My new $100 Craigslist bike. The Moto-Guzzi of e-bikes??

[StudEbiker]

Well I came home from work last night and was looking through the bike listings on CL and this little cutie popped up and I just couldn't resist.



It is an Italian e-bike with a locking 36v 5ah SLA (dead) underseat battery pack. Quite a few other cool little features though, not the least of which is the internally geared 5spd rear hub with an internal brake.







Another cool little retro feature is the friction generator that powers the front and rear lights. In this picture you can also see the led indicator that shows battery condition on the "center console."



The motor says it is 250w. It looks like a Heinzman, but it says ABB servomotors on the label and the cover is branded La Prima. Information on the web is somewhat hard to find on these bikes. They have a website, but it doesn't have to much technical info. Anyone recognize the motor??



The battery is dead. Here is a shot inside the case. 6- 6v 5ah SLAs.



Anyways, I am going to need to replace those with something. Suggestions for what might work well in this case?? It is a European e-bike and there is no throttle, but it does have two settings for speed and range.....the eco (economical) and the sport. It is a pedal first and then the assist kicks in. 5spd hub has a twist shift. Cosmetically it is in very good shape. It actually still has the nubbies on the tires. I am going to need to replace them though because they have pretty bad cracks. Came with a nice looking 36v 2.7a charger which I forgot to get a picture of last night. Anyway, pretty excited about having a new project!

 

[ambroseliao]

What a beautiful ebike! It's elegant and looks like something you'd find in an old black and white European movie. Congrats. How big is the battery in terms of dimensions to see what might fit in the battery box.

Ambrose

 

[enoob]

wow . what a shame while back i walked right past one of these for sale on granville island barley even looked at it. bummer . that was before i started down this ebike road and thought hub motors were .... well less than. then i saw methods 2w burn out. that still makes me laugh.
gotta love them italians style is part of the process not an afterthought.

that internal 5spd roller brake hub would have been worth it never mind leaving it intact for the wife.

nice find .

 

[StudEbiker]

So I've done some looking around on the bike and I can easily make an adapter wire to run the 36v 10ah LiFePo4 battery to this bike, but before I do I thought I would check here to see if anyone could see any potential problems doing that since the original batteries were SLA. With a 250w motor I don't think the amp draw would be so high as to have to worry about the c rating of the battery, but I am still new to this so I thought I should check.

 

[dnmun]

if it is brushed, keep the amps down, way cool ride.

 

[StudEbiker]

It is brushless.

 

[hetexengines]

ABB is a worldwide company in the electrical equipment business. In New Zealand, they make transformers for electric power transmission, as I have a friend there that works for them. I would think that a Google search for ABB and Italy and motors would find them.
Are you sure the batteries won't recharge? I've been surprised by old batteries even in cheap products such as hand vacuums and telephone answer machines.

 

[AussieJester]

That there is THE best e-bike i have seen to go Lycra hunting on (when upgraded hub is added of course) the
looks on a Lycras face when you pedal by them on that would be priceless, picnic basket with bread roll and bottle of vino hanging out the top
perched neatly on the rear rack, bere' atop your head pant leg tucked in sock, classic...

KiM

 

[theyerb]

Good god, you gotta love the Italians. They know how to make something beautiful. Did you really get it for $100???!!! If so, this is an amazing deal.

 

[gmouchawar]

I have bought a front wheel from this bike for more than you paid for the whole bike. Congradulations.
The front hub motor is brushless sensorless design. It is hard to find a generic controller for it if the original controller is not working.
Let me know when you put in new batteries. You can use any battery chemistry as long as you don't go over 36V significantly.
The hub motor looks massive and should be able to run more than 250W but with a different controller.
I think Keywin here has a sensorless controller that should work with it.
Good luck,

 

[StudEbiker]

I have bought a front wheel from this bike for more than you paid for the whole bike. Congradulations.
The front hub motor is brushless sensorless design. It is hard to find a generic controller for it if the original controller is not working.
Let me know when you put in new batteries. You can use any battery chemistry as long as you don't go over 36V significantly.
The hub motor looks massive and should be able to run more than 250W but with a different controller.
I think Keywin here has a sensorless controller that should work with it.
Good luck,

Thanks for the info. The Hightekbikes Aotema motor is brushless sensorless, do you think their controller would work with it?? I hooked up my 36v 10ah LiFePo batt to it yesterday and got it the motor to run with the bike upside down, but when I went for a real ride, the motor never would quite catch. It would try and kick in at the 3-4 mph mark where the motor would normally kick in on this bike, but it would just kind of shudder and shake a little and then when I went faster it just wouldn't do anything. What do you think I should look at? I think ultimately I wouldn't mind getting rid of the European start feature and just put a throttle on it, but I'd like to get it running how it was originally before I make that decision.

 

[mwkeefer]

100.00 from CL? Man I really need to start watching the darn list.

Nice.

-Mike

 

[gmouchawar]

This is a pedal 1st controller in the bike. It must detect the cracks moving via a sensor on the pedal before it will allow power to the hub. Perfectly normal and the law in Europe.

 

[grindz145]

Wow! nice find! Nice design and with some LiPo or LiFePo4 that thing would be absolutely stellar. That 5 speed hub is worth $100 alone!

 

[StudEbiker]

Well, I think I solved the problem of the motor not kicking in the way it was supposed to. Just some loose connections on the controller. Finally got to take the bike out tonight for a ride. I am impressed the 250w motor really pulls much harder than I expected and really climbs the hill in front of my house very well. It is advertised as a high torque motor and I believe it. I think the top speed is around 18mph though. I pulled all the body panels off today in search of the loose connections and I thought it would be a real headache trying to get them to all fit right again, but I have to say these Italian panels really went back into place very easy. The frame is unusal to say the least. I didn't get any pictures of it "naked", but I did find another site where someone was playing with this type of bike and they literally dumped the panels in the dumpster.....tragic.

Here is a video they made after they disposed of the panels.

[youtube]5C87EckHudQ[/youtube]

Now I just have to decide what batteries to go with on the bike. Ambrose, I got some pictures of the case with a measure for reference. For some reason the right side of the first pic got clipped when I uploaded it, but the case is about 14.5" long.





View attachment 3



I'm thinking I might try the Bosch FatPack route on it. However, I think hightekbikes has a nice 10ah LiFePo4 battery that is about the dimensions of this case too though.

Anyway, I am very happy with the bike now that I solved the issue I had with the motor not wanting to kick it. The head light on it is even brighter than the led light I am using on the mountain bike and the friction drive really makes sense because you don't really feel the drag like you would on a non-electric bike.

One other thing I want to fix on the bike is the front fender. It's really the only thing that is wrong cosmetically with the bike and unfortunately I think it happened when I picked it up. The front fender cracked. Does anyone have any experience or tips with fixing something like this. I know I could just go get another fender, but this one matched the color of the rest of the panels.

 

[dogman dan]

Finding a glue that sticks to plasitc can be difficult. PVC stuff, no problemo, just use pvc glue. But polyethylene is a real bitch. When I had a polyetylene windsurfboard I found the only thing that worked and really sticked to poly even underwater was the caulking they sell especially for sealing raingutters. Not your regular silicone, this stuff really worked . You could get some thin strips of poly, or even fiberglass fabric and do repairs with that on the underside of the fender.

 

[heathyoung]

Butyl Mastic?

 

[dogman dan]

Butylene caulk is the bomb for some things, but it stays too flexible forever and takes weeks to even harden a little. I use it all the time to seal windows and skylights that are leaking. The gutter caulk gets harder, but not too hard like epoxy, and works well on things that flex a little. It's pretty sticky stuff though, just about as hard to get off the hands as butyl.

 

[kilowatt]

If the fender is plastic or fiberglass you can repair it with epoxy resin and glass cloth from the inside. To fill any cracks, mix epoxy with microballoons and fill in. Very easy to sand. Go to your local RC hobby shop for everything you will need plus advice. Match the paint and your done.

Dave

 

[nwmtnbiker]

That's a beautiful bike. Prima e-bikes are still sold and the color of your model is called "sand." If you can't figure out how to repair the fender, you should be able to order a replacement. Here's a link to the company's web page. http://www.powerbikes.com/prima.htm There are several North American distributors, just do a Google search. You got an excellent deal, new, the Prima bikes sell for close to $1000.

 

[StudEbiker]

Can any of you battery gurus give me some recommendations for what you think the best choice of batteries to go into the stock battery case are. Something around 8ah would be great, maybe 10ah, but I think I am probably going to sell this so I don't want to put too much money into it. I though about the Bosch packs, but it seems like they are too tall to fit in this case.

 

[velowatt]

That is such a beautiful bike, you might not want to do modifications that are permanent. Have you considered putting a battery (LifePO4, NiCad or even SLA) in a bag that attached to the rear rack? You could just remove the old/dead SLA's and set up a connector (Anderson Powerpoles work great) wired into the old battery box. That way, you could ride the bike, demonstrate how it works to a prospective buyer, and have minimal changes to the "stock" equipment for minimum $$ investment. Just make sure the rack can take the weight.

 

[StudEbiker]

Right Velo, I am wanting to find some batteries that will go in the original battery box. I really do want to keep it stock looking but just upgrade the SLAs.

 

[mabman]

I helped an older (70) woman friend in getting one of those. She loved it as it drew attention wherever she went on it and that meant alot to her The bike had no range though with the original battery and a Giant LaFree came along for a really good deal and she upgraded to it and likes it better but still doesn't have alot of range due to the SLA batteries. She is going to upgrade it soon and have found a 24V 20AH LiFePo4 battery that will fit in the original box of the Giant no problem. Anyway here is a pic of her old one that sold for $100 on CL when we got rid of it. The front fender broke in that same place and she threw it away.

 

[StudEbiker]

I actually fixed the fender this week. Used a two part epoxy that dried to a color that matched pretty close to the original color. It's on the backside of the fender too so it won't be too noticeable.