Magic Pie 3... diagnosis time. Lil assistance

So rode 12 miles yesterday get home last night at 10pm. Bike was fine. Parked it. Went out this morning charged it up. Charged with power off to the controller as normal. This morning throttle lit up, power to the controller and everything fine. Cept no go. Bypassed throttle up at where it plugs into the harness. Nada. Bypass it back at the junction close to the throttle. Nada. Pulled the controller out and looks like brand new. All plugs tight. No corrosion no burn smell, not popped caps. I run 12s so plenty of room below the 63v limit.

Haven't pulled motor cover off yet. Have a support ticket in. I planned on swapping this out to an external controller but not quite ready for that yet. Have a ticket in to Gary see if I can get some help from him on this. 4400 miles so far so can't complain much. Any suggestions? Have pics of controller out, but nothing I see seems out of order.

Ok checked the halls and they all seem to be working right. Checked power right to the circuit board on the controller and that seems correct. Am I down to just the controller being bad? Get zero movement from the motor. Suggestions?

Are you using brakes with a cut out? If so worth checking for a short.

Caliban said:

Are you using brakes with a cut out? If so worth checking for a short.

Click to expand...

Nope no ebike brakes. Really odd since it ran fine coming in last night. Beautiful night no moisture. Argg.

Here is a pic of the controller out. I see nothing that looks like an issue, no burnt smell. Worked fine driving home last night. Have double checked all connections, bypassed the throttle everywhere but directly inside the controller as I didn't want to mess with the wires in there till I hear from Gary. As far as visual inspection and checking to make sure the halls are registering correctly. And checked power directly to the board on the controller it all looks correct. Powering up the throttle lights right as well.

Really is my only transportation right now, so can't have it down for too long. Cash flow problem for the next week or two as well.

So if warranty won't cover I'm in a pickle but can probably make something happen. So if I do have to buy a new controller I'll be upgrading to an external. Which one will get me the most bang for my buck running 12s? This was a planned upgrade just not quite yet. I should of ordered an external a few months ago and had it ready for this.. I knew this was likely to happen.

So best external to pair up with an MP3 so I can get a little more speed out of a 12s setup?

Here is a pic of the controller out. I see nothing that looks like an issue, no burnt smell. Worked fine driving home last night. Have double checked all connections, bypassed the throttle everywhere but directly inside the controller as I didn't want to mess with the wires in there till I hear from Gary. As far as visual inspection and checking to make sure the halls are registering correctly. And checked power directly to the board on the controller it all looks correct. Powering up the throttle lights right as well.

Really is my only transportation right now, so can't have it down for too long. Cash flow problem for the next week or two as well.

So if warranty won't cover I'm in a pickle but can probably make something happen. So if I do have to buy a new controller I'll be upgrading to an external. Which one will get me the most bang for my buck running 12s? This was a planned upgrade just not quite yet. I should of ordered an external a few months ago and had it ready for this.. I knew this was likely to happen.

So best external to pair up with an MP3 so I can get a little more speed out of a 12s setup?

since you have the controller out why not check to see if the throttle signal voltage is in the 3V range when you use the throttle. measure on the pcb where the throttle signal comes back to the board.

dnmun said:

since you have the controller out why not check to see if the throttle signal voltage is in the 3V range when you use the throttle. measure on the pcb where the throttle signal comes back to the board.

Click to expand...

Not sure with the way the controller is made I can check anywhere other than the wires coming in. Can only see one side of the pcb. This is just bad timing for this to happen. grr. lol Should be green and white wire I think if the color stays the same. There is a red wire a green wire and white wire that connects inside the throttle to the hall sensor. The red wire goes back to the lil pcb board in there. I'm using the stock mp3 thumb throttle.

Going to hunt to see if I can find a diagram of the mp3 controller and what is what. Nothing looks burnt and don't want to accidentally make something look burnt till I hear from Gary.

I'm having a hard time thinking it is anything else but the controller though. Was hoping since I found out it was dead it was something stupid like usually happens. I found one of the throttle plug pins on the end of the throttle cable was bent and thought that was it initially, though didn't make sense since I hadn't unhooked anything last night and it was running fine when I parked it and shut it down.

if it worked before then it is not the controller imo. by taking the controller apart now there is a second level of failures that could be introduced and make it really hard to find the original cause imo. it would have been easier to check the controller by putting 3V of battery on the throttle signal line.

dnmun said:

if it worked before then it is not the controller imo. by taking the controller apart now there is a second level of failures that could be introduced and make it really hard to find the original cause imo. it would have been easier to check the controller by putting 3V of battery on the throttle signal line.

Click to expand...

I checked all that before I pulled the controller. Checked wire continuity in the harness all good. Bypassed the throttle at the front and the rear. Hall sensors are all working fine. Has to be the controller. Not wiring, not throttle, and not motor. Battery was sending 49.5v to the controller and I verified that. It was working when I pulled it in last night with no issues. My harness is well protected anyways so I didn't really expect it to be that. Was still feeding the voltage to the throttle voltage indicator as well and reading right. No flickering or anything. Just no engine spiny.

So if he won't warranty this for some reason any suggestions for a 150-200.00 controller that will give me a little better acceleration and little higher top end with 12s and and Mp3? Have my trip I'm trying to make in Sept 500 miles from PA down to NC and back. Just around 1,000 miles in about 10 to 15 days is the plan. Need something pretty rock solid. Can't complain on the mp3 much with 4400 miles just about on it. Not happy it died, but can't complain much since I expected it to die much faster.

but you do not know what the voltage on the throttle signal line is. if you use a 3V battery across the throttle input to the controller, then you would know if the controller or the throttle was at fault. that is still unknown. that is why i meant it woulda been better to do that first before you opened the controller so you would not have the uncertainty from having opened the controller causing a secondary fault which conceals the previous failure. i don't know how to explain it, just how to systematically eliminate variables without introducing new ones.

dnmun said:

but you do not know what the voltage on the throttle signal line is. if you use a 3V battery across the throttle input to the controller, then you would know if the controller or the throttle was at fault. that is still unknown. that is why i meant it woulda been better to do that first before you opened the controller so you would not have the uncertainty from having opened the controller causing a secondary fault which conceals the previous failure. i don't know how to explain it, just how to systematically eliminate variables without introducing new ones.

Click to expand...

Yes but you can fully bypass the throttle to make it run like it is fully on which I did before I pulled it, and checked continuity on all the wires too. There isn't much to removing the controller from an MP3. only 4 plugs and 3 of them are spade plugs. The motor all the halls are working fine. Checked them with controller hooked up and checked the voltages, they also when touched together all made a difference in motor resistance.

Only extra controller I have is from a hilltopper and it is only an on or off throttle. Would probably get me down the road though. I had it running 72 volts with no problem, just not worth the effort to try and get it working with the pie if it even will.

Received the warranty replacement this morning and did a quick test. It was the controller. All good now, going to storm this afternoon, so tomorrow heading to work will be my first actual test of it. But the motor turns and it wasn't before, so should be all set. Thanks much Gary from Golden motors Canada for helping get me back on the road fast.

I will be buying a Lyne or some other external controller so I can get a little more out of my MP3. I'll keep the internal as a backup once I swap though. Can't complain too much with the near 4500 miles I had on the other one with zero problems till this.

Glad to hear you're back up and going, I have a MP3 as well. Love it so far after 1600miles.
Just bought a 72v mini kelly also, should be in tomorrow. Only 149$. Quick thing, GM throttle colors are weird, just connect black to black, and the other 2 are 50/50, if it doesn't work, or only puts out 3v continuously swap the white and green wires. Same with the brake handle, has 3 wires in shielding but only 2 ports, so black to black and I believe blue is power in, not red. other than that halls are good, but I'm still trying to figure out phase wires.

Ussyamoto said:

Glad to hear you're back up and going, I have a MP3 as well. Love it so far after 1600miles.
Just bought a 72v mini kelly also, should be in tomorrow. Only 149$. Quick thing, GM throttle colors are weird, just connect black to black, and the other 2 are 50/50, if it doesn't work, or only puts out 3v continuously swap the white and green wires. Same with the brake handle, has 3 wires in shielding but only 2 ports, so black to black and I believe blue is power in, not red. other than that halls are good, but I'm still trying to figure out phase wires.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the info. Ya did 40 miles with it today. Only had two problems. First I noticed as I got about 3 miles away from the house and didn't have time to turn around and change.... I forgot to bump the amps up to max. I was only pulling a max of 25a but most of the time was under 20. Normally I pull 28a max. I notice with our hills around here the little extra amp ability to get a bigger burst of speed before hills and kind of roll up the top, instead I was fighting getting up the hills.

The other issue was I do about 20 miles each way to work and back. Thought I was using a lot more Ah and didn't notice till the way home, only the triangle battery was being used. So had another 20Ah untouched. lol Have to charge packs separate tonight. lol Well getting the more used pack up to the same as the other pack, then top the full pack off at once. The last of the Hxt plugs I need to change over to the x-60 plugs. Should of double checked after the bike sat a week. Should be fully back to normal for tomorrow's ride.

rborger73 said:

Only had two problems. First I noticed as I got about 3 miles away from the house and didn't have time to turn around and change.... I forgot to bump the amps up to max. I was only pulling a max of 25a but most of the time was under 20. Normally I pull 28a max. I notice with our hills around here the little extra amp ability to get a bigger burst of speed before hills and kind of roll up the top, instead I was fighting getting up the hills.

Click to expand...

I've noticed with my controller if I leave it sitting for about a week without power that it resets to default settings. Do you notice the same thing? I use mine for commuting as well but only for a 20mile round trip. At least you were clever enough to get proper connectors instead of just terminals http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=63023&p=942394#p942394

Ussyamoto said:

rborger73 said:

Only had two problems. First I noticed as I got about 3 miles away from the house and didn't have time to turn around and change.... I forgot to bump the amps up to max. I was only pulling a max of 25a but most of the time was under 20. Normally I pull 28a max. I notice with our hills around here the little extra amp ability to get a bigger burst of speed before hills and kind of roll up the top, instead I was fighting getting up the hills.

Click to expand...

I've noticed with my controller if I leave it sitting for about a week without power that it resets to default settings. Do you notice the same thing? I use mine for commuting as well but only for a 20mile round trip. At least you were clever enough to get proper connectors instead of just terminals http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=63023&p=942394#p942394

Click to expand...

Ya I use the XT60 plugs now. Have to order some more soon. Still have the rear carrier batteries using the hxt banana style plugs back there. The triangle is fully rewired and nothing has moved at all. Those plugs just work. Have to have one of those little alligator clip setups for soldering them, but very worth it.