Building a beach cruiser/ board track bike

B

babyhughie

100 W
Joined
Feb 4, 2014
Messages
117
Location
Michigan, Metro Detroit
What's up fellas I'm new here and am planning a build which I will showcase here...

I'm from the USA and want to build a board track racer style bike...

Here is the bike I want to start with. However I haven't seen anyone use one for a build.. Am I missing something?? It seems like it would be a perfect platform for a starter, it's got disk brakes 7speed and a triple tree fork.... Please let me know what u guys think..
http://bikebuyers.com/fito-modena-gt-alloy-7sp-men.htm

Also with the build I want a 3540 crystalyte kit from ebikes.com and a 48v or maybe a 60ish volt battery...

I would like to cruise at around 25-30mph but be able to top out around 35-40mph...

This will be my commuter no more than 30 miles a day.. With average trips around 7-12miles...

I will be building the battery into the frame triangle/oval and adding leather saddle bags to the rear for groceries and other small items...

This will be my first e-bike but I have ride motorcycles/dirt bikes in the past...

Any help/guidance will be greatly appreciated... Mostly need to know what you guys think of that bike... This is gonna be a fun build, goal is to have complete 2-3months from now... Thank you
 
Nice one. One-piece crank is harder to fit with PAS, if you want that. Shame they don"t sell that in Europe i think. A perfect platform for a front drive, if you want one. It"s would be still tail heavy with front drive and mid-triangle battery. Cruisers are great but put as much weight as far front as you can, cruisers are very tailheavy to begin with.
 
that bike looks really nice, youll most likely need to spread the dropouts though to fit a motor in the rear. I looked at that bike and considered it, but it has an aluminum frame. So if the dropouts need to be widened you cant really just spread them out, like you can with a steel frame. Plus its a 7 speed? Which complicates things even more when it comes to actual usable space for the motor.

Im not trying to discourage you and im not saying its not possible, but you might run into issues if you try to run a rear hub motor. Just something to consider
 
You won't have a problem with that bike. It's a 7 speed, so it will have a 135mm back dropout width. I don't know what Danj is talking about, 7 speed rear gear bikes are the easiest to convert. It meets all the criteria I cite when pointing people to a good frame for a first rear hubmotor ebike.

2" longer will make it run at speed nice, and the lower seat will result in nice cornering. The frame is generally pretty stiff on cruiser bikes, and the battery space is nice and big.

If you do want different front sprockets, you can get a spindle that allows use of regular square taper cranks.

Alloy frame, so do include making or buying some torque plates to your shopping list. But I'd recommend torque devices for any bike, even steel ones.

Disk front brakes, and it appears rear disk too. Bueno.

60v won't get you in the 40 mph club. But you will have decent speed at 48v. 48 charges to 58v btw, so you can't run 60v nominal on most 48v controllers. You can get controllers that tolerate a range of 36-72v though.

Once you hit a good pothole or manhole cover on a no suspension bike at 40 mph, you won't want to repeat it. Build it for 30 mph.
 
sounds like your in business. i was unaware that all 7speeds were standard dropout width. that should fit an hs3540 no problem then. from what ive read you cant fit the wider 4080 with a 7speed though. good luck with the build
 
Good luck! I am usually leery of aluminum frames for motorized bikes, but I know people use them successfully for electrics so you will likely be fine. We experience a lot less vibration than gas bikes do. That is a great looking bike, btw!

One thing you are going to want to take a hard look at is how much time/distance you want to spend at 25 - 30MPH and how much in the 35-40MPH range. That is a huge difference in power to make it happen.

I love beach cruisers for motorized bike builds. So nice to ride under power. I built mine off of a 6 speed Schwinn Cruiser Supreme. I was not intending it as a BTR, but it ended up a little BTR-ish.

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I build my wife's bike off of a single speed Huffy Panama Jack. That one has a rear hub motor and rear saddlebags (for the batteries and controller), so all of the weight is in the back. Even still, it is easy to ride and handles ok. I would certainly not want it as a track bike, but for a commuter the setup is fine.
 
You guys are awesome, thank you for all the replies and support.. It looks like the bike I picked out will be a good choice...

I'm going to order most the stuff today and get this bad boy going :)....

I'm still undecided about the battery.. If I knew more about batteries I would get some lipo packs from hobbyking.. However I tried to understand how to wire them and charge them and it all seemed pretty complicated.. So for that reason I'll most likely just get a pre-made battery from bms ping or em3ev... The 72v 15ah from bmsbattery.com would be pretty sweet and the price isn't too steep.. Does anyone have experience with this battery http://www.bmsbattery.com/packs/531-48v-10ah-38120-lifepo4-battery-16-cells-ebike-battery-pack.htmlor their 60v 20ah batt???

I want the battery to be able to go 25-30mph 80% of riding and 30-40mph for short bursts in spots that have very nice road (no pot holes/bumps) and when no one is looking ;)
 
Out of those two, I would go with the em3ev pack since it supports a 3C discharge rate, so over 48A. Whereas the ping pack peaks at 30A. But in order to get 30 miles out of a 15 - 16AH pack you are likely going to have to cruise closer to 20 MPH, or have tall gears and be able to pedal to help. Higher speed sucks down juice very quickly.

For your 7-12 mile trips, cruising at 25-30 MPH and some bursts in the upper 30s should be no problem for that pack. But... you will want to make sure that the motor and battery you pick can hit 40 MPH if that is your upper goal. My wife's bike running a 9C 2807 at 15S lipo (just over 60V hot off the charger) hustles to the upper 20s quickly but tops out at 32 MPH. To hit 40 on that bike, we would need quite a few more volts.
 
I like the fito modena gt. Itll be nice to have extra gearing with that bike when you need it. I wanted a single speed to keep the appearance and functionality as simple as possible. I might end up putting a large front crank on it to assist with over speeds over 20mph.
 
The battery selection is a tough one. Ive researched so much my eyes could have bled. I still havent made up my mind. I dont think ull be satisfied with 50v. The more voltage, the easier it will be to reach your 40mph top speed
 
Right now I am leaning towards the Ping 60v 15ah, 30mile trips will be on very rare occasions and I wouldn't mind peddling a lot of that time... I'm in pretty good shape so it wouldn't be a problem.. DanJ you really got me wanting that dual pack from Ping but it's just too much for my price range right now :-(... Thanks again for all the help fellas
 
I put a Ping pack on the first build I did which the father in law has been using for years now, he does look after it well, always unplugging the BMS from the cells if it is going to be parked up more than a week or 2 so it doesn't pull the cell down that runs the BMS, we learnt that after the first winter! He is pulling 2c off it but it has stood up to this use very well, I wouldn't hesitate to recommend one if your usage fits it limits.
 
Quick question.. I'm about to start ordering some of the stuff..

Questions is: Will I need both front and rear torque arms?? Or just Rear or just front??? FYI The crystalyte 3540 hub motor will be installed on the rear wheel

Also will I need 1 torque are for each side?? Do they sell them in pairs from ebikes.ca??

So if I do need them for front and back will I need 4 total or just 2?? Sorry for these newb questions, i just want to get this stuff ordered asap and I couldn't find this info anywhere on the forum
 
If you really want a cool bike, find one of these. Unless the frame is something he built himself. Then what a waste that put the damn Chinagirl engine on it.

If you just want a bike cheap, $200 for this and you can fix it. http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/bik/4301147394.html

OldBike.jpg
 
Uhhhh......???....??? That thing is awful looking... The only cool thing about that bike is the handle bars... To me it looks like a mountain bike frame that he welded a curved bar on to support the gas tank... The lines on that bike are horrible the whole bike is straight angles except for the one curved bar... That's not my style bro... I'm not sure if u were being serious or not...

And that bike on craigslist... Is Just a cheap ass mountain bike with a hub motor on it...

No offense but I think I'll stick with my original plans ;)

I have a vision for this bike and it doesn't include a squared off frame.. No offense to you it's just not my style.. Thank you though

Edit: is that a lantern for his headlight??? Lmao
 
Dauntless said:
If you really want a cool bike, find one of these. Unless the frame is something he built himself. Then what a waste that put the damn Chinagirl engine on it.

If you just want a bike cheap, $200 for this and you can fix it. http://orangecounty.craigslist.org/bik/4301147394.html

Click to expand...

Edit: sry still learning on how to use this forum
 
If you will build for 40 mph, you want two torque arms, for the motor wheel.

You won't get in the 40 mph club with a pingbattery. You'll kill one in 15 ah size with a controller much bigger than a 25 amps.

Before you order the motor controller, or the battery, you need to decide what you are building. Very few people riding their ebikes much above 30 mph are using pre made batteries. 40 amps controllers will hit your battery with a lot more than 2c discharge rates. Most of us are using lipo for the really fast bikes. Only lipo can put out 40 amps in a tiny battery size. Even with 20c lipo, you need to keep the c rate under 5c. Battery specifications max rates are all lab results. On the street, you kill your battery unless you back off from that lab spec a lot. I found out a lot of this the hard way, I killed some batteries.

I strongly suggest you build for 25-30 mph on the first try. 48v and a 25 amps controller. ( 48v charges to 58v btw) Then later, a different controller and battery on a bike that can handle bumps may be all you need to go a lot faster. A decent hubmotor and a 48v 15 ah pingbattery is not a bad place to start. You'd have 20 mile range at 25 mph, and 30+ miles going slower.

At that power level, 1200w, one torque arm should be enough, and an easier to maintain battery is all you need.

Like I was saying, you won't be riding that thing 40 mph unless the streets are perfect. My 47 mph boardtrack type bike is ridden on exactly that, a track with no potholes or manhole covers. Even then, that fast with no suspension is quite a ride.
 
BTW, that "old bike" with the China Girl is a Walmart 32" Genesis Super Cruiser with the top bar welded on for the gas tank support. I cannot believe he was actually able to stuff a China Girl in that small opening. While I think the style is terrible, kudos to the builder for making it happen!

For clarification, torque arms (and torque plates) are add on items that help keep the motor axle from spinning inside your frame's dropouts. So you only use them on your motored wheels. Hub motor axles are flat on two sides. So when the motor/wheel spins, force is applied on the axle in the opposite direction. Without additional torque arms, the motor may have enough power to eventually open or break the dropouts, causing the axle to spin instead of the wheel, and likely causing damage to the motor wires.

As Dogman said, for lower power levels a torque arm on just one side of the motor should be fine. There are many who do not use any torque arms at all, but they are usually running steel frames. The safe route is to run a torque arm on each side of the motor, better safe than sorry. On my wife's bike I have the Grintech bolt on torque arms on each side and on my higher powered bike I have Doc Bass' torque plates welded on, but you can use epoxy as well.
 
Hey babyhughie! Glad you are getting help setting up you first e-bike and I know you said you are from the USA in your OP, but sometimes people miss OP's and wouldn't know where you are from....So...

Welcome to ES 1.jpg

BTW building your own e-bike mean you will have to do some of your own modifications. If you are using an aluminum frame then the rear dropouts will be stiff if you need to spread them to fit a 150mm motor. When you go to put your motor into the frame it is nice to have a buddy with you to help spread the frame while fitting the motor. To get the motor centered properly sometimes it takes a few times in and out of the dropouts to get the spacing right.

Anyway welcome to ES!
 
dogman said:
If you will build for 40 mph, you want two torque arms, for the motor wheel.

You won't get in the 40 mph club with a pingbattery. You'll kill one in 15 ah size with a controller much bigger than a 25 amps.

Before you order the motor controller, or the battery, you need to decide what you are building. Very few people riding their ebikes much above 30 mph are using pre made batteries. 40 amps controllers will hit your battery with a lot more than 2c discharge rates. Most of us are using lipo for the really fast bikes. Only lipo can put out 40 amps in a tiny battery size. Even with 20c lipo, you need to keep the c rate under 5c. Battery specifications max rates are all lab results. On the street, you kill your battery unless you back off from that lab spec a lot. I found out a lot of this the hard way, I killed some batteries.

I strongly suggest you build for 25-30 mph on the first try. 48v and a 25 amps controller. ( 48v charges to 58v btw) Then later, a different controller and battery on a bike that can handle bumps may be all you need to go a lot faster. A decent hubmotor and a 48v 15 ah pingbattery is not a bad place to start. You'd have 20 mile range at 25 mph, and 30+ miles going slower.

At that power level, 1200w, one torque arm should be enough, and an easier to maintain battery is all you need.

Like I was saying, you won't be riding that thing 40 mph unless the streets are perfect. My 47 mph boardtrack type bike is ridden on exactly that, a track with no potholes or manhole covers. Even then, that fast with no suspension is quite a ride.
Click to expand...


I really don't think I'll be satisfied going only 25-30mph... I am an experienced bike and motor bike rider... Thanks for the clarification on the torque arms I'll be getting dual arms in the rear.. Id rather be safe than sorry...

Well it looks like the Ping battery is out of the question... Are the bmsbattery.com batteries really not good??? I would love to get their 72v 15ah.. But I don't want to have to get a new battery after a month of use or have it blow up on me...

48v is just not gonna be big enough for me.. I've been using the calculator at ebike.ca and I'm not gonna go lower than a 60v.. One of the reasons I'm going with a beach cruiser type bike is so I can fit a bigger battery in the frame... If I was gonna do a 48v I would get a mountain bike to convert or just get a pre-made ebike...

One of the reasons for the bigger battery is because I don't want to push to the max very often... Most of the time I would run it at 50-75%... I just want that extra 25% there when I want to push it and I want to be able to take it easy on the battery/controller so it lasts me a while...

I would rather buy bigger everything and only run at 3/4 speed rather than buying everything smaller and run it at 100%...
 
babyhughie said:
I really don't think I'll be satisfied going only 25-30mph... I am an experienced bike and motor bike rider... Thanks for the clarification on the torque arms I'll be getting dual arms in the rear.. Id rather be safe than sorry...

Well it looks like the Ping battery is out of the question... Are the bmsbattery.com batteries really not good??? I would love to get their 72v 15ah.. But I don't want to have to get a new battery after a month of use or have it blow up on me...

48v is just not gonna be big enough for me.. I've been using the calculator at ebike.ca and I'm not gonna go lower than a 60v.. One of the reasons I'm going with a beach cruiser type bike is so I can fit a bigger battery in the frame... If I was gonna do a 48v I would get a mountain bike to convert or just get a pre-made ebike...
Click to expand...

72v 15ah is definitely the minimum you need to get what you want or very close to it. Battery is always the tricky part. If it was me, I'd assemble 18S 15A LiPO battery from 9x 6S 5000mAh 20C packs or 6x 6S 8000mAh 30C pacs, with the later being a bit more expensive and simpler but either will not have any problem giving you enough current.

At least you have the bike and motor/esc (HS3540 + 40A ESC) figured out. This will be an interesting build.
 
ronnbot said:
babyhughie said:
I really don't think I'll be satisfied going only 25-30mph... I am an experienced bike and motor bike rider... Thanks for the clarification on the torque arms I'll be getting dual arms in the rear.. Id rather be safe than sorry...

Well it looks like the Ping battery is out of the question... Are the bmsbattery.com batteries really not good??? I would love to get their 72v 15ah.. But I don't want to have to get a new battery after a month of use or have it blow up on me...

48v is just not gonna be big enough for me.. I've been using the calculator at ebike.ca and I'm not gonna go lower than a 60v.. One of the reasons I'm going with a beach cruiser type bike is so I can fit a bigger battery in the frame... If I was gonna do a 48v I would get a mountain bike to convert or just get a pre-made ebike...
Click to expand...

72v 15ah is definitely the minimum you need to get what you want or very close to it. Battery is always the tricky part. If it was me, I'd assemble 18S 15A LiPO battery from 9x 6S 5000mAh 20C packs or 6x 6S 8000mAh 30C pacs, with the later being a bit more expensive and simpler but either will not have any problem giving you enough current.

At least you have the bike and motor/esc (HS3540 + 40A ESC) figured out. This will be an interesting build.
Click to expand...


If I knew what I was doing making a battery pack like that and charging it I would love to do it... I just don't know much about batteries and don't feel comfortable doing it... I tried to find a thread on here about making a pack like that out of hobbyking lipo but I didn't have any luck finding a thread like that...

Is it possible to make a pack like that without having to use a soldering iron?? Maybe using just connectors??

Any sources anyone has that would help with a battery build like that feel free to share the links, a video would be very helpful as well... I have already read all the basic battery threads here at ES so I know the basics...
 
If you are at all leery about batteries, I would stay away from RC lipo packs until you have done a LOT of research and soul searching. I went from SLA to lipo and glad that I did, but these little bricks can be very touchy. They are not at all plug and play, set it and forget it. You do that, you burn your house down.

But, when you are ready, they are very easy to build a pack with. Much easier than you would think. If you do not mind paying a little extra, there are members here who will custom build a wiring harness for you. I am not sure if he is still doing them (he had a post in the "for sale" section), but my first lipo harness was built by icecube. I told him what my setup looked like and how long I wanted each run of wire and he put together a 10 gauge harness with fuse holder in no time.

You can also easily build one using the bulk 10 gauge Turnigy wire and pre-made 12 gauge connectors from Hobbyking, using copper crimp sleeves and heatshrink for a custom, no-solder solution. So you have partially 12 gauge wiring instead of all 10 gauge, but I think the 12 gauge wire may be close to the limit of wire gauge if you are pushing 72V and 40A... I hate soldering, but I had to do it to make my own harnesses.
 
babyhughie said:
ronnbot said:
72v 15ah is definitely the minimum you need to get what you want or very close to it. Battery is always the tricky part. If it was me, I'd assemble 18S 15A LiPO battery from 9x 6S 5000mAh 20C packs or 6x 6S 8000mAh 30C pacs, with the later being a bit more expensive and simpler but either will not have any problem giving you enough current.

At least you have the bike and motor/esc (HS3540 + 40A ESC) figured out. This will be an interesting build.
Click to expand...


If I knew what I was doing making a battery pack like that and charging it I would love to do it... I just don't know much about batteries and don't feel comfortable doing it... I tried to find a thread on here about making a pack like that out of hobbyking lipo but I didn't have any luck finding a thread like that...

Is it possible to make a pack like that without having to use a soldering iron?? Maybe using just connectors??

Any sources anyone has that would help with a battery build like that feel free to share the links, a video would be very helpful as well... I have already read all the basic battery threads here at ES so I know the basics...
Click to expand...
An 18S battery can be made as easily as connecting 3 lipo packs together like pictured below (except you need to use 3 6S packs instead of those 4S packs). Add more groups of the same three lipo packs for more capacity.
12s1p.jpg
E-S member jkbrigman has a thread where he assembles an 18S battery pack to try lipo. The link below might help you visualize what you need to do to assemble your own (just connect 3 packs in series). He also writes about charging.

jkbrigman's 18S Series Harness
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=36097&p=540976#p540966

In particular see the picture of his packs connected for 18S. That is 5ah. To get 15ah you just need 2 more groups of the three packs pictured.
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/download/file.php?id=77024

If not for the bullet connectors that you need to connect to the pack's bullet connectors you wouldn't have to use a soldering iron. You could find someone else to solder them for you or you might be able to find already-soldered bullet connectors with wire leads at eBay. If you don't solder you'll have to crimp instead. Here's a couple of links to dogman's articles on crimping for ideas (like making a bullet connector to Anderson connector adapter).

Yet another, no solder, paralell lipos thread
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=25627

Dogman; How To Crimp an Anderson Powerpole Connector
http://www.electricbike.com/crimp-anderson/
 
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