them cope. I have no idea what the motor on the scooter needs for amps, but generaly they try to pull over 20 amps, and thats about the practicle limit for that pack. 2 packs could handle 40 amps.