Electrifying SUCKS Amps!!!

retro

retro

100 mW
Joined
Oct 6, 2009
Messages
35
WTF?? That's all I can say. I waited half the summer for my wheel build, now I'm dealing with this goddamn controller... I've wasted a whole frocking summer, and for what? I'm thousands of $$$$ lighter without a penny to spare and now nothing, absolutely nothing to show for it, except for a pretty wheel, which has nothing to do with the electrics.

I've been following this forum for a couple of years and wow, thought this is the cat's ass.... I got suckered, cause I don't have money to throw around, yet thought it could be done within a reasonable investment.... guess again... unless you're a moron with endless pockets, this idea sucks!!!!!! folks reading this and wondering what to do???" go buy yourself a cheap Chinese knockoff scooter and forget the rest. This isn't rocket science by any means, yet to get anything to work.... buyer beware :twisted:
 
That's one opinion. I can only add that I have had no problems by just buying kits that are already known to be compatible systems and steering WAY clear of Lipo battery setups. The suckiest part is having to rely on Chinese suppliers for an affordable lifepo4 battery. It also helps that I have experience as a former electronics technician. So, for those that don't have such abilities, maybe your advice to just get a prebuilt Chinese scooter is not ill-advised. At some point, though you need to learn about how to fix things, because out-of-the-box Chinese bikes are bound to need fixing sooner rather than later.
 
Take a breath and post up what exactly is wrong..
 
Sometimes people make things more complicated than they actually are.
 
The TerraTrike Zoomer is a really nice trike. That's what my buddy from Medford has. I'm sure you are aware that you should use some torque arms if you put the hub motor wheel on your Zoomer, since the frame is aluminum.

As mentioned earlier, let us know what motor and controller you have and what your problem is. There is plenty of help available here. With a couple of exceptions there has been nothing but ebike grins once the little issues are resolved. Good luck with the rest of your build. :D
 
retro said:
WTF?? That's all I can say. I waited half the summer for my wheel build, now I'm dealing with this goddamn controller... I've wasted a whole frocking summer, and for what? I'm thousands of $$$$ lighter without a penny to spare and now nothing, absolutely nothing to show for it, except for a pretty wheel, which has nothing to do with the electrics.

I've been following this forum for a couple of years and wow, thought this is the cat's ass.... I got suckered, cause I don't have money to throw around, yet thought it could be done within a reasonable investment.... guess again... unless you're a moron with endless pockets, this idea sucks!!!!!! folks reading this and wondering what to do???" go buy yourself a cheap Chinese knockoff scooter and forget the rest. This isn't rocket science by any means, yet to get anything to work.... buyer beware :twisted:
Click to expand...

Sounds like you have no one to blame but yourself.

"waited half the summer for my wheel build": Why? There are plenty of hub motors pre-laced and readily available.
"I'm thousands of $$$$ lighter": A complete hub motor kit can be bought for less than $200, cell_man's kit for example.
"cause I don't have money to throw around": Yet you're thousands of $$$$ lighter???
"This isn't rocket science by any means": Finally, you're correct. The secret's is to ask the right questions and to buy products that are proven for your first project. Walk first, run later.
"go buy yourself a cheap Chinese knockoff scooter and forget the rest": Wrong again, but might work out better for you given the circumstances.
 
The feedback is appreciated and in a moment of frustration, I blew up :oops:

Everything posted in reply is true and so is the truth of what I've put into this.
Yes I could have, should have, would have done many things differently, that's the past and a mute point. I'm in the Now and dealing with Murphy.

Others may have no problem with fellow member's hard work and product, if there's a one-in a million chance something will go wrong, it will for me.
But I will not trash anyone online or their product until I get a resolution first hand, then I'll praise them if I've been dealt with fairly.

That's where I sit, waiting for resolution.
 
Yea I know how it is sometimes. http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=6924 So I know about the frustration when all goes wrong and then it's all downhill from there. My $350 "new BMC motor" just sits there to remind me of how wrong things can go. I stole the 16ga phase wires off of it and added them to my V2 wires so they were very expensive wires. But the second try on the second build werqed out very well and after 4500+ miles I upped the voltage and hit 40+ on level ground with a bit of a headwind. Oh and I had to graduate from my original $700 battery investment once I tried the a123s so that's a grand right there not counting the extra frames, chargers, power supplies and other parts I bought and likely will never use. Remember it's just another addiction they are not posed to be cheap nor pretty. ;^) Hoping the best for you but never give up cuz nirvana could be right around the corner.
 
IMHO you need to sleep on it.

I spent last summer and fall reading ES for months being totally confused about where to go with my build.. and then waiting on all sorts of various stuff that held me back. Ended up getting into winter and missed out on all the rideable weather. In Oregon, that's 6 months of intermittent rain and constant gloom. It sucked bad.

I've learned to keep 2 of everything since getting into this hobby.
Once you get into it, and finally have a working build, you'll find yourself where i am; won't have it any other way.
 
I can understand the frustration when, through no fault of your own, everything seems to go wrong.
After waiting three months for battery delivery, one of the chargers didn't, six weeks later the controller crapped out and by the end of 6 months the batteries were sledding south, fast.
So, by the end of the first year it would have been easy to get discouraged and severely regretting ~$2500 down the toilet.

However my local dealer made everything right with their understated awesome excellence.
If it weren't for the people at ebikes.ca I'd have probably written off the whole ebikes thing as a bad idea poorly executed.
Now after three years I'm convinced electrification has greatly improved the utility of my bicycle.
 
Find the closest es member and take your build for a visit, if no close enough try a local shop, if not close enough describe what you got and what works and doesn't.
 
Slowdown and take a deep breath and thinge will get better.I am almost 68years old and up till 2-1/2 years ago I had never seen an e-bike or even heard of one, now I have (3) trikes and it did not start off good. you can learn a lot here and slowely learn what to do. E-BIKES are the future for a lot of fun and for some and a way of good cheep transportation for others. GOOD DAY :) :)
 
I think I have two or three posts to my name where I try to sell all of my stuff because shit went wrong and I got frustrated. On bad days where nothing goes right, I still feel like that sometimes. It gets better though. I haven't had one of those days for six months or so.

Back up are nice to have. But really... I don't think I've had anything break that wasn't because of a mistake I made. It's the diddling that messes things up, but once you get a bike up and running it'll be trouble free. If something does break, it's usually cheap to replace or upgrade. The only downside is shipping times.

If you live in north texas, I'd be happy to help you with what ever you need! You WILL get your bike running. And right as the weather starts to cool down too :)
 
I can also understand the OP frustration, I have been trying to get this WE front hub going reliably ever since I got here. I respect the guys that get thousands of miles out of their bikes, I wish I could join the fray. One of the reasons guys have so many extra hubs, controllers, chargers, etc... is because this shit breaks all the time! Honestly, from a $$$ standpoint you can't beat the stone cold reliability of a Honda 80cc scooter which can be had used for less than a grand$. I bet even Dogman would agree that scooters are better if you have to get to work everyday and can't afford to break down half way through a 15 mile commute. Granted, you can pedal onward and arrive at work soaking wet, but if you don't fix the problem that night, you're screwed. Not to mention the PITA that is pedaling an electric bike unpowered and arriving home in time to go to bed after 2500 feet of incline. :roll:

Certainly there is a learning curve and once you get the hang of it, fixes and problem solving comes much quicker, but you can hardly say these ebikes are reliable.
 
Months later, thousands of $$$$ and yet nothing to show except frustration? I just don't have faith in the trend to assemble your kit from differently sourced parts.

Turn key pre-fab kits (just add the bike) or complete ready made ebikes may cost more sure. They may not be as over-clockable, as customizable, or even upgradeable. But for less than $1,500 you can get a ready made ebike from a variety of reputable manufactures with excellent customer service and even a warranty that do 20mph for 20 miles. Buy a 2nd battery if you need more range. Ten years ago this was a bare market, now look at it.

Don't give up. Don't turn others off. Learn from this and help those who are new to the sport!
 
My translation:


If you're useless, anything that requires someone useful is a poor choice in hobby.


Stick to TV, video games, movies, all the other hobbies enjoyed by the useless.
 
Frustration is part of the game, but it doesn't last, once you are working again to build. The more trouble you have to go through to succeed, the more you enjoy the success when you get to it. This is what make us build again, with higher goals, every time a step further.

Then, some are not made to build, as Luke said a little rudely.
 
lol M E G A - T R O L L ! ! ! B-))
You could have asked for help nicely.. but I fully agree, this post is a success ^^ And nobody knows what your problem is and why your daaamn summer finish the 10th of July ^^
Gruß,
H.
 
On the subject of having a backup..

When I built my bike I realized that shipping crap from china was a PITA so I have a backup for everything but the battery. Batteries are just too expensive for me to have more than one, and if push comes to shove I can always stick some cheap SLAs bought locally on it. Currently just for my one bike, I have the Clite controller in use, a cheap ebay infinon, and a 12 FET Ecrazyman controller. I also have a 1000W golden motor. These parts were bought for a reasonable price, and IMO are priceless if and when something goes wrong. However saying all that, my current setup has been running since 09. I am however on my second LiFePO4 pack because I never bothered to understand C rates and destroyed my last 1C pack.

Like I said, post up whats wrong as see if anyone can help. There is a vast amount of knowledge here and very few problems come up that haven't been seen before at least by someone round here.
 
Wecome to why I have six running ebikes these days, and spare motors and controllers laying around. It sure is frustrating when your favorite toy is down and it's a saturday. When I was starting out, I made some REALY bad choices, before I found the sphere. The wife laughed her ass off, as I kept saying " this will save me money". In the end, mo money was spent, but now I know how to keep the fleet running, and I have saved myself a lot of time and money I used to spend keeping high mileage cars running. Now the cars need half the maintenance, with half the miles of driving.
 
Pure said:
... and a 12 FET Ecrazyman controller.
Click to expand...

Who's Ecrazyman? I keep hearing this name and it appears to be a seller on Ebay. But a search of Ebay userID turns up nothing.
Sorry for being off-topic.
 
SamTexas said:
Who's Ecrazyman? I keep hearing this name and it appears to be a seller on Ebay. But a search of Ebay userID turns up nothing.
Click to expand...
http://myworld.ebay.com/e-crazyman/
 
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