PDQ Power Trike control box

malc123

1 µW
Joined
Jul 17, 2011
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1
Hi. I have bought a power trike that attaches to my wheelchair. The control box seems to be on the blink. Anybody know a replacement that I can buy. The original has battery state indicator 2 speed key switch. Devinci the supplier want a fortune to replace the unit....Thanks in anticipation
 
Hi there, I stumbled across your question (very apt for my style of walking) as I am the proud owner of 2 PDQ trikes a MK1 and a MK2 "Extra" with the newer "upgraded" control box. My first was purchased through the ever present eBay and ran for just long enough for me to fall in love with being able to go out and about again then the circuit board fizzled out and after much searching we (well my excellent local electrical fabricators) found the contact details for Davinci and you can still purchase the control boxes at the knock down price of ......£170 + £30 p&p or £180 +£20 p&p. I found it quite interesting that both quotes although different added up to a nice round £200!

Whilst umming and ahhing about what to do I found a complete set-up of Power Trike Extra, Liberator wheel chair, extra off road tyres, carry/storage case (I now have two of those too as I had just purchased one of.....yep eBay again) a normal lead acid battery and the much better Niad battery which sell for £450 to buy from Davinci and it roughly doubles the distance, double battery carrier etc etc etc in perfect working order sold as seen.....got it by courier didn't work and after the first 2 days 1200 Euro's down the barking drain! I decided to bite the bullet and but a new controller from Davinci for the newer trike....they no longer hold them as a stock item, can't get them and don't know the company that makes them......but they will take the trike in and retro fit the older system onto the newer trike...but that would involve a new circuit board, wiring loom, controllers etc etc etc at considerably more than the cost of just the faulty circuit board....so began my search for alternatives....

Right down to business, it is possible to find replacement controller boxes on eBay for the size of motor the trike has for >£30 I picked one up for £16 + £2 or £3 p&p but have not got the cagoules to start chopping the wires to fit it!

But, I have recently found a company who make good quality controllers and can provide a controller pre-wired to a new twist throttle speed controller as the origional ones can (so I have been told, but cannot confirm) be part of the problem with the circuit boards over heating!

The Company e-mail address is http://www.4qd.co.uk and the controller they think will do the job from my description of 250w motor (it may even just be a 150 motor) and 36v batteries they replied to my e-mail coming back with what I had thought may be the best one and I had also seen on a forum somewhere but cannot remember where now
All info is in their site. and they suspected the following application:
http://www.4qd.co.uk/prod/ptr.html The Porter controller
http://www.4qd.co.uk/accs/pots.html#mag The twist-grip throttle

The beauty of this system is that it has only 6 wires for you, me, us to mess around with 2 for the battery 1pos & 1neg same for the motor and again for the throttle assy 2 more wires. I don't know if you have had a look inside the trike control box yet, but there are a lot more wires than that as there is ignition and battery power level indicator but I'm sure with a bit of doctoring I could pass the positive wire through the ignition key and also wire in either the trike battery indicator or another one from....the provider of all things (n)ever needed..... eBay!!!

The above set up is around £100 cheaper than the Davinci weak control box, its not just us they are lying in the back of garages all over the country because of the same problem....yet the company still insists in fitting the same crappy circuit boards! The Porter Controller is £47.25 and the Magura Throttle + 1m CONI lead £43.58 and a matching grip for the opposite side of the handle bars comes in at £2.10 totaling at £ 92.93 but of course it could be worth a punt to try keeping the existing throttle assembly. After all if it does go wrong we know where to get a one that does match the circuit board/controller and that will put it at under £50 either way its cheaper than Davinci, a far simpler system and backed up by a company that specialise in these type of things. They started out producing golf buggy controllers, which have to be sturdy and take some heavy, abusive use and last the lifetime of the buggy. The difference between Davinci and 4qd is one had a captive audience and the other had to make something that works and compete with the competition if they produce poor quality they will soon be out of business!

I hope my rambling yarn makes some sense and points you in at least "A" direction even if its not the one I am investigating (and will in truth be purchasing in the next few days I am just deciding whether to go with the old throttle or stump up the £44 for the new and guaranteed one.

Charlie
 
Hi Charlie, I'm so glad to have found your post, I've been dealing with Davinci Mobility for a few weeks now as my mother purchased a second hand powertrike (mark 1) and I unfortunately broke the throttle when adjusting the handlebars. I phoned Davinci who quoted me £70 including postage for one of their cheapy throttles and so I decided to try and repair the old one, they gave me no help at all, if you want to read the conversation I had with another chap from the pedelec forum then here's the link!
http://www.pedelecs.co.uk/forum/electric-bicycles/6743-broke-my-throttle-2.html

If you break the throttle the link will give you the model of the hall sensor that can be found inside, they're about £4 to replace but Davinci wouldn't tell me what they were, in the end I've bought one of their throttles just to get my mum mobile again but I still have problems, it could be a dodgy throttle, it looks as if it may be wired incorrectly compared with the picture I took of the old one, but this time I managed to find the model number on the sensor should it need replacing again
I must say they haven't been very helpful, although I got hold of a chap called John there and had a chat about being unhappy with the quality of the wiring from the throttle that their engineer put together and he seemed quite a reasonable chap.

I may replace the box and throttle and buy the one you did as i think davinci prices of repairs and parts somewhat expensive.

And another thing whilst I'm going on, they want £180 for a replacement 36v lead acid battery, so I opened up the case and it has 3 Yuasa NP7-12 12 volt batteries inside, did a search on google and found they're for sale at £13.99 each so a total of £42, I somehow dont see the plastic case they're housed in being worth £140,
it annoys me that a company who supply products for disabled people (who have enough to deal with) charge so much for such a basic thing like batteries!
Troy
 
I have a pdq trike thats broken. I replaced the battery cells inside the box but it still bust (http://www.davincimobility.co.uk/index.php?page=pdq_powertrike).

What Im thinking of doing is getting a whole ebike kit from golden motor (http://www.goldenmotor.com/)
Currently the pdq has 200w hub motor, 20" wheel, 7ah 36V sla battery -- it was built 6 years ago.

What I cant decide if if I should get something similar, say 36v 250w mini or the 36v 750w motor, or just get a magic pie 3, with a 48V battery.
Then I could run it as 48v 1000w -- which should it plenty of power for the hills, going off road, and it'll be fast that 11mph.

Has anybody got any advice on for me here ?
 
Hello PDQ users.

I recently upgraded my very old PDQ hub motor (I think the 250W) with an e-bike front wheel kit of 500W and I'm well pleased with the result although I regret to say that I didn't research the available kits as well as I might and bought just on price and the fact that I thought every 500W would be pretty much the same. I doubt I'll be doing another wheel swop soon, but since me and my trike are never likely to be parted, I may well upgrade again next year.

If I do I will choose the BMC front hub motor. One that's wound for high torque is what's needed and the only other kit I had in mind was the high torque Crystalyte. Have a look at some of the hill climbing videos on YouTube or read this review http://www.electricbike.com/hubmotor/ . If, like me, you have any hills around you'll maybe see why this would be my choice. As an alternative, I know someone who opted for to fit a GoldenMotor to the PDQ and he's well pleased with its hill climbing.
 
In the end I got the ebike kit from

http://www.cyclotricity.com/electric-bike-kit/

A 250w geared hub motor and a high capacity of 36V/10Ah battery for £399.
It gets up the hills by me OK, except for one particular steep ramp access hill.
Top speed is 15mph.

Overall its a good fit. Excellent support from cyclotricity too.
 
I have visited Steve at 4QD today and he has fitted new power boxes to my two PDQ Trikes. One has had the larger box plus throttle and the other has the smaller cheaper box with throttle. They are both working brilliantly and I'll be giving them a good testing over the next few weeks. Steve was realy helpful when we rang him and I would recommend anyone with a PDQ powerbox problem to consult him.
 
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