I need help wiring an aftermarket controller to my electric scooter

[ruski007]

I have a Phantom Gogo A8 Electric scooter, Recently fried the controller for it, So I ordered an aftermarket one-off Amazon but the wiring it's a little bit different, And I can't seem to figure out how to get the LED Display to turn on, Because I have no clue which wires to connect to on the controller because they have different Wire connectors, I figured out the hall sensor wires and motor wires I just don't know how to do the rest. Bellow I have pictures of the controller wires and the scooter wires.

 

[amberwolf]

If the display didn't come wiht the controller, it probably won't work with it; there are no "standards" and a number of different types of wiring, voltages used, and signals, as well as different data stream formats / etc. Many controllers don't even support a display at all (and those with connectors that look like they're for one are for something else).

If you want a display, you'd probably either need to have the original controller, or get a matched set of controller/display as a kit.

Sometimes you can get lucky and it works anyway, but not often.

It's not uncommon to damage a display (and the new controller) in the process of figuring out the wiring because there are usually battery-votlage wires on there as well as 5v or even 3v wires, and mixing any of them up usually damages or destroys parts.

And, rarely, depending on the damage to a controller, it can also damage the display, which may also damage a new controller if reused...)

 

[ruski007]

Ok, what about the throttle wires, because they are attached to the display, can I just snip the wires off the display and hard wire them to the controller throttle wires?

 

[amberwolf]

If the throttle is part of the display, then it probably sends the throttle data serially. There are several similar-looking displays that do that, with a round section for the display (some are LED digits, some are LCD display, some are LED dots), with a "trigger" throttle sticking out of the button-section next to the round part. There are a few threads about these, some with good pics of the insides; I don't recall their typical name, though, so I don't have any links to them.

If yours doesn't look like that, you could open it up to see which wires go to the throttle hall sensor, and use just those. But there's a good chance that there are no wires to the sensor, and it's still sent serially like the other ones. :/

But if the hall sensor is typical type, you might be able to cut the traces from it to the rest of the board (leaving the hall still physically in-place and unaltered) and wire your controller's throttle wires to it. I think one of those other display threads discussed doing this, but I don't recall the results.

 

[ruski007]

Heres a picture of the display wires, I circled the ones that go to the throttle. Lmk what you think.

 

[ruski007]

Here's the Pic

 

[amberwolf]

Wiht that setup, then it is probably a standard hall throttle, and it is likely that red is 5v, black is ground, and green is signal. No guarantees, but those are common.

Worth a shot as long as you can replace the throttle / etc with new stuff if things break from wiring conflicts.

 

[ruski007]

Ok so I did snip the throttle wires and hard wired them to the controller and it worked, only thing that sucks is that I won't know how the battery level, and im gonna have to make a toggle switch to make my headlight work

 

[amberwolf]

If you can be sure of which are the main power wires to your display, you may be able to connect just those to your battery (leaving the rest of the wires that would go to the controller disconnected), and use it as just a meter and a headlight swithc (assuming your light ocnnects to it and not your controlller.) Many diisplays read the battery level themselves instead of having hte controller do it, so it might work.

There are what look like chinese characters marked next to the connectors on the display, if you can use the google translate app or similar to find out what they mean, they may help, or you can trace out or measure where hte wires go from the old controller's display connector to the battery, inside the controller itself, to make sure which ones are which.



There are cheap battery level meters out there, you'd just have to be sure you get the right one for your battery chemistry and number of cells in series.
The label on your battery suggests it's a 10-cell Lithium-Ion type that would be full at 42v and averages around 36v, so a voltmeter for a "lithium 36v" battery would probably work. These pages show a bunch of different types; I don't know that any specific one is suitable for your system, but I'm sure there is at least one that would be out of the list.

Amazon.com : 36 volt battery meter

Google Search

FWIW, the few things I've gotten by "DROK" have not failed yet, so ones like this

https://www.amazon.com/DROK-Battery-Capacity-Indicator-Phosphate/dp/B0CL71QFHZ

would probably work ok. That specific one is listed as for LiFEPO4, and your battery is probably not that kind, so it will probably not show you an accurate reading. But if you find one like it for Li-Ion / Li-Polymer (not LiFEPO4 / iron-phosphate) it would probably work (assuming that's the kind of battery you have).

I have this one

https://www.aliexpress.us/item/3256805051536247.html

from aliexpress, but haven't started the project that it will be used on so don't know how well it works long-term (it did power on when it arrived and correctly detect the state of the batteries I connected it to, some close to empty, some full, etc).


If you want more info such as how much power you're using, actual Ah / Wh readings, etc, then meters like this

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B013PKYILS

can give you that...I have that specific one and it works alright (not as accurate as my Cycle Analyst v3's) but it's not even remotely waterproof (or resistant), and it's more complicated to install than a simple battery voltmeter.

 

[ruski007]

Dude your hella awesome, hell yeah, thank you for all the info that I need