Motorino XPn Chinese ebike (scooter)

Surprise today, I turn the scooter on and twist the throttle and the motor spins very silently like nothing is wrong :eek: I didn't do anything to it, I was going to work on the problem this weekend. So I'm thinking that maybe the CA is not the only thing that got water into it, I'm thinking the controller may have water that got in.
 
So I opened my controller and although I didn't see any moisture or water, I saw three spots with a little corrosion so water got in there at some point. I cleaned those spot carefully, did a light shunt mod, built up the traces and closed the controller trying my best to seal it tight.
I have been monitoring one 20P string of my pack that would always drop faster than the others in voltage. I decided to replace it with a fresh one and I wanted to report that the 12 gauge pre tinned copper wire I used to solder the 400 18650 cells together has done a great job at keeping them together. I inspected all the cells and they are all still very well soldered together, I couldn't find any joint that came undone. The 20P string I changed had two dead cells in it. I'm back riding the scooter instead of the bicycle.
 
To charge my battery, I have a few options. I bulk charge with the BMS Battery charger. To balance charge, I tried 2 Revolectrix Cellpro 10S chargers and they work very good at balancing all the cells perfectly but if one or two cells are low on voltage, that balancing process can take all night. I also tried with 2 Hyperion EOS1420i chargers and I seem to keep on getting lemons, both chargers had to be replaced and I still have problems with one at the moment. I think I know what the problem is and the fix is not complicated but I'm getting frustrated with those chargers which seem to repeatedly fail on me.
Plus there is the way that these balance fast chargers work that bugs me, how they charge up the cells and then start bleeding some voltage out of the ones that charge up faster to let the other cells catch up, that constant charging/discharging process must be damaging the cells over time and I don't like it.

So I finally got myself 4 of these.

bc168_1_zps825f5486.jpg


From what I can see from using them the first time yesterday to charge all the cells of my battery, they work much faster at balancing the cells perfectly without the extra stress of the constant charge/discharge the other chargers use.
 
Ok, I been using these chargers for a couple of days only and the hell with any other RC charger I have and the hell with bulk charging. yeah even the Cellpro 10S I liked so much will be collecting dust. These BC168s are amazing. The four of them plugged on a small server power supply, I can only charge at 6 amps per cell but still, it gets the job done quite fast and the cells are perfectly balanced each time with no stress of charge/discharge like the other chargers. Love em!

EDIT: I made an expensive mistake apparently by using the four of them all connected to the same power supply. Two of them failed after 4 weeks of daily charging. Lesson learned.
 
A little thing I did last night and this morning on my E-Moped. This is the gauge cluster I have on my Motorino. I took this pic when I was mocking up the installation of the CA. See the voltmeter on the right? Well when I went to 74V, that needle just went to the ''H'' and stayed there forever never to move again.

ca2.jpg


I wanted to have a working voltmeter in that gauge again even though I have a volt display on the CA. So I bought two small digital voltmeters on ebay. You can see one on the top left of this pic. I took the old voltmeter completely apart, emptied the chrome casing and made a small disk out of carbon fiber to house the new digital voltmeter inside the chrome casing.

voltmeter2_zps36aca9fd.jpg


And here it is all put back together and re-installed where it belongs. Looks good. The flash of the camera takes a lot of the brightness of the blue numbers away but they are very bright. The voltage shown by my Fluke multimeter is 81.9V so the volt meter I installed and the CA are off a bit.

voltmeter1_zps2e160773.jpg
 
I think I over heated my motor again. It sounds like a hall sensor died on me. I rebuilt this motor in the summer of 2012 and I drilled holes in the end caps for ventilation and sprayed the rotor and stator with dielectric urethane varnish to protect against rust.

Up here in Canada with the rain and snow and slush and salt, drilling holes in the motor is not a very smart option but being a newb, I had to try something if I wanted to continue riding this scooter at 60 km/h. Also, the varnish does not help at all against rust. Here's what my motor looks like after one winter. It's a bit hard to see because of the size of the pics but there is traces of rust everywhere. Plus a good amount of dirt and grime.

varnish_no_good2_zps85626fb6.jpg

varnish_no_good1_zps15a87ab5.jpg


Another winter and this motor would have been totally rusted inside.

So I decided to try oil cooling for a second time. The first time I didn't seal the wires well enough and I got tired of the oily mess in my nice clean garage. This time, I will do a better job at sealing the wires, the end caps, and I will put a coat of sealant on the face of the bearings. The bearings will never be perfectly sealed no matter what I do to them but some sealant will help. But the bearings not being absolutely sealed is something that I think will work for me as I seriously think that this will serve as the venting of pressure due to the oil getting warmer. I will drill a small hole in the end cap for putting the oil in, that hole will be threaded and I will plug the hole with a set screw.
 
I fixed the motor, changing the hall sensors did the trick. I paid a lot of attention to all the places that I wanted to seal so the ATF stays in. Once I did that, I started putting the ATF in using a 10ml seringe. I wanted the fluid level inside the motor to be at about half shaft to see how well I did on the sealing. I put quite a lot of ATF, I was surprised that 950 ml went in before the fluid started hoozing out of the small fill hole I made. I put the plug in and let it sit for 4 hours.

No visible leak so I put the motor back on the scooter and went for a 7 km ride at full throttle. When I came back, some ATF dripped out from the one way sprocket. So what I was thinking about the bearings serving as the pressure release valve seems to work because that is where the surplus fluid came out of when the pressure became too high. When the ATF level drops down below the shaft, I'm hoping that only hot air will exit from the bearing.

I feel I should've taken the time to install a thermistor but I didn't have one and I didn't want to wait. So I can't monitor the temp of the stator. I will just run this motor like I want to and if it fails again because of over heating, then it might be the end of my E-scooter adventure.
 
Here I am wasting part of my Saturday working on this scooter because the second ATF cooled motor attempt didn't work. It did cool my motor well enough to enable this 220 pound scooter with 250 pound rider to go 60 km/h all the time and have good torque to go up steep hills, but the ATF did other damages that rendered the motor useless within a couple weeks of daily use. If you're interested, go see this thread.

http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=7&t=49803

So I took the rotor from one motor and the stator, end caps and tire from the other motor and made one good motor that is not full of holes and has no fluid in it but it is still sealed against water and dust. I will limit the speed to 35 km/h so the motor should not overheat and this is how it will be until I decide to buy a more powerful motor that will not need any kind of cooling to give me the speed and torque I want.
 
I'm not doing much lately except just use my scooter on a daily basis governed at 50 km/h top speed with most of my riding being done at 36 km/h so not to burn this 500 watt motor. When I do buy a new motor, it will be something like John in CR's hubmonster. I already have a 10'' Vespa rim in which I know hubmonster can fit with minimal modifications. First I have to find the money, then I have to find the time. Plus I want to make sure I can license and insure this scooter because once if I ever make this thing go 80+ km/h, I will need to take those darn pedals off.
 
You likely will not be able to insure your scooter, it will not have a VIN Number. I'm trying to figure out all this stuff in BC.

http://www.mto.gov.on.ca/english/dandv/vehicle/emerging/e-bike-faq.shtml#a16

8. Am I allowed to modify my e-bike so it can go faster than 32 km/h?
No. Modifying your e-bike for the purposes of increasing its speed beyond 32 km/h will no longer qualify it as an e-bike. Motor-assisted bicycle (moped) and/or limited-speed motorcycle (LSM) requirements such as licensing, registration and insurance may then apply.

E-bikes and Limited-Speed Motorcycles (LSM)

16. What are the safety differences between a scooter-style e-bike and a limited-speed motorcycle (LSM)?
A scooter-style e-bike does not have to meet any federal safety standards and can reach a maximum speed of 32 km/h. Limited-speed motorcycles (LSMs) must meet several federal safety standards and can attain a maximum speed of 70 km/h; the maximum speed for a moped is 50 km/h.

Unlike LSM and moped operators, operators of scooter-style e-bikes do not require licensing, insurance and registration.
 
I was told that the Motorino XPn is built on a 2010 Yamaha Vino frame. It has a VIN on the chassis. Starting with that, I have to get the info I need to find out what needs to be done to license this thing as a LSM.
 
mistercrash said:
I was told that the Motorino XPn is built on a 2010 Yamaha Vino frame. It has a VIN on the chassis. Starting with that, I have to get the info I need to find out what needs to be done to license this thing as a LSM.
Click to expand...


Wow on the VIN, i didn't think about that, and i'm really excited to find out that motorino makes an already regulated low speed motorcycle! I can't wait to try that out. http://www.e-ride.ca/Electric_Motorcycles/Motorino_GTx.htm
 
hi I have been lurking here for a few weeks I home built a e bike but due to family issues I will be purchasing a new 2013 motorino xpn In a week or so :mrgreen: is there any thing I should get as extras with the scooter

laser
 
The scooter is pretty solid out of the box. It's a small motorcycle that is governed to go 32 km/h only so there's not much to break at that speed. Extras would be stuff you'll find at a good motorcycle shop like rain wear, good warm gloves and warm clothing if you're going to ride in winter. A Lithium battery to replace the SLAs to get better range, torque and speed and if you're going to ride in winter, a way to heat the battery before you ride, if the scooter sits outside for a few hours, it's good to keep the battery, SLA or Lithium, warm and toasty.
 
mistercrash said:
The scooter is pretty solid out of the box. It's a small motorcycle that is governed to go 32 km/h only so there's not much to break at that speed. Extras would be stuff you'll find at a good motorcycle shop like rain wear, good warm gloves and warm clothing if you're going to ride in winter. A Lithium battery to replace the SLAs to get better range, torque and speed and if you're going to ride in winter, a way to heat the battery before you ride, if the scooter sits outside for a few hours, it's good to keep the battery, SLA or Lithium, warm and toasty.
Click to expand...


thanks for the info, I will not be rideing over the winter I will be useing my home built e bike beater for the winter or a normal bike as I live just over 11 km round trip to work and home, is it easy to remove the batteries for the winter when it drops the white stuff

laser
 
To get to the battery, you have to disassemble the whole rear body panels and seat. I did a mod on my XPn using an extra ''under the seat'' compartment which I bought at the dealer, it was not that expensive to buy, something like $45 IIRC. You can find pictures in this thread of how I did it. My new under the seat compartment is now made of two pieces, a top piece and a bottom piece. I unscrew two bolts and two screws and I can simply take the bottom piece out which leaves a big hole to access the battery compartment.
 
It's still summer and warm and beautiful but I did do some work to keep my battery warm this winter. My scooter sleeps in a cozy insulated and heated garage but at work, it sits out side in the snow for 4 to 5 hours at a time. So I bought two of these:

batt_warmer1_zpsc060b37d.jpg


They are automotive battery warmers. 80 watt in power, 36'' long by about 6'' wide. They are made to sit around a car's battery under the hood so they are made sturdy out of oil and chemical proof vinyl. They are said to keep the battery 60 to 70 degrees F above ambient temperature so I'm hoping that they will keep my battery well above freezing all winter long. My battery is in two 10S20P parts so I wrapped each part with its own battery warmer and I also put a temp gauge in the middle of the battery just to monitor the temperature. I put the temp display screen on a small bracket I made in the under seat compartment.

batt_warmer2_zps9eb49f0f.jpg


A warm Lithium Ion battery is a happy battery.
 
Mr. Crash where did you get the small voltmeter? I just got mine ( down payment) getting it on Friday and I like the thought of having a digital meter on board

Thanks

Jim
 
Question about the alarm system is there a way to not have it go off all the time can it be activated and deactivated ie deactivated when at home shared garage with land lord but activated when at work , reason is the land lord may have to move the bike and I do not want the alarm going when he has to do that

Jim
 
I bought a couple of those on ebay.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1pcs-Blue-L...443?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c356dc083

The alarm I had on my scooter was activated with the remote key. Turn it on or turn it off. The problem I had one day was when the battery went dead in the remote key, I couldn't turn off the alarm so I had to ride all the way home with the alarm making a heck of a ruckus. I decided to just take it off recently since my scooter sits in a garage at night. When I go somewhere like a store and leave the scooter outside for a while, I turn off the breaker under the seat and lock the handle bars. Kinda hard for some punk to run away with a 200 pound scooter that has no power and has the handle bars turning left.
 
http://www.ebay.com/itm/DC-300V-100A-Dual-LED-Digital-Volt-Amp-meter-Voltage-Power-Meter-100A-75mV-Shunt/290940254874?rt=nc&_trksid=p2047675.m1851&_trkparms=aid%3D222002%26algo%3DSIC.FIT%26ao%3D1%26asc%3D163%26meid%3D553936790981492894%26pid%3D100005%26prg%3D1088%26rk%3D3%26rkt%3D4%26sd%3D321143529857%26

hope that link works mrcrash that is for a volt meter and ampmeter combo unit I will probably will order 2 when my motorino shows up it's held at customs as my dealer let me know yesterday :( so I won't have it for the weekend but I hope Monday

jim
 
called the dealer today and they have it and I should have it Saturday. :lol: I will be taking a bunch of pics and some videos and will be posting them
 
Made the final payment on the xpn and it should be delivered to my home by six pm today will post pics and such

Jim
 
its here its here

:D :D :D :D :D
 
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