new cyclone 3000 w mid-drive kit?

[Warren]

"Yes, no pedal at all. 26" wheels with spiked tires, see my pictures."

Got a link to those pictures?

 

[gman1971]

"Yes, no pedal at all. 26" wheels with spiked tires, see my pictures."

Got a link to those pictures?

The 2 6S LiPo Batteries are inside the styrofoam box so they doesn't freeze when its negative around here.

G.

 

[gman1971]

"I am pedaling as hard as I can, but at 1800 watt motor power my input doesn't mean much..."

Yeah. I guess an upright MTB, with studded knobbies is pretty inefficient compared to a laid back recumbent with high pressure street slicks.

hahaha, yeah, and don't forget the side paniers with all the tools... the large and plush coat that makes me look like I am 300 pounds overweight... basically like a brick wall against the wind... highly aerodynamic....

G.

 

[StinkyGoalieGuy]

30% is pretty steep; perhaps I would recommend you doing a normal right side install and use a three chainring setup like what I have? I do a lot of uphill towing on my bike with 100lbs of cargo on the snow during my family weekend adventures; now, I have to admit that the motor struggles in certain passages of the trail even with a 32T chainring and a 36T rear cog... so I would say that a direct drive left side might not be able to deliver the performance you seek for your application.

On 72 volts on a steep uphill you are going to have a MASSIVE amount of torque transfered over the chain, the internal motor planetary assembly and the rear sprocket, all without any way to lever that torque; and chances are that things could snap rather fast... again, I would advise to go from high motor RPM to high torque at the wheel in a progressive manner, not the other way around...

Most of the noise on mine comes from the motor, my experience has told me that excesive chain noise was due to chains not being tensioned/lined up properly (and lubed to some extent) The motor in this kit is fairly silent tho, doesn't sound like angry hornets but again, thats running at 48V; if you run this motor at 72V I am sure it is going to sound like an F1 during a qualifying lap...

G.

Valid points.

I want to avoid the unsprung mass of a hub motor.

So you think running at 72volts but geared down to top speed of 30MPH, this motor would not have enough torque to climb hills? I do have some serious off-road hills, with short sections of around 30%. I'm guessing geared down to 25MPH still wouldn't be enough?

i'm also thinking it would be quieter to direct drive to the rear wheel. On my previous mid-drive builds, I think a lot noise comes from the freewheel spinning on the front chain ring. I was running a White Industries freewheel. Maybe they are louder than others.

That's good information. Thanks for sharing your experience with this motor.

 

[lantice13]

1k peak is nothing, I'm doing 750w-2.5kw on steep climbs, inclines so steep the front wheel lifts up, but the back tires wants to keep going and going.

lol coming from a GNG gen 1, 1.5 kw can lift the front pretty good already specially with the stock controllers with that unknown motor control profile. it will bend stuff over time too with hard hammering of the throttle.

Well, 1k peak is nothing for this kit as well. On 12S (48V) this kit will easily pull ~2.2kW when batts are fresh; and about 1600 when batteries are at 43 volts. Hammering the throttle on the 34-36T sprocket, at any battery level, at low speed is an instant bike flip if you hold the throttle for more than a fraction of a second. It runs very cool as well, I have attached a temp sensor to the side and so far the motor case hasn't reached 60F on a 20F ambient at 1800 watts sustained cruise commute at 30mph.

This kit offers something no GNG kit has: it is super compact and doesn't have all the extra crap hanging out exposed. For me riding around Wisconsin salty and sludgy roads in a Gen1 GNG wasn't the way to go: belts will corrode, salt will get everywhere... plus GNG customer service is utter rubbish... had to get Payal involved with a serious dispute just to get a "replacement" crank which they should've sent as a replacement for free. They will nickel and dime you every step of the way, asking to help their roommate with the expenses on the plane ticket... etc. GNG is NOT worth it, seriously....

In my 400 mile experience with this Cyclone kit, 12S LiPo won't lift the front wheel at any road speed on its own, and I doubt anything ebike-wise with just 2.5 kW will do as well, again, not it at any road speeds and definitively not without any help from the rider (leaning back, jerking the front up... etc) From a dead stop or very slow speed? Absolutely, it will flip the bike on command. Now, running it on 72V might pull a wheelie at speed, but seriously, why abuse the bike drivetrain? In my experience the bike is perfectly well mannered with a 30mph cruising speed and at 1500-1800 watt power draw.

G.

And I seriously agree to some of this actually lol. I guess you are not member of the ES-FB group where I did all the reviews/headaches of the GNG kits. Yep they are still bad after all these years. Then again they got a new 2016 version that looks very similar to LR small blocks. Gotta love market competition. But anyway yup I completely agree that this cyclone kit is a bit better than the GNG gen 1. But let's not get carried away here with all the raves and praises . It's a $350 kit like the GNGs so expect it to have that characteristic of a $350 kit. It's not a Hub motor that are very reliable at $350. There will be tweaking and modding for sure to get things running as it should. I got reports from other members in the FB group about the long screws that holds the plates together bending already when used in their rated 3kw motor power, screws getting loose from the flexing and vibrations too. Also, only the first stage is seald... your 2nd and 3rd reduction is still exposed like the ones on the GNGs and LR kits, so you will still have the same problems with salt and rust and gunk on your chains. If you examine how the mounting plates attached to the motor/gearbox housing, it's not gonna be rigid enough to prevent flexing. There is a video showing the whole thing flexing at no load. here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FknsRYZrK_c watch how the motor moves at no load starting at 15:05. Imagine that flexing amplified greatly with load specially on gear shifts and doing repeated wheelies. That's gonna be really problematic in the long run. 400 miles is really nothing. come back after 2000 miles with your current setup and see if the mounting hardware still straight down there.

If you guys remember when the original GNG gen 1 came out, everyone is raving about the darn thing.... 400+ post later everyone hated it since they don't last.... well duh??? it's a freaking cheap kit that was made dirt cheap in China. And like the traditional ES mentality, lets dump 4kw in it even though it's clearly rated at 450W. Yeah the motor might be able to take more but the hardware around it might not? Most people kinda fail to figure that out in advance I guess and gets gang-ho in running too much power in their kits...lol then the endless cycle of beefing up and modifications that always leads to other weak links in the system breaking down, Yep been there done that. At the end of the day, most of the kit was replaced minus the motor. Sounds familiar? yep That's why Lightingrods came up with their version of these GNG mid drives which are built from the ground up with high quality and stronger parts with tweaks with the structure of the mounting, and jack shaft plates to make them able to handle 1.5kw-2kw. I see the same thing happening with this cyclone kit. most prominent piece of bad engineering I see in this 3kw cyclone kit is how they did their mounting solution. Not enough structural reinforcing done...as they just did this mounting setup as it was just an after though of the whole thing...Also need to understand that we still don't know how robust the nylon gears inside the gear box. They are not exactly BMC/MAC composite gears which are known to take 3kw on souped up geared hub motors. It's a whole can of worms if you ask me...

So in conclusion, I don't see this as a 3kw kit as it is to last very long. This thing needs better mounting hardware to withstand that much power. They are very similar to the GNG in build quality down to the questionable engineering. Starting to see it now as people in the ES FB group reporting in as they test this kit. It's gonna be interesting to see what things needed to be improved and for some validation of my initial observation of this kit. For it to last a long time, you need to over build these things for the amount of power you want it to run. If not, run it at a much more conservative power level. Hope I'm not too preachy. =P

 

[emaayan]

consumable parts aside, the gng 2015 mounting solution is superiour, it's both short and has support in the middle, the upper mounting, is placed in a lateral way to the motor's casing, which natrually a hell of a lot stable, my only problem is that it kind binds me to the primary reduction (it's not like i can use larger or smaller T8F sprockets) but still, very strong.

 

[emaayan]

btw lantice, as an admin shouldn't you plug ESFB link in you signature? i actually got a pm from someone who wanted to join but couldn't find it

 

[Warren]

gman1971,

Thanks for the link to the picture. I had actually seen those with the GNG motor, back on page 3. I forgot you had some showing the new motor....not enough coffee.

Did I see you mention you were in Milwaukee? Grew up just north of there. Batteries in a styrofoam box. Now you know why I moved to Virginia.

 

[Warren]

Does anybody on here have a ENO Dos freewheel?

https://www.biketiresdirect.com/productimages/images450/wndos1-2.jpg

I would love to know if you can wrap two 9 speed chains around those sprockets without them rubbing together. This would make such an easy mid-drive for a recumbent.

 

[gman1971]

Not preachy at all... I've been burned by the GNG turd so I am "well done" at this point.

Calling this kit "a bit better" than GNG I think is an understatement, seriously, IMO this kit is on another league... the GNG was bad from the start: everything failed, the installation was a nightmare... it took me 3+ days of work just to get it to run... with this Cyclone kit I was commuting to work the next day without missing a beat. If you guys think the mounting plates are insufficient, then the motor plates on the GNG were half the thickness of the ones in the cyclone. All the GNG bolts are just stuck in there, the Cyclone everything is countersunk so they don't stick out of your plates, for your chains to catch them... its just little details... and like they say, the devil is in the details...

I understand this kit might not survive well on 72V (3000+ watts) and that was perhaps one of the reasons I didn't chose to run it at 72V, along with other reasons explained here:
a) First, I don't need a 50mph eBike... really? craiglist is full of cheap dirt bikes...
b) My frame probably won't hold together running this motor at 72V without snapping; again, forget about motor flex... with the GNG at stock peak 1400 watts power my frame was flexing and still flexes with cyclone at 48V... so at 72V I might end up with a snapped bike frame and crash at 40+mph... no thanks. I love speed, but I also value my life.
c) 72V is basically 18S Lipo, and that means another big battery to carry around; that adds more time to recharge times, more things to cover in styrofoam... more headaches... more balancing crap... one more thing to fail... etc. I've been flying RC helicopters since 2006 and I don't mind the LiPo chores of balancing ports and whatnot, but one more to do is just a PITA... no thanks.

As for this motor flexing, in my experience that has nothing to do with the mounting plates. If you read PAGE 3 on this thread I posted a couple of CAD diagrams as to how I fixed the flex/bent bolts on my motor: I made the holding blocks really thick and that took care of it. Perhaps people just don't read my posts...? In addition to that, I also put red loctite to all the main support bolts and that has made a huge difference in these bolts not coming lose with vibration (mine did came lose after like 100 miles or so, hence the loctite). After doing those two simple things my motor doesn't flex the slightest bit, even when hammering the throttle with fresh lipos @ 2200 watts. Crashing the bike will also bend the bolts, how do I know? From my GNG experience thats one of the things I tested by lying the bike on its side, and I found out that the motor will NOT CLEAR the ground if you fall off to the side... and that will surely bend the bolts... and that is not Cyclone's fault if someone falls off the bike and the thing is all bent up... now, the GNG motor shaft snapping at ~140 miles while commuting to work at the stock controller 1100 watts then that was a problem.

I did learn my lessons the hard way with the GNG turd: Eliminating all flex is the key to avoid all your mid-drive troubles; I don't know how to overstate or emphasize this...

My Cyclone kit has 430 miles as of today (most of them ran at 1600-1800 average, and about 30 are hardcore offroad in snow towing two bike trailers...), and so far the only thing I am suspecting it will need a replacement soon is the chain and the rear cassette/cog since my 13T (my primary cruising cog) is starting to skip. Other than that, this kit has been absolutely bulletproof; okay, I needed to waterproof the connectors so it wouldn't short in the salt/snow mix... but other than that it is working great.

To address my 9th and 10th gear skipping I did order the 48T middle chainring last night from Cyclone to replace my 44T; so my new chainring configuration will be 44T-48T-32T and if my calculations are right this new 48T chainring will allow me to cruise in 7th or 8th gear at 30mph and leave the smaller 13t and 11t cogs alone except for downhills. The bike should be able to get up to mid-low 40s mph when going downhill (instead of topping out at 40 mph sharp) which is fine by me too...

G.

And I seriously agree to some of this actually lol. I guess you are not member of the ES-FB group where I did all the reviews/headaches of the GNG kits. Yep they are still bad after all these years. Then again they got a new 2016 version that looks very similar to LR small blocks. Gotta love market competition. But anyway yup I completely agree that this cyclone kit is a bit better than the GNG gen 1. But let's not get carried away here with all the raves and praises . It's a $350 kit like the GNGs so expect it to have that characteristic of a $350 kit. It's not a Hub motor that are very reliable at $350. There will be tweaking and modding for sure to get things running as it should. I got reports from other members in the FB group about the long screws that holds the plates together bending already when used in their rated 3kw motor power, screws getting loose from the flexing and vibrations too. Also, only the first stage is seald... your 2nd and 3rd reduction is still exposed like the ones on the GNGs and LR kits, so you will still have the same problems with salt and rust and gunk on your chains. If you examine how the mounting plates attached to the motor/gearbox housing, it's not gonna be rigid enough to prevent flexing. There is a video showing the whole thing flexing at no load. here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FknsRYZrK_c watch how the motor moves at no load starting at 15:05. Imagine that flexing amplified greatly with load specially on gear shifts and doing repeated wheelies. That's gonna be really problematic in the long run. 400 miles is really nothing. come back after 2000 miles with your current setup and see if the mounting hardware still straight down there.

If you guys remember when the original GNG gen 1 came out, everyone is raving about the darn thing.... 400+ post later everyone hated it since they don't last.... well duh??? it's a freaking cheap kit that was made dirt cheap in China. And like the traditional ES mentality, lets dump 4kw in it even though it's clearly rated at 450W. Yeah the motor might be able to take more but the hardware around it might not? Most people kinda fail to figure that out in advance I guess and gets gang-ho in running too much power in their kits...lol then the endless cycle of beefing up and modifications that always leads to other weak links in the system breaking down, Yep been there done that. At the end of the day, most of the kit was replaced minus the motor. Sounds familiar? yep That's why Lightingrods came up with their version of these GNG mid drives which are built from the ground up with high quality and stronger parts with tweaks with the structure of the mounting, and jack shaft plates to make them able to handle 1.5kw-2kw. I see the same thing happening with this cyclone kit. most prominent piece of bad engineering I see in this 3kw cyclone kit is how they did their mounting solution. Not enough structural reinforcing done...as they just did this mounting setup as it was just an after though of the whole thing...Also need to understand that we still don't know how robust the nylon gears inside the gear box. They are not exactly BMC/MAC composite gears which are known to take 3kw on souped up geared hub motors. It's a whole can of worms if you ask me...

So in conclusion, I don't see this as a 3kw kit as it is to last very long. This thing needs better mounting hardware to withstand that much power. They are very similar to the GNG in build quality down to the questionable engineering. Starting to see it now as people in the ES FB group reporting in as they test this kit. It's gonna be interesting to see what things needed to be improved and for some validation of my initial observation of this kit. For it to last a long time, you need to over build these things for the amount of power you want it to run. If not, run it at a much more conservative power level. Hope I'm not too preachy. =P

 

[gman1971]

consumable parts aside, the gng 2015 mounting solution is superiour, it's both short and has support in the middle, the upper mounting, is placed in a lateral way to the motor's casing, which natrually a hell of a lot stable, my only problem is that it kind binds me to the primary reduction (it's not like i can use larger or smaller T8F sprockets) but still, very strong.

Sorry, this is NOT TRUE, don't claim GNG 2015 mounting solution is better because it is NOT... it bends and flexes like a cheap can... its HALF THE THICKNESS of the Cyclone mounting plates... I have both kits... the GNG 2015 Gen2 and the Cyclone, and the differences are night and day...

G.

 

[gman1971]

gman1971,

Thanks for the link to the picture. I had actually seen those with the GNG motor, back on page 3. I forgot you had some showing the new motor....not enough coffee.

Did I see you mention you were in Milwaukee? Grew up just north of there. Batteries in a styrofoam box. Now you know why I moved to Virginia.

Nice, more like near the Madison area, which is close to Milwaukee...

I did wrap it in styrofoam because the first week the temps plunged from the 50s down to the 20s my battery performance tanked... and at single digits the voltage sag got really bad so...

Work keeps me here... but I used to live in Florida so I know exactly what you mean... the truth is that I really like it here; and since I grew up in the mountains with snow this isn't something new to me. Snow is cool, especially when you ride a fully winterized ebike with spiked tyres... all the cars sliding around and crashing into each other and you're safely cruising at 30mph past all the stuck cars in the snow/traffic... gotta love this!

G.

 

[DingusMcGee]

gman1971,

I liked your fix for salt water contamination. I did it the same way with the zip lock bags, tape and cable ties our first snow storm in Dec. But after riding home with shorted out control wires.

You and I cocurr on most of the performance details of Luna's Cyclone 3000. My first build goes 42mph on 52v using 11T on rear. I think it could climb 30% = 16.7 degrees. I will take the angle reading level to the test hill. There is a 2-track up it.

I have built two of these so far. Here is the second on a Trek 69er. Will add shocks and thudbuster soon.



The entry wires of my brake switches are sealed with silicone and the rest of the wires are inside the battery box. Hopefully salt proof. This build has a plywood battery box (3 3/8" wide) because there was no room for the battery bag within the triangle when using the 52v Luna triangle battery.

 

[tomjasz]

Nice, more like near the Madison area, which is close to Milwaukee...

.

Dang I keep hoping for a playmate closer. Close but no cigar!

 

[gman1971]

Sweet ride man! Yeah, the ziplocs are a simple yet effective solution! No more shorted out bike... It happened to me once and it was scary with the throttle acting up...

Yeah, on 52v the Cyclone should scream!! My pack only stays 49-50 volts for the first quarter of a mile, and it quickly drops to 46-48volts but speed keeps steady for cruising at ~30mph... I might try 14S LiPo someday, but not until I install the 48 tooth chainring to reduce the amount of torque to the rear. Crusing on a 13t is basically asking for a lot of additional wear on the drivetrain. I am also considering changing the motor input chainring from a 44T down to 36T to overdrive the motor even more so I can cruise in 4th gear without worries of wearing chains left and right. That will make it impossible to pedal along with just throttle... but when I am doing 30 mph my pedal input is pretty much negligible.

I am on my phone, I'll have a better answer later !


G.

gman1971,

I liked your fix for salt water contamination. I did it the same way with the zip lock bags, tape and cable ties our first snow storm in Dec. But after riding home with shorted out control wires.

You and I cocurr on most of the performance details of Luna's Cyclone 3000. My first build goes 42mph on 52v using 11T on rear. I think it could climb 30% = 16.7 degrees. I will take the angle reading level to the test hill. There is a 2-track up it.

I have built two of these so far. Here is the second on a Trek 69er. Will add shocks and thudbuster soon.

View attachment 1

The entry wires of my brake switches are sealed with silicone and the rest of the wires are inside the battery box. Hopefully salt proof. This build has a plywood battery box (3 3/8" wide) because there was no room for the battery bag within the triangle when using the 52v Luna triangle battery.

 

[lantice13]

consumable parts aside, the gng 2015 mounting solution is superiour, it's both short and has support in the middle, the upper mounting, is placed in a lateral way to the motor's casing, which natrually a hell of a lot stable, my only problem is that it kind binds me to the primary reduction (it's not like i can use larger or smaller T8F sprockets) but still, very strong.

Like I was saying in that one thread that are having a discussion about the initial findings about the build quality of the new Cyclone kit,If someone can combine the 2 good bits of the 2 kits, it should make it a really nice kit. I mean the 2 motors used are very similar to begin with.

 

[lantice13]

consumable parts aside, the gng 2015 mounting solution is superiour, it's both short and has support in the middle, the upper mounting, is placed in a lateral way to the motor's casing, which natrually a hell of a lot stable, my only problem is that it kind binds me to the primary reduction (it's not like i can use larger or smaller T8F sprockets) but still, very strong.

Sorry, this is NOT TRUE, don't claim GNG 2015 mounting solution is better because it is NOT... it bends and flexes like a cheap can... its HALF THE THICKNESS of the Cyclone mounting plates... I have both kits... the GNG 2015 Gen2 and the Cyclone, and the differences are night and day...

G.

Is this the ones you talking about? You do know that the thickness of the plates is not the only factor that affect structural rigidity right? examine the pictures much closer. only thing I bent with the 2015 Gen 1 are the crappy freewheeling chain rings.

 

[lantice13]

Not preachy at all... I've been burned by the GNG turd so I am "well done" at this point.

Calling this kit "a bit better" than GNG I think is an understatement, seriously, IMO this kit is on another league... the GNG was bad from the start: everything failed, the installation was a nightmare... it took me 3+ days of work just to get it to run... with this Cyclone kit I was commuting to work the next day without missing a beat. If you guys think the mounting plates are insufficient, then the motor plates on the GNG were half the thickness of the ones in the cyclone. All the GNG bolts are just stuck in there, the Cyclone everything is countersunk so they don't stick out of your plates, for your chains to catch them... its just little details... and like they say, the devil is in the details...

I understand this kit might not survive well on 72V (3000+ watts) and that was perhaps one of the reasons I didn't chose to run it at 72V, along with other reasons explained here:
a) First, I don't need a 50mph eBike... really? craiglist is full of cheap dirt bikes...
b) My frame probably won't hold together running this motor at 72V without snapping; again, forget about motor flex... with the GNG at stock peak 1400 watts power my frame was flexing and still flexes with cyclone at 48V... so at 72V I might end up with a snapped bike frame and crash at 40+mph... no thanks. I love speed, but I also value my life.
c) 72V is basically 18S Lipo, and that means another big battery to carry around; that adds more time to recharge times, more things to cover in styrofoam... more headaches... more balancing crap... one more thing to fail... etc. I've been flying RC helicopters since 2006 and I don't mind the LiPo chores of balancing ports and whatnot, but one more to do is just a PITA... no thanks.

As for this motor flexing, in my experience that has nothing to do with the mounting plates. If you read PAGE 3 on this thread I posted a couple of CAD diagrams as to how I fixed the flex/bent bolts on my motor: I made the holding blocks really thick and that took care of it. Perhaps people just don't read my posts...? In addition to that, I also put red loctite to all the main support bolts and that has made a huge difference in these bolts not coming lose with vibration (mine did came lose after like 100 miles or so, hence the loctite). After doing those two simple things my motor doesn't flex the slightest bit, even when hammering the throttle with fresh lipos @ 2200 watts. Crashing the bike will also bend the bolts, how do I know? From my GNG experience thats one of the things I tested by lying the bike on its side, and I found out that the motor will NOT CLEAR the ground if you fall off to the side... and that will surely bend the bolts... and that is not Cyclone's fault if someone falls off the bike and the thing is all bent up... now, the GNG motor shaft snapping at ~140 miles while commuting to work at the stock controller 1100 watts then that was a problem.

I did learn my lessons the hard way with the GNG turd: Eliminating all flex is the key to avoid all your mid-drive troubles; I don't know how to overstate or emphasize this...

My Cyclone kit has 430 miles as of today (most of them ran at 1600-1800 average, and about 30 are hardcore offroad in snow towing two bike trailers...), and so far the only thing I am suspecting it will need a replacement soon is the chain and the rear cassette/cog since my 13T (my primary cruising cog) is starting to skip. Other than that, this kit has been absolutely bulletproof; okay, I needed to waterproof the connectors so it wouldn't short in the salt/snow mix... but other than that it is working great.

To address my 9th and 10th gear skipping I did order the 48T middle chainring last night from Cyclone to replace my 44T; so my new chainring configuration will be 44T-48T-32T and if my calculations are right this new 48T chainring will allow me to cruise in 7th or 8th gear at 30mph and leave the smaller 13t and 11t cogs alone except for downhills. The bike should be able to get up to mid-low 40s mph when going downhill (instead of topping out at 40 mph sharp) which is fine by me too...

G.

And I seriously agree to some of this actually lol. I guess you are not member of the ES-FB group where I did all the reviews/headaches of the GNG kits. Yep they are still bad after all these years. Then again they got a new 2016 version that looks very similar to LR small blocks. Gotta love market competition. But anyway yup I completely agree that this cyclone kit is a bit better than the GNG gen 1. But let's not get carried away here with all the raves and praises . It's a $350 kit like the GNGs so expect it to have that characteristic of a $350 kit. It's not a Hub motor that are very reliable at $350. There will be tweaking and modding for sure to get things running as it should. I got reports from other members in the FB group about the long screws that holds the plates together bending already when used in their rated 3kw motor power, screws getting loose from the flexing and vibrations too. Also, only the first stage is seald... your 2nd and 3rd reduction is still exposed like the ones on the GNGs and LR kits, so you will still have the same problems with salt and rust and gunk on your chains. If you examine how the mounting plates attached to the motor/gearbox housing, it's not gonna be rigid enough to prevent flexing. There is a video showing the whole thing flexing at no load. here. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FknsRYZrK_c watch how the motor moves at no load starting at 15:05. Imagine that flexing amplified greatly with load specially on gear shifts and doing repeated wheelies. That's gonna be really problematic in the long run. 400 miles is really nothing. come back after 2000 miles with your current setup and see if the mounting hardware still straight down there.

If you guys remember when the original GNG gen 1 came out, everyone is raving about the darn thing.... 400+ post later everyone hated it since they don't last.... well duh??? it's a freaking cheap kit that was made dirt cheap in China. And like the traditional ES mentality, lets dump 4kw in it even though it's clearly rated at 450W. Yeah the motor might be able to take more but the hardware around it might not? Most people kinda fail to figure that out in advance I guess and gets gang-ho in running too much power in their kits...lol then the endless cycle of beefing up and modifications that always leads to other weak links in the system breaking down, Yep been there done that. At the end of the day, most of the kit was replaced minus the motor. Sounds familiar? yep That's why Lightingrods came up with their version of these GNG mid drives which are built from the ground up with high quality and stronger parts with tweaks with the structure of the mounting, and jack shaft plates to make them able to handle 1.5kw-2kw. I see the same thing happening with this cyclone kit. most prominent piece of bad engineering I see in this 3kw cyclone kit is how they did their mounting solution. Not enough structural reinforcing done...as they just did this mounting setup as it was just an after though of the whole thing...Also need to understand that we still don't know how robust the nylon gears inside the gear box. They are not exactly BMC/MAC composite gears which are known to take 3kw on souped up geared hub motors. It's a whole can of worms if you ask me...

So in conclusion, I don't see this as a 3kw kit as it is to last very long. This thing needs better mounting hardware to withstand that much power. They are very similar to the GNG in build quality down to the questionable engineering. Starting to see it now as people in the ES FB group reporting in as they test this kit. It's gonna be interesting to see what things needed to be improved and for some validation of my initial observation of this kit. For it to last a long time, you need to over build these things for the amount of power you want it to run. If not, run it at a much more conservative power level. Hope I'm not too preachy. =P

Ah...I think I remember you now. you are the guy that wanted to run the GNG gen2 kit at 320kw.......which previously broke his motor since he run it over 1.5kw without any controller programming..... If my memory serves right, I'm the one that told you about the Cyclone 3kw kit......https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=28&t=45740&start=275 I also remember that I am the one who is trying to convince you that the GNGs are crap but you bought their crappiest kit anyway after showing you evidence of it as being crappy. Yeah told you that brushed 450w kit and the new 2015 freewheeling cranks are bad..... lol But I guess your not gonna believe me when I said that the Cyclone 3kw is not really designed for 3kw.... like I said, report back after 2000 miles with your current setup so that we can compare notes. :wink:

 

[gman1971]

Motor on the GNG Gen2 was run with the stock controller, which peaked at ~1200 watts with freshly charged LiPos. I think I was considering shunting the controller at some point, but after speaking about it with you I never did. To run the motor at anything above 1.5kW it would've needed more like 32 amps, and the controller topped out at 22 amps IIRC, at least thats according to CA.

I remember you recommended me the Bafang and hub motors, I don't have recollection of any mention to the Cyclone... regardless tho, I was total noob then. I didn't have much of a clue about what made a good eBike and after sinking 320 dollars on that GNG kit I figured I had to try to at least make it work... In the end, I got tired of that POS breaking all the time so I tried the Cyclone, but I was one inch away from purchasing the BBSHD... I also got fed up with their customer service (or lack thereof) so that was the straw that broke the camel's back. What I knew tho is that wasn't keen on hub motors. And for the record, few days after the motor came out of my bike I took it apart and fixed the slipping clutch with a drill press and some metal plates, so the kit should work if I was to install it on another bike.

As for the pictures that you've showed, that's not the motor/kit that I have; but the plates look like they have a strikingly similar thickness of my Gen2 kit... fairly thin IMO, and on mine they are not countersunk... so they can have interference with the chainring...

I am willing to accept I might've made a mistake messing around too much with the GNG, but in the process I learned a lot... about bikes, and about ebikes... however, I am not picturing what your problem is tho...

FYI, the eBay 24V brushed motor that you warned me it was going to be total waste of time turned out to be a decent kit after all.... Works very well, and it only took me about 4 hours to install it and the only mod I had to is add some side adjustment holes to the motor mounting plate to allow for lateral movement and get the motor lined up with the chainring. As of today its been absolutely rock solid and my son has clocked about 200 miles on it running it on 12S LiPo @ 48V and it goes up to about 28mph on his 24" Roadmaster mtb. Is not Cyclone quality/power, but it has worked out to be a much better kit than Gen2 GNG.

G.

 

[gman1971]

Nice, more like near the Madison area, which is close to Milwaukee...

.

Dang I keep hoping for a playmate closer. Close but no cigar!

Where do you live?

G.

 

[tomjasz]

Near LaCrosse...Winona.

 

[DingusMcGee]

lantice13,

I see these qualitative arguments like yours all the time--never addressing what is significant and what also happens but is of little significance. How about one simple quantitative idea?

BLDC Motors : for the sake of a simple understanding of BLDC motors, let's do some (linear analysis) of these motors using the likes of Ohm's Law V = I * R. And from this follows that Power[watts] = v * I = I * I * R = V * V / R The wattage of these motors can be calculated and declared for any reasonable voltage value[maybe 12v thru 96v]. The resistance in effective ohms here is due to the resistance in the wires and motor's load.

Let's say you have battery sets of many, many sets of parallel cells that can supply a huge amount of current and you can hook these sets in series to get both 48v and 72v. So current from this battery is not the limiting factor. Suppose the Cyclone 3000 uses 1500 watts at 48v then the effective R of this is 48 x 48 / 1500 = 1.536. Current I = V/R = 48 / 1.536 = 31.25 amps. Now at 72v, we see Power = 72 x72 / 1.536 = 3375 watts. This power into the motor for the same effective R.

The power out is Torque x radian RPM. We know voltage changes speed (motor RPM) proportionally to voltage change and current changes torque proportional to voltage change. And if your battery can supply more amps (infinite source) we could see more torque with more loading at a fixed voltage but here we are talking about the same effective R.

Next get your Cyclone 3000 motor and a CA and determine I max = current max the motor can get from your 48 v batteries. The current max will be on hills or accelerations with big loads. For that same loading at 72 v the torque changed is 72 / 48 = 1.5 and you will likely see an amperage increase of about 1.5 x , if your battery can supply it and the controller will allow that increase.

So when going from 48v to 72v with the same effective Resistance how much extra destroying force can 1.5 x torque do? If the framework of the motor setup has safety factor of 1 at 48v then 1.5 x torque puts loads on the aluminum that it cumulatively can not recover from. Most likely the Luna Cyclone 3000 setup at 48 v has safety design factor > 2, hopefully around 4?


We already know there is no catastrophic failure at startup when changing this setup from 48v to 72v. Changing the voltage here is not the same as putting Nitro in an engine that is without a forged crank.

 

[DingusMcGee]

lantice13,

but your idea of this frame set up being underdesigned is not without merit. My intuition tells me the weakness in the frame set up is the "band-aid" fix of the big diameter gear clamp to counteract the tangential chain force. The 2 through bolt linkages that hold the motor to the frame are floppy like and alone do not resist the tangential chain force adequately in normal use. So if the clamp fails we can expect some bolt bending and maybe catastrophic failure.

How strong is a gear clamp: area = 2 x 0.15 x 0.019 = 0.0057 sq in. Yield for stainless? Say 60 ksi, then clamp tension max achievable per side is 0.0057 x 60,000 = 342 lbs. The clamp in wrap fashion would generate 684 lbs force max to resist the tangential chain force. But we see chain failures [due to cyclic loading and wear most of the time] and bike chains are often good for more 8000lbs when new. It seems reasonable to ask why is the gear clamp not as strong as the chain knowing we got a 2 bolt floppy linkage otherwise? The set up has no redundancy for a clamp failure.

Simple Fix: Add another gear clamp in the same location but make it's anchor from a separate stand off that goes through both frame sides located more towards the BB.

 

[emaayan]

Motor on the GNG Gen2 was run with the stock controller, which peaked at ~1200 watts with freshly charged LiPos. I think I was considering shunting the controller at some point, but after speaking about it with you I never did. To run the motor at anything above 1.5kW it would've needed more like 32 amps, and the controller topped out at 22 amps IIRC, at least thats according to CA.

I remember you recommended me the Bafang and hub motors, I don't have recollection of any mention to the Cyclone... regardless tho, I was total noob then. I didn't have much of a clue about what made a good eBike and after sinking 320 dollars on that GNG kit I figured I had to try to at least make it work... In the end, I got tired of that POS breaking all the time so I tried the Cyclone, but I was one inch away from purchasing the BBSHD... I also got fed up with their customer service (or lack thereof) so that was the straw that broke the camel's back. What I knew tho is that wasn't keen on hub motors. And for the record, few days after the motor came out of my bike I took it apart and fixed the slipping clutch with a drill press and some metal plates, so the kit should work if I was to install it on another bike.

As for the pictures that you've showed, that's not the motor/kit that I have; but the plates look like they have a strikingly similar thickness of my Gen2 kit... fairly thin IMO, and on mine they are not countersunk... so they can have interference with the chainring...

I am willing to accept I might've made a mistake messing around too much with the GNG, but in the process I learned a lot... about bikes, and about ebikes... however, I am not picturing what your problem is tho...

FYI, the eBay 24V brushed motor that you warned me it was going to be total waste of time turned out to be a decent kit after all.... Works very well, and it only took me about 4 hours to install it and the only mod I had to is add some side adjustment holes to the motor mounting plate to allow for lateral movement and get the motor lined up with the chainring. As of today its been absolutely rock solid and my son has clocked about 200 miles on it running it on 12S LiPo @ 48V and it goes up to about 28mph on his 24" Roadmaster mtb. Is not Cyclone quality/power, but it has worked out to be a much better kit than Gen2 GNG.

G.

that's what i thought, i had question marks when you started referring to gng 2015 gen2, as there is no gen2 for the 2015, so everything you've experienced is related gng gen2 (no 2015) , the 2015 has no upper plates, it's jackshaft is held in a horizontal arm which is part of the motor casing itself, this is what i mean by superior, additionally the lower brackets are also strengthened by a middle arm in between them. those have not bent or broke (known on wood).

 

[DingusMcGee]

lantice13,

a simple fix for the lack of redundancy is to put a clamp around the motor and the rear semi circle of the sheet frame where it goes around the BB. see pic.



You can stabilize the floppy 2 bolt frame linkage by adding another gear clamp to the right of the recommended positioning for the OEM clamp that covers the 2 bolt linkage zone of deflection. See pic.



Some say: Gear clamps -- Ugly. This is not a cuttie bike as i like my dopamine sooner than going that route and I am satisfied with what I get from a kludge ad hoc fix.