Ebike road race bike: Questions and build info

[Jay64]

Gonna continue the charger discussion in the battery technology and then post the end decision back in here.

http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=32598

 

[etard]

Is no news good news? I hope you have worked through some if your problems Jay, give us an update when you have time.

 

[Jay64]

No, unfortunately no news is no news. :lol: I did get an outrunner motor mount from Thud. Got that mounted up. Waiting on the rear sprocket so that I can work on making sure it is aligned correctly.


20" forks should be arriving today. Trying to find some bolts to use the stock rear rim brake mounting points for my battery mounting plate. Apparently it is an odd ball size so no one around here has what I need so far. Might end up having to drill it out and use a more common sized bolt with a nut on the end of it.

 

[AussieJester]

How are you going about gearing the bike, i.e. what sorry of reduction drive do you plan on using?

KiM

 

[Jay64]

Reduction? What is reduction? Gonna try and put a big ass sprocket on it.

I finally just got the 20" fork in today. I'm gonna try out both sets of forks and see which one gives me a rideability.

 

[AussieJester]

Bloody hell Jay, the sprocket will need to be the size of the 20in
Rim I gather your having this made?I have to wonder
If our resident numero uni rider of "Team THuD" will have a hand in
this i'm thinking a lexan skip tooth sprocket?! :lol:

KiM

 

[Thud]

jay is running a nuvinci rear hub..not sure but like most bicycle hubs its prolly a step-up gearing senario...& another bag of worms for puttinfg a sprocket on with a pedal system.

I just know you will need 800 wheel rpms to make 50mph. whatever it takes to get you there. making monster sprockets fit in chain stays is a pain.

 

[etard]

You guys, he is running a 75 KV motor so he may be able to get by on a 10:1 ratio with a 9 or 10 tooth motor sprocket and a 90- some tooth rear sprocket on #219.

That Thud motor mount sure looks nice! I wonder if one of those is making it's way out to Cali hmmm....

By the way Jay, I was able to find screws to fit my brake studs at Ace hardware, yours may be different, but mine was a rarely used size, but the were big so I drilled them out for lightness.

 

[Jay64]

Wow, can literally nothing go as planned???? I ordered a front brake caliper for a 203mm front rotor, it was supposed to have the 203mm bracket for a Rock Shox fork. Then I ordered a 203mm rotor. When I get the rotor mounted, I realize that there is not enough space between the rotor and the fork, looks like I'm going to have to machine down the spacer that the hub has for the rotor. Then I get the caliper, and the adapter is for IS mount and the Rock Shox have Post mount for the caliper. So I order a post mount adapter for 203mm rotor. I go to mount it up today, and it doesn't clear the 203mm rotor!!!! WTF?!?!?!

And, I got my new seat that I wanted to try to run today. But the way that it attaches is not the same way that the current seat post works. So I grabbed one of my other seat posts that looked close to being the same size. Not even close. I did a search and apparently no one makes the type of seat post I need in a 30.6.
I'm supposed to be leaving tonight to go up to Daytona for testing on the Harley tomorrow and I'm not any where closer to having this bike done.

 

[Thud]

Wow, can literally nothing go as planned????

never with an e-bike race build....I had a motor spontainusly short out earleir this week.....4 attempts to get it re-wound without a short has blisters on my blisters....have the speedcontrollers build...but no plan as of yet other than righ side drive & how to mount the motors to a frame....I need to ship a packadge tomorrow...i wonder what will be in it? LOL

I wonder if i can pick up a gas motor out in cali & build one of them...e-bikes suck!

 

[Jay64]

I've got a little 2 stroke motor I took out of a pocket bike for a conversion. I can bring that for you if you want. :lol: I just put the front wheel into the 20" forks I got, it has IS mounts......now I can't find the friggin' 203mm IS bracket that came with the brakes!!!!! Where in the HELL did I put that thing???? I took it to a few shops to see if they had something similar in the post mount and now I don't know where I put it. :lol: :lol: :lol: :lol:

I think the rim brakes might work with the 20" forks. Maybe I'll just go back to that. Does anyone know if I can put spacers on the bottom of the steerer before it goes into the head tube? I was thinking that I wanted to use the 26" forks because I wanted the front end a little higher. Now I'm thinking that if I just put spacers on the bottom of the tube with the 20" forks, that would push the front end back up. Would that compromise the strength of the forks?

I got my sprockets in today, one thing I was thinking of trying to do is not going to work out. So I need to bore out the axle hole to do it another way.

Damn it, I need to pack up the Harley! I gotta stop messing with this. :lol:

 

[Jay64]

Yeee Doggy!! Now this makes up for all the build stress I've been going through. Doing a test day at Daytona International Speedway on my XR1200 race bike. Nothing like good ol' fashion throttle therapy on the high banks of Daytona to get your mind off things. I'll get back to work on everything when I get back tomorrow. Today is my real job. What a great day at the office. :lol:

 

[Thud]

Oh to be young again......Be safe & leave it all on the track.
(where is the Jellous emoticon?)

 

[Jay64]

So, does anyone know if you can add spacers to the bottom of the steerer under the frame tube?

 

[full-throttle]

Wow, can literally nothing go as planned???? I ordered a front brake caliper for a 203mm front rotor, it was supposed to have the 203mm bracket for a Rock Shox fork. Then I ordered a 203mm rotor. When I get the rotor mounted, I realize that there is not enough space between the rotor and the fork, looks like I'm going to have to machine down the spacer that the hub has for the rotor. Then I get the caliper, and the adapter is for IS mount and the Rock Shox have Post mount for the caliper. So I order a post mount adapter for 203mm rotor. I go to mount it up today, and it doesn't clear the 203mm rotor!!!! WTF?!?!?!

Jay, there should be a set of concentric washers between the mount and the caliper

 

[LI-ghtcycle]

So, does anyone know if you can add spacers to the bottom of the steerer under the frame tube?

In theory, yes, but I have never heard of it. How much of a spacer are you talking? 1/4 in 1/2? What ever spacer you make will have to have the lower bearing race it on top of it, so it will have to be a pretty snug fit, but sure it could be done.

 

[Jay64]

Jay, there should be a set of concentric washers between the mount and the caliper

Ah, that makes a lot of sense. Thanks. The pieces I bought didn't come with that. I guess I will have to try to find some of those.

 

[etard]

Jay, I'm fairly certain you cannot add spacers to the bottom of the head tube because the bottom headset cap ( forget what it's called, the disc that the bearing ride on) goes around a flare in the bottom of the fork tube which wedges everything tight. If you take the fork out you will notice this piece is often hard to take off because of this bit once you slide it past the first inch it slide freely. Sorry, I hope that makes sense, I can't remember what anything is called, perhaps I should review a diagram or Sheldon Brown before posting. I hope that makes sense.

I'm really jealous of you riding Daytona, I know a lot of riders don't like it because of that rough banked section at full speed where someone in third can overtake the lead rider, but it sure is fun to watch! Was it bike week? It used to be so crazy until the local police started trying to make money off it. My brother uses to live there and we would always goes down for bike week. Madness.

 

[Jay64]

The reason I ask is because on the 20" forks that I got, the part where the steerer comes out of the fork (crown?) seems pretty flat, so I don't see what the difference would be if it was flat right there, or if there was a higher up flat area on a washer. Is the steerer flared in that area? As I wrote that I realized I could measure the diameter of the steerer as it moves up. I'll get to that after I send this. I actually like the movement of the 20" forks much better than the 26". I was surprised by that because I thought rock shox were really good quality. But maybe I just bought the cheap version and the quality was a lot less for the ones I got. But the 20" forks were even cheaper than the cheaper Rock Shox.

Riding Daytona again was a blast, and it was really cool to finally ride it on a Harley. The rough parts of the track have been greatly improved since they repaved it this year. It was actually really smooth compared to some of the tracks. I don't think many racers don't like the drafting aspect of Daytona, most of us feel that's one of the things that make this a fun track. Usually the people that you hear bitching about it are the ones that just got beat from it, but when they are using it they don't complain at all. It is quite a rush to get a 3 bike draft while up on the side of a wall. It's crazy how steep that banking is, I think it's something like 31 degrees. I really like this shot of me on the banking. It almost looks like I am on a flat road with a shot from a helicopter or something above me. But I was on the banking and the photographer was standing on top of an RV shooting horizontally.

I really don't have any idea if it is bike week right now or not. I've been so caught up in trying to get this bike build done and get ready for my trip I haven't been paying attention to much else. I think it is about that time of year for bike week though. There is a semi pro race going on this weekend so they had a practice/school day on thursday. I signed up to just do some practice. I needed to get some testing on the track with the Harley for the race coming up next March. I missed the '11 Daytona race and a few of the other early rounds because I had a preseason crash where I went over the handle bars at 100+ mph. So I wanted to get a little data before I showed up at the pro race next year.

 

[etard]

Awesome photo Jay! That should be your avatar pic, except people might think you enjoy the Jap bikes instead of that grunty american breed you seemed to like. :lol:

Yeah, the steerer is flared right at the bottom. I'm not sure why you can't just add the spacers on top like everybody else :wink: unless you are trying to slacken the head angle a little? They actually make headsets that have adjustable head tube angles by way of eccentric housing:

http://www.canecreek.com/component-headsets?browse=Complete&name=AngleSet

Woops, apperently it's only for 1 1/2" tapered headtubes, yours is 1 1/8" and at $150 fairly pricy, but still a cool feature, I wonder if motorcycle manuf. will one day follow this very cool feature.

So the Pirellis are fitting the 20" forks?

 

[Jay64]

Actually, I am a huge fan of Japanese bikes, especially Suzukis. I have raced Japanese bikes (Honda, Yamaha, and Suzuki) for over 15 years now (damn, I can't even remember when I started :lol: ) My current avatar is actually also a GSXR 600, but that one is my '06, the daytona pic is my '04. I can't find the original photo I used to make it, but I do know it is from the same set of photos that this one came from.

I used to be one of the biggest people talking out against HD. Too heavy and not enough performance. But this new bike and class they got kind of sparked my interest, it's like a retro bike. And a sponsor offered to cover everything if I came out of retirement and raced it for them. That was a no brainer to me. I'll race a Chinese Lifan if someone pays for me to do it. :lol: :lol: :lol: And there is a certain mystique of racing a HD at Daytona where it all started. I like being able to say that I did something that not too many other people on the planet have done. I guess that is another reason why I like to do the EV stuff. It's funny, the HD is so bad handling that it actually adds to the street cred of having raced it. Hard core racers are always telling me that they can't believe we race these things because of how bad they shake and wiggle all over the place. :lol:

I do have spacers at the top of the steering tube on the 26" forks, but when the 20" forks are going to make it so low, that I wanted to try to bring the frame of the bike back up, not just the handlebars.

 

[Jay64]

Yeah, the pirellis fit in the 20" forks, but I had to deflate the tire to get it to pass the rim brake posts.

 

[Jay64]

Well, looks like I let the white smoke out of my LYEN 24 fet controller. I had got some thinner wire for the hall sensors and did up another motor. I was checking the timing and going through the different hall sensor wire combinations and the controller stopped working again. I unplugged the power, let it sit for a while and plugged it back in to see if that would reset the controller. When I applied throttle, there was a pop. I unplugged everything and took the controller out of the bike and there was white smoke coming out of it. I had the motor mounted in the bike, but I didn't have any load on it. I didn't even have the sprocket on the motor. These motors are out for the count.......

 

[Thud]

Wow,
It fryed with a bench load? you sound as dangerous to ellectronics as i am Jay. Either way that sucks.....I have my suitcase packed to the hilt with controllers & motors & i know i am forgetting something......oh well....I am oficialy on vacation at 11:30 am EST today.

I'll hit the gorund in Ontario CA. at 10:30 pm tonight (1:30 am tomorrow est) for the monster chop & fab session west coast edition.

You setting up the hub motored bike Jay? still making the trip i hope.

 

[Jay64]

Yes, I'm still making the trip, not sure what I'll be racing. My hub motor builds are only rated for 36 volts though. I tried switching out a 48v controller that I had into one of the builds and it fried the on/off switch in a second, not sure what caused that. I didn't go into detail trying to figure that out at the time cuz I was trying to concentrate on getting this bike built. But I have other plans in Cali, so I'm still going to be going out there. Hell, I just got an offer to test my ICE bike out at the Vegas track on the 23rd. If I'm going to try to make the Grange event I have to leave tomorrow.

Edit: Is it supper hard on contollers when you don't have the hall sensors wired up in the correct order?