HOW DO YOU TEST BATTERIES THOROUGHLY? I have no torque

[Stumper]

I bought a 6 month old eLation V3 kit off ebay for my mountain bike. The system is (finally) all together and going BUT I have absolutely no torque at all. In first gear on the flat it does not even make an impact. Obviously something is wrong but what is it? Doesn't matter what speed I am going or what gear I'm in I can't feel any power coming from the motor. The motor certainly turns and I can also hear it whining. [I once rode a cheap K-mart IZIP and remember being quite impressed with the impact of the motor kicking in].

I tested the battery a few days ago and at no load it was 55V. Regardless, I gave it another charge and the charge light went green after 7 minutes, so it shouldn't be a battery issue (right?).

I've emailed the owner of eLation and he suggested I send the motor back to him for testing. I may have to end up doing that BUT would like to be able to diagnose myself if I can (with the help of a technician friend).

Question: HOW DO YOU TEST BATTERIES THOROUGHLY? ie more than just a no load test.

(I've had a stack of contact with the ebay seller and I'm confident he isn't pulling a swifty on me. He has said he kept the battery charged as it was supposed to be.)

(I previously posted in a eLation V3 thread:
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=4&t=10867&p=429516#p429516)

 

[theRealFury]

Well, only way to test what you need it to do a load test on the battery, You would ideally need a watt meter, watts up meter or cycle analyst for measuring purposes, or an amp meter if the above are not possible. If you are on a 110v system you could perhaps use a space heater as a load. I may be wrong but a 110v space heater rated to 1kw i think would pull just over 500watts at the 55v of your battery.

If the motor spins in the correct direction but has no torque then it is sually a sign of a hall/phase mismatch though so possibly try to swap and change the hall/phase wire combos on your motor first to see if you can get a better drive out of them. Im pretty sure that if your battery is a 48v battery and is putting out 55v then it is at least fairly healthy so should still be able to put out enough watts to put some torque into the motor.

 

[John in CR]

The best way to test batteries is to put them in a bucket of very salty water.

 

[AussieJester]

I bought a 6 month old eLation V3 kit off ebay for my mountain bike.

According to 'Lesspedal' it appears to be a 200watt motored kit? dunno what you were expecting as far as "torque" from it goes?? but i can tell you 200watt motor ain't going to be pulling you along very fast at all i would expect 20-25km 30 tops if you have a tail wind on dead flat ground
and you don't weigh much more than a soaked cat ... A 200watt motor, LoL be lucky to pull your jumper off if it was a tight fit .. I hope it is a fault and not working correctly for your sake sounds harsh to say that :-| but would be the best outcome wouldnt it LoL best of luck sorting it

KiM

 

[Stumper]

Gee thanks for all the replies - that's wonderful.

AussieJester:
Yes it's 200watts. It definitely is some sort of problem. The motor wont move me at all. Once I'm going about 5 or 10km per hour on the flat it can't even maintain me at that speed. If I stop pedaling I come to a complete stop.

theRealFury:
"If the motor spins in the correct direction but has no torque then it is sually a sign of a hall/phase mismatch though so possibly try to swap and change the hall/phase wire combos on your motor first to see if you can get a better drive out of them."
Would these be the three heavier wires going from the controller to the motor? They are colour coded so I just plugged the wires from the controller into the identical type & same colour wire that go down to the motor (ie. there's 3 wires coming out of the controller with pin connections which match 3 identical wires going down to the motor). What are the 3 wires for (ie why are there 3)?

I might try your suggestions with my technician friend.

John in CR:
I might give your suggestions a go by myself. Probably wont get a chance till Saturday.

Thank you for your help.

Cheers

 

[AussieJester]

With the motor under no load it spins but Does it spin freely
without jittering when starting? I thought it could possibly be a blown hall
sensor?

KiM

 

[theRealFury]

Would these be the three heavier wires going from the controller to the motor? They are colour coded so I just plugged the wires from the controller into the identical type & same colour wire that go down to the motor (ie. there's 3 wires coming out of the controller with pin connections which match 3 identical wires going down to the motor). What are the 3 wires for (ie why are there 3)?

Yes, the 3 colour coded wires coming from the mortor should be green, yellow and blue (or they are on most motors anyway) These are the phase wires and basically (im no motor buff) if im correct what the controller does is send pulses of current down the wires in a sequance to match the rotation of the magnets to generate torque. If these wires are in the incorrect order or one or more is not connected properly then the sequance will be incorrect and the motor will either not run at all, run backwords or have no power under load. When i got my motor i actually had to swap 2 of the phase wires arround because when i matched the wires with the controller wires colour for colour the motor ran backwords. It was trial and error but i got there.

Does your motor have any other wires coming out of it besides the 3 phase wires?

 

[dogman dan]

It could be as simple as the problem that is the culprit 80-90% of the time. One of your plugs is making a bad connection on one wire. So you are only getting perhaps 50 watts to the motor. Particularly check the three big wires to the motor, for bad connections at the plugs, and nicks in the wire. I once had a bike running real weak, and only one strand of the big wire was still uncut. The rest had all been cut when the wire rubbed the tire.

 

[Stumper]

Test Day

John in CR:
I did the Battery Load test and the voltage hardly dropped at all (went from 55v to 53V). Therefore battery must be good (Hooray!!)

The whirring sound of the motor does not change with throttle, so no gear slippage.

theRealFury:
I thought I'd see what happened when I remove each of the 3 phase wires one at a time.
Removed the blue - motor would not start (replaced blue)
Removed the yellow - motor would not start (replaced yellow)
Removed the green - first time I did this the motor definitely went faster* BUT I cannot replicate this. Every subsequent removal of the green wire and the motor just does not go.

* How do I investigate this phenomenon further? Is there a possible answer to my problems in this?

Swapped blue and green wire around - motor made a very bad sound and did not move (I stopped it very quickly)
Swapped yellow to green, blue to yellow, green to blue (or something) - motor made even worse sound, did not move, so again I stopped it quickly.

Does this throw out the whole hall/phase mismatch theory?

"Does your motor have any other wires coming out of it besides the 3 phase wires?" Yes. The motor has 5 other wires coming from it to the controller. Theses are finer wires - probably signal wires? The had a combined plug (ie all 5 wires combine in one plastic male plug).

Aussie Jester:
"With the motor under no load it spins but Does it spin freely without jittering when starting? I thought it could possibly be a blown hall sensor?"
Yes it spins without jittering. Fairly smoothly

Also, the person I purchased it off is wondering if the motor just needs running in (as he said he literally only went around the block a couple of times and hadn't finished running it in so he really didn't push the motor). Allan D from eLation has said in his instructions that the tolerances on these motors had been tightened up and they needed to be run in for 10 to 40 hours - (so basically ride gently in this time). But surely if needed I would feel power. the running in instructions seemed to only refer to the noise of the motor rather than power.

Appreciating the help guys.

Cheers

Steve

 

[Stumper]

John in CR

I may have miss understood your comments:

"Does the whirring speed sound of the motor vary with throttle without a change in speed? If so, then something is slipping. If a it's a geared motor, then the gears are probably gone or the freewheeling clutch."

When I do the load test on the battery I use the rear brakes to stop the wheel BUT the motor continues to make the same noise, ie internally it sounds like the motor is still turning but the motor's external sprocket is not turning (this a chain drive system). Is this just a clutch engaging in the motor and is this what is meant to happen? Or is this what you are saying above, it's slipping when it is not meant to and hence there is no torque?

Cheers
Steve

 

[John in CR]

Yes, something is slipping..

 

[Stumper]

Yes, something is slipping...some kind of clutch I guess unless there's plastic gears hidden from view that are stripped. I'm not familiar at all with the system. If the motor had little torque to turn and was held in place, then the motor sound would be of a stalled motor, not the whirring of a spinning motor.

The other possibility is something installed backward that was meant to make it pedal easier, or the motor spinning backward and just freewheeling. Does the wheel spin at all in the correct direction using the motor with the wheel off the ground? Is the motor harder to turn by hand in the backward direction?

* Yes I thought the motor should be stalling in the scenario of putting the brakes on but that certainly doesn't happen.
* Yes the wheel spins in the correct direction using the motor with the wheel off the ground.
* Yes the motor is harder to turn by hand in the backward direction.

But I'm feeling a little thick in the head tonight (too much Tour de France) and I'm not understanding very well. I'm not sure what you mean by this:
"The other possibility is something installed backward that was meant to make it pedal easier, or the motor spinning backward and just freewheeling."

Are you saying it's been designed to do this OR are you saying this is the problem I'm looking for?

What should I do next?

Thanks for your help.

Steve

 

[John in CR]

I poked around a bit online for details about the eLation kit. It has a planetary gearset, which at that low power probably has plastic gears like geared hubmotors use to keep noise low. Unfortunately that's where I believe your problem lies with this used kit, because those other answers don't indicate something simple like the motor running in reverse or clutch on backward.

Unfortunately it sounds like stripped gears to me, and not just dead or weak batteries. How difficult does it look to crack open the motor? At the same time shoot off a troubleshooting inquiry to eLation without mentioning that you bought it used. Also, shoot a question off to the dick that sold it to you on Ebay (Do you have his return address from the package?).

It should be pretty easy to service yourself, and gears or a clutch shouldn't cost too much. With it being only 6 months old, if eLation is worth their salt as a company, they should fix it for free if you want to go through the PIA return route. Again, don't bring up that it's used. Before deciding, check how difficult it is to get in there.

I know it sucks to not just be working correctly right off the bat, but if you can get in there to diagnose the problem, and get the part(s) to fix it (which should be cheap), then there's real reward in fixing it yourself. You'll be doing the equivalent of pulling the motor out of a car, and taking the transmission apart and fixing it. With an ebike that kind of job is simple and easy, but it still gives you a whole other layer of satisfaction in riding the vehicle.

John

 

[Stumper]

...the eLation kit. It has a planetary gearset, which at that low power probably has plastic gears like geared hubmotors use to keep noise low. . . . sounds like stripped gears to me,
John

I've got the gear box cover off, surprise - they are not planetary gears (despite what the elation website says, this is probably and update on the motor that the website hasn't kept up with) and they are not plastic. They are steel. The final gear has a freewheel on it. The website refers to a sprag clutch drive. Perhaps this is the freewheel on the final gear? ["A Sprag Clutch is a free-wheel device having an inner race, and an outer race" http://www.renold.com.au/Products/SpragClutchFreewheels/Sprag_Clutch_Index.asp].

They all seem to be working perfectly. They look like this: http://omaralshahrani.wordpress.com/2011/06/14/my-first-online-blog/

I've undone the motor cover but can only get it off about 10mm. It's very simple so I think there's nothing mechanical that could go wrong in there and not be seriously obvious.

Qn: So could it only be the sprag clutch drive? Or am I back to the hall/phase possibilities?

 

[John in CR]

No pics? Always take pics when you open stuff up.

If you hold the wheel stationary, run the motor, and hear the motor whirring away, then something is obviously slipping. My guess is the clutch.

If you want to satisfy yourself that it's not electric, then measure the no-load current that the motor draws. WOT wheel off the ground should be low current, in the neighborhood of 2 amps. High current with no load indicates an incorrect wiring combo, but I haven't seen a small motor like than spin up at all with a bad combo.

BTW, PM stands for Private Message, not Notification of New Post ("I just posted a question, please go answer it quickly")

 

[Stumper]

Yes I took some pics but yesterday struggled to figure out how to load them up to the forum. I've learnt now:

 

[Icewrench]

On Heinzmann internally geared hub motors they can have two internal failures where the motor will run but the wheel will not rotate.
One is the small gear on the motor`s shaft can come loose ,the other is the internal clutch / sprague failure.
Both will leave you sitting there going nowhere.

 

[evp001a]

I have the latest eLation 200w Kit purchased new, came with no working clutch. Sent back to eLation and they repaired clutch promptly. A new problem has developed, that results in motor 'slipping' and 'clicking'. I will send back to eLation again and see what they say. I have an old copy of a cyclone 200w kit that has no clutch and metal gears, it has heaps of torque and can propel my ebike at a constant 28Kph on the flat without assistance. When the eLation kit was working it had even more torque and could maintain 32Kph on the flat without assistance. I'm not game to open my eLation motor, but I'd like see inside if anyone else is prepared to post a picture...

 

[Stumper]

I have the latest eLation 200w Kit purchased new, came with no working clutch. Sent back to eLation and they repaired clutch promptly. A new problem has developed, that results in motor 'slipping' and 'clicking'. I will send back to eLation again and see what they say. I have an old copy of a cyclone 200w kit that has no clutch and metal gears, it has heaps of torque and can propel my ebike at a constant 28Kph on the flat without assistance. When the eLation kit was working it had even more torque and could maintain 32Kph on the flat without assistance. I'm not game to open my eLation motor, but I'd like see inside if anyone else is prepared to post a picture...

Hi evp001a

The pictures I posted above of the opened up motor are of the eLation V3 purchased new around last Christmas.

Can you tell me what the symptoms of the 'no working clutch' were and also the symptoms of the motor 'slipping'. At this stage I'm trying to figure out what my problem is. It's possibly mechanical. If it is mechanical eLation say it's not cost effective to repair, I'd have to get a replacement motor and mounting bracket (since they have new models since Christmas requiring new mounting bracket) and that will cost me $500 - all for a motor that's been around the block twice. Caveat emptor ebay.

Qn: HOW DO I TEST IF THE MOTOR IS SLIPPING? As I've said above, when the motor turns under throttle it turns the wheel and it makes a certain noise. When I forcibly stop the wheel (not requiring much force) while the throttle is still on the noise of the motor stays exactly the same- which I'm presuming means it is doing the same thing - ie still turning. From this I'm assuming there is a slippage on one of the shafts.

Started a new thread about this because it's no longer a discussion about batteries:
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=30577

 

[evp001a]

I received my repaired motor back from eLation and the clutch had failed (for the second time), they replaced it with a more robust one. I'll bet thats the problem with yours too. The new clutch makes a bit of noise whilst it wears in, but otherwise seems fine. I'll let you know if I have any other probs.

As for testing direct to the output of the motor, there won't be much torque as the motor will spin at around 2500rpm, it is the gearbox 10:1 ratio that slows it down to 250rpm and gives it torque, I've tried direct drive 200w motors in the past and they suck. A good engineer may be able to make you a cog to replace the clutch using a lathe or laser cutter or similar. Germans make very good gearboxes for electric motors, you'll need more $$$.

The V3 kit from eLation is good in every respect except for that damn clutch. The cheaper ebay kits (copy of cyclone kit) are a cost effective alternative but are a pain to fit. Hub motors are too easy to fit, just use brute force to climb hills and ride an illegal 750w motor. The Avanti Electra is a very cool hub motor but is too expensive. The ultimate kit would be a hub motor coupled to a hub gearbox like the sturmi-archer or the nuvinci. I've only ever heard of these being made for motor bikes though. If you're keen look at the 200w fischer and paykel brushless washing machine motor and find a way to use it with a constantly variable transmission.

Brett White is from Island Earth is a good source of information if you can find him.

Nothing about electric bikes is cheap. If you build it on the cheap it will suck unless you're some sort of engineering wizard and build your own parts.