Suzuki GSX600F - Electric Conversion Build

Swayze

100 µW
Joined
Aug 18, 2014
Messages
9
Location
Scotland, Edinburgh
As the title would suggest, this thread is going to be about the build process of a 1995 GSX600F, hopefully it will be interesting to read, help some people in the future and help me in the present!

A quick bit of history about myself before we dive in. I'm 27, live in Edinburgh Scotland, and currently work for one of the larger Solar EPC companies in the country, i went to university in Edinburgh where I studied Engineering at HND Level then went on to do an MSC in Energy and Environmental Engineering. I don't currently ride a motorcycle however do a lot of mountain biking, mainly Downhill racing and Enduro/all mountain riding. I see myself as a hypocrite of the renewable world as I drive a diesel car, live in a house powered by Gas, and don't have solar panels as I don't own the house.

So what do I hope to achieve from this build:

1. A fun vehicle to drive.
2. A cheap method of commuting to work (17 miles each way).
3. A slight feeling of smugness when discussing renewable energy.
4. A good project for my mate Angus who is recovering from a serious push bike incident.
5. A flick of the V's to everyone who has been negative about the project.

So without further a do, here is the beast (?)

Actually I dont have a picture of the original state it was in yet, so here is what it maybe looked like once upon a time...

Maybe at one time.jpg

We were able to pick this up from Gumtree for £150, the bike actually ran when we collected it, however had mismatching exhaust parts, worn chain, sprockets etc, and was not MOT'd or Taxed (which suited us just fine). The question was raised when we arrived as to how we were going to get the thing home. Being an optimist I told the seller that I would just pop it in the car, a look of bemusement followed, but I had an ace up my sleeve ,the toolbox in the boot.

Car in Boot.jpg

The journey home had a faint smell of petrol fumes which is strange for a diesel but was ultimately successful, until we removed the bike from the boot and the kickstand unfolded and landed of my friend Simmo's toe, a short trip to A&E confirmed the break... This build has taken its first casualty... My dad always told me motorbikes were dangerous...

So first things first, take out the old engine and find out how much space there is available for everything else.

Being absolute motorbike novices this enevetably took 3 times longer than it should have, as originally we thought that the Engine would need to be lifted out the top like you would a car, only after we had dismantled 50% of the Engine block and discovered what the inner workings of a 600cc engine look like did we stumble across the bolts holding the lower subframe(?) on, after noticing these things got quicker until I managed to shear the head off a 6 inch long bolt that refused to come out, an evening and a half of drilling, cursing and snapping drill bits left me with this.

Motor Dangling.jpg

A few precision blows and the motor dropped out

Motor Out.jpg

After Many an hour of looking online at DC motors and becoming generally confused by ratings and KW's and HP I decided that the weight and size of the Agni Motors looked good, and happened across one on Ebay on sale from Enid1448.

A few days later and it arrived at work

Agni 135.jpg

That almost brings us up to date, the plan going forward is this (However I am very open to suggestions as this is all based on vague internet research and standard Grade Physics (I did Higher but I have definitely forgotten it all)

22 x 3.2V 40Ah sinopoly Batteries (if budget can reach that {Currently it cannot})
72V 400A Alltrax Motor Controller (SPM72400) - again alternative more economically viable solutions welcome altough this does give me the option to up to an Agni 95R if we decide more oooomf is required.
Magura 5V throttle

Cables and connectors I should be able to source (off cuts from work) either 50mm singles if I can get them or 2x25mm for the battery/controller - controller/battery links.

I'm still at a bit of a loss for Chargers and Battery management. so any help on this front would be much appreciated.

More updates to come as funds become available!

Hope you have enjoyed my story so far.
 
Hi Swayze,
Let me be the first to welcome you to e-s. Your build looks sound, I converted my Thundercat recently to a similar spec to what you are proposing. If I can give you some advice, keep all nuts and bolts, connectors, keep all your receipts, don't cut or grind anything off until you are sure will not use it and buy a Haynes manual.

I look forward to seeing this build.

Bernel
 
Bernel said:
Hi Swayze,
Let me be the first to welcome you to e-s. Your build looks sound, I converted my Thundercat recently to a similar spec to what you are proposing. If I can give you some advice, keep all nuts and bolts, connectors, keep all your receipts, don't cut or grind anything off until you are sure will not use it and buy a Haynes manual.

I look forward to seeing this build.

Bernel

Thanks for the Advice Bernel, I think I had actually looked at your post prior to purchasing the bike. How are things going with the custom build? Any more hints or tips? I welcome them all.

As for keeping the parts, I've got Bags of nuts and bolts for the fairings and all the other parts we dismantled, did you only use the Haynes manual for the wiring guide? I think by the time its finished I will only need that, the section on brakes and suspension, everything else will be missing?

Out of curiosity, the motor mount you used, only attached onto two points on the chassis? What thickness did you go for and does it give you any flex/issues, I was thinking something along these lines...

First motor mount.jpg

but was unsure about the thickness I would need, like this I can get 3 definite points to bolt on, with the option of a couple more with some shims.

As for Battery placement & Containment, I was thinking about making something out of Fibreglass, everyone seems to go down the metal route, is there a reason for this that I am missing? I was thinking fibreglass to keep the weight down, I could also cut some channels through it to cool the batteries if required...

And for entertainment value here is another picture of the bike going in the car :shock: which looks like the result of a horrendous accident.

Car Crash.jpg

Thanks again for your advice!
 
Does anyone have any recommendations for motor controllers? I'm currently looking at the Alltrax SPM 72400, which is suitable for 72V constant 220A with burst of up to 400A, (from memory) this I think would be ideal other than the lack of option for regen.
Ideally I'd like to buy from the UK or Europe. Jozztek sell the above controller so that would be my current option. Does anyone have one, and do they have any issues or thoughts on them? And is there much extra to buy to get it working? Solenoid, 0-5v throttle?
If I can find something suitable for around the £500 mark then I could purchase this month.

All options and oppinions welcome!
Thanks!
 
HI Swayze,
I response to your question on my motor mount the sprocket side is 6mm aluminium. I originally mocked it up out of MDF, when I rotated the back wheel by hand with the chain on I noticed that it flexed. I then made another mount out of 8mm MDF which clamped round the motor on the fan side. This is what Podolefsky over on elmoto , this cured the problem. I then got them fabricated in aluminium and no more flexing. I have used the original motor mounting points on the frame and it works very well, tight as a nut.

I already had a Haynes manual, so this is all I used for the wiring. I copied the drawing on my PC and deleted the cables I didn't then added the wiring for thr conversion then used that as my guide.

Your mount should be fine if I am seeing the picture correct. It is fixed at the front and rear of the frame.

Happy building.
 
Hey Swayze,
I am new to E-S as well and have been looking at making an electric motorcycle for quite a while now. The alltrax controllers are definitely very popular and seem to get great reviews. But I have also seen a lot of people use Kelly controllers because they offer regen. If you haven't found it already there is an awesome site to look up other bike builds at

http://www.evalbum.com/type/MTCY/48

Sorry i can't give you the experienced opinion but i don't think you can go wrong with alltrax. I know i will most likely use the AXE 7245 on my own bike when i convert it. But I know that there are several other manufacturers worth looking at such as Curtis, Zapi and Kelly.

I'm excited for your build! Post lots of pictures!
 
Hey Yamamonger, thanks for the support!
Yeah I think I will go for the alltrax, its just a shame that you can not do regen with it.
One more pay cheque and I should be able to afford it. I've got a few more pictures of the motor mount , after a long day of cutting 5mm steel with a jigsaw. And I'm waiting on some copper strip and 6mm bullet connectors to try and make some sort of busbar. Hopefully I will be able to post then up soon(resizing and posting from a tablet seems to be impossible for me) anyway, should get the bike running within 2 months at some level, so watch this space!

Thanks again for all the help and support.
 
So a couple of Weekends and a pay cheque or two have passed since my last update, this is mainly due to being burgled twice within a week, and having a useless computer that crashes randomly on all too frequent an occasion, which puts me off writing posts.

Anyway, sorry for the delay.

Last Mention I had bought some 5mm thick steel for the motor mount, Having been pretty happy with the Wooden template I bought myself a Jigsaw and set about cutting the metal sheet, I had thought this could be hard work, but it took so much longer than I had thought.

Cutting 5mm Steel.jpg

After simplifying the design to minimise the number and complexity of the cutting, I made it to this stage after about 2 hours...

Steel 1st Fit.jpg

The next challenge was drilling the hole for the motor shaft and mounting bolts, but some new HSS drill bits made suprisingly "Light" work of this

Steel Mount.jpg
Steel Mount 2.jpg

So after searching high and Low for Motor Controllers I had almost settled on an Alltrax from Jozztek, however when searching for contactors on Ebay I came across a chap who was selling contactors, Curtis Controllers, DC-DC converters and battery gauges, after a bit off discussion and some bartering, I ended up with the following parts arriving through my door... Christmas Arrived in Scotland late in September!

Christmas Time.jpg
Thanks to Gordon (GJSolar) for sorting me out.

My Choice of battery for these was always going to be a tough one, I had thought originally of going for some 40AH Sinopoly blocks, but building them up to my desired 74V would have been a one-off hefty outlay that I could not justify without knowing that the bike would work or not. Instead I have ended up picking up some Turnigy 5000mA 18.5V blocks from Hobby King, they run at 20-30C (25-35 for the second set I bought) the thinking being that 4 in series cost me £100 and could pull 150A, so would prove the bikes capabilities (all be it for a very short period). I then worried myself about ruining the cells if I tried to pull to many Amps through them so bought another 4 to run in Parallel - the motors max Amperage is 200A so this should be covered by the two packs in series for now.

After some searching for Cable using the sources I have, and deciding that I definitely wanted to Use Red and Black for safety sake and that 25mm Flexible Welding/Jump start cable would be the easiest solution. A halfords deal ended up being Cheaper per meter than anything I could find on the web.

A trip to the local Bike shop sorted us out with a new 46 Tooth Chain Ring and 120 Link 530 chain.

The first thing we connected was the DC-DC converter, it fitted conveniently onto the existing Battery tray, giving us a nice short jump to the battery.

Top View.jpg

After this the Motor controller went on - the positioning for this may not seem ideal as if the chain comes off/snaps we are going to have some serious issues, however we wanted to try and keep a good air flow to the motor without any obstructions. time will tell if this is wise or not.

View attachment 2

After a long day of crimping and cable routing we were pretty happy with the results, a lot of cable still to be removed/neatened up from the original loom, but a large leap forward in the construction of the bike.

I had spent a long time trying to sort a mount out for the batteries at the front of the bike with varying amounts of success, however, the Jump Cables that we used of the wiring had come in a handy plastic case, which could hold 16 Packs nicely, so for the time being this was secured to the bike with a Jubilee clip and some wishful thinking.

After this the weekend was over, and the weather turned.
Yesterday we had a moment...

I was charging a battery in the kitchen when my girlfriend decided she wanted to make some lunch (ridiculous I know) she unknowingly pushed the cables back causing the two crock (of shite) clips to touch together, - cacking her pants she ran outside to get me, luckily by the time i got in, thankfully nothing had gone plasmatastic, and I was able to kill the power to the charger and pull the positive and negative apart... the crock clips had welded themselves to the battery leads and had to be broken off... i've not had a chance to see if the battery is dead or not, but it sure has reminded me just how dangerous electricity can be. ( I was wearing my 1000V Rigger boots all day and using insulated tools but still a reminder is useful)

Today I spent a long time looking for a 5kOhm potentiometer after messing around with a 5V twist throttle and getting nowhere . Eventually I found a 4k7 one, and made it home to try out....

Success, the wheel spins and spins under control ! Which is amazing news, I will try to upload a video as soon as I work out how.

Next step to buy a 5kOhm Magura twist throttle and sort out a permanent Voltage and Current Gauge, also some sort of temperature monitoring for the motor and batteries would help set my mind at ease.

Fuel Gauge Removal.jpg

Anyway I hope the next post wont take so long, and hope you are all enjoying the thread!

Cheers
Swayze!
 

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http://youtu.be/rcQuyKY5vQ4

This should link to the video of its first spin up, a long way to go yet, but a long way from where we started!
 
Well done Swayze I bet you are please that it spins. Regarding your voltmeter, ammeter and temperature gauges you can use a resistor that varies its resistance with temperature and connect it you your oil temperature gauge. That is what I have on my bike or use an Arduino, just google arduino temperature monitor. I have a 4 channel monitor, one for the battery, one for the motor, one for the controller and for ambient temperature, it works really well. All the code is downloadable, so if you are able to program, solder and read acircuit diagram you should be good to go.

Good luck

Bernel
 
I may have missed it but what model/brand controller did you end up selecting?

I am very much considering a very similar motor package and very similar power goals for my conversion project. I have been on the hunt for a decent quality but budget friendly 72v 300A~400A capable DC motor controller. Very seriously looking at the Alltrax SPM-72400 and an Agni 95R.
 
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