1st ebike. Yescomusa battery/controller options

Been lurking here off and on for the last year, sifting through and trying to make sense of the plethora of options available for a build. I think I've finely narrowed things down to a cheap yescomusa 1000w 48V rear direct drive as the best fit for me. Would love a little input and review from all your experience before I order anything.

What I'm looking for:
Minimum 30 mile range (more obviously better) at ~20 mph on flat ground, with me (180lbs) on a 26" steel hardtail (rim brakes). ~30mph max speed sounds fun, but don't really need anything much faster. Also hoping for good acceleration to deal with stop and go on the first half of my commute.
Looking to shorten my now 9 mile work commute (all flat, secondary streets and bike paths) to 20-30 minutes such that I can conveniently bike it again and don't need to drive. I live in the cascade foothills, so having the ability to handle short 10-15% grades a plus when running errands (but not essential for the flat commute). Also, I live in Oregon, so 6 months out of the year will be wet and I'll want a motor/battery that lets me still commute if drizzling. I'm also thrifty. I'm fine (and generally even prefer) a gritty, diy set-up that takes a little futzing from time to time but has some real pep, over some slick, polished solution that costs twice as much.

What I'm planning:

• 1000w/48v xcerries/yescomusa rear direct drive for $169-197. Been reading lots of posts about the yescomusa 1000w 48v read direct drives by wesnewell and others with great interest, and they seem like they right price/performance for me. Is the lcd and PAS version of their kit worth it (or things I'd probably end up wanting to upgrade anyway)?

• Battery. Thinking of a UPP pack. Maybe this 52V 17Ah 30A continuous triangle pack for $335. Is a 30A discharge enough with the yescom?
  Was seriously considering RC lipos for a while (and love that people are making them work). But, in the end I'm not sure if I can deal with both 1) an elaborate, multi-piece charging kit, and 2) the need to charge in a fire safe area. Either one by itself would be fine, but I don't think I have an easy space in my yard (that my wife wouldn't object to) that I can store and keep dry a bunch of fragile electronics where I also don't mind if they catch fire.

• Controller? I see folks running beefed up 72v controllers with the yescom kits. What's the primary benefits over the stock controller? If I upgrade, I assume I also need to find a battery with a higher continuous discharge rating?

• Torque arm. Probably one Grin v4 although it seems rather pricey on a budget build.

Does this all seem like it will do what I need? Any other motor/battery/controller or other part options I should be considering?

Thanks!

I bought this kit in Australia..catch.com.au... The controller lasted one ride.. its been 2 weeks I am waiting for replacement!

Welcome to ES.

I got 17000+ miles out of my Yescomusa front hub motor before a hall sensor went out. I replaced it and it is running again.

Speed ='s volts. Torque ='s amps. If you want speed over-volt the motor, just don't overheat it. If you want to get up hills increase your amps. The easiest way is to get another controller. 48v 1000w motor should get you around 27mph on the flats. Maybe faster if you pedal. If you want to go a long distance, you need watt-hours. Around here the rule of thumb is around 25 watts per mile. So, if you want to go 30 miles, 30*25=750 / 48v = 15.625 amp hour battery. If you have hills, wind, cold air, and any other thing that cut distance out of a battery, you will need more battery. Think about a 20 amp hour battery. Or just go slower. As for a PAS, if you don't need it, don't bother I say.

As far as grades, how short is you 10-15% grades. That is usually the time when you pedal unless you have say, 72v to power up a hill. You will also need a 72v battery. Probably no great reason to go 72v, but you will be using leg power.

As for the wet time, google search Weatherproof E-bike and start reading. A big problem is getting your throttle wet and having your bike go WOT on you with no warning.

https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=63933

As for a battery, it is important to get one from a reputable dealer. Cheap ones don't last and might burn your house down. Spend the extra money on a battery, or if you want to go with RC lipo, learn how handle them and charge them safely.

For batteries look at:

ebikes.ca
EM3ev
Luna Battery
Ping Battery
Hobby King

e-beach is right. Spend money once and you won't have a bad time. Ebiking is expensive to get into, even for an entry-level build like yours.

Definitely get a battery from one of those legit suppliers, not aliexpress.

Agree with above; 48V for 28 or so mph (52V on my YESCOM = 33+ mph). 20 ah for 30 (at most) miles. My Luna 52V, 10 ah battery still functions well after three years. Live in CA, so no rain, therefore can't help.

I bought this kit in Australia..catch.com.au... The controller lasted one ride.. its been 2 weeks I am waiting for replacement!

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Bummer about the controller. At least a new controller doesn't look too expensive although the wait must suck.

Thanks e-beach. 17000 miles sounds awesome! Cheap, utilitarian and reliable is what I'm going for and the yescom sounds like it fits the bill for the motor. Will look into the weatherproofing options before the rains get here.

As far as grades, how short is you 10-15% grades. That is usually the time when you pedal unless you have say, 72v to power up a hill. You will also need a 72v battery. Probably no great reason to go 72v, but you will be using leg power.

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The daily commute is almost no grade, and around town it would be just be some occasional 1/4 mile hills depending on where I'm going (and I'd be fine taking it slow and pedalling). That actually covers 95% of my need/want for an ebike (I have a separate human powered mnt bike for trail riding, but want the workout and have no plans to electrify it). At some point I might want to go on slightly longer trips just outside of town with some bigger/longer hills, but that's rare enough that I'm not going to design my bike around it and will just upgrade things if it becomes limiting.

So, it sounds like a 48-52v battery with ~20Ah should have me pretty well covered (daily commute is only 18 miles, and 30mi was including some leeway already) , and the stock controller is probably fine until if or when it fails. Is a 30A continuous discharge rating on the battery sufficient with the stock controller? As for the battery supplier, I was under the impression Unit Power Pack was at least somewhat reliable? Is that not right? Or are they more the best of the worst of the ebay/ali crowd? Was hoping not to have to spend $500+ on batteries, but definitely don't wont to waste money on some dodgy crap that fails in short order either.

For lipo, I did spend a couple days reading up. I love the cost/performance of the batteries, but am a bit turned off by how non-portable most peoples charging kits are (power supply, charger, parallel board, cellog, etc) that seem to be needed for packs larger than 10s. Seems a bit unwieldy to be hauling back and forth from my wooden garage to a firesafe area daily (begging for something to get knocked loose or hooked up wrong one morning when I'm in a rush). Are there any simple and rugged/portable chargers capable of charging packs larger than 10s? Hard to tell what's currently on the market, when a lot of the lipo charging threads I've read through are 10 years old.

Forget lipo, that's craziness. There's a reason you have to dig up discussion of lipo from the distant past.

If the battery can hold 48V while delivering 30A, that's close to 1500W, so it seems like that would be in the general ball park. As for performance, you can get significantly better range by just riding slower. For example, you mention 20mph - at 18mph, you'd save 25% of the battery juice, in terms of watt-hours per mile.

The battery is the super important part of an e-bike. It is that way on all EV's. I didn't like paying $650 for my first battery, but after 7 years it is still giving me 80% of original capacity. A cheaper battery would have only lasted a couple of years and maybe caused problems up to and including a fire. It is not worth it saving on. Think of it this way, if you spend $600 on a battery and you ride 4000 miles per year for 7 years you are spending something like 2.1¢ per mile for your battery. If you multiply that by 20miles to the gallon like a car might get, you are paying 42¢ per gallon to go as far. You just need to pay for it all up front. It is worth it though.

As for a controller, you can always mod the shunt to get a few more amps out of it, but your battery and BMS need to be able to discharge at what ever your max amp draw is. BTW, the only time you draw max amps out of an e-bike controller is when you are starting from a dead stop, or going up a steep hill.

A 52v 15ah battery would suit your needs well.

Definitely the battery is the heart of the system. A good one will perform better (be capable of higher discharge with lower voltage sag (so you get more power out of it) and less heat generated, etc.), last longer lifespan, and stay balanced better (so you don't have to charge as long).

More expensive doens't necesarily mean better, but pretty cheap is often a fair indication of worse quality.

Any battery can have a problem at any time...but the cheap ones are more likley to have them sooner and more often.


BTW, if you choose a battery format that doesn't come prepackaged with a BMS, you can always add one, so you can just bulk charge like any regular battery (no spaghetti-wired setup to carry around)...though BMS's also come in cheap and not cheap varieties, and are also part of what makes a better battery better (and more expensive).

The charger can also be part of what makes a better battery more expensive, because cheap ones can fail in all sorts of ways, some of which can take out the battery if the BMS doesn't prevent it (like passing rectified wall voltage straight to the battery). Better chargers are designed so that sort of thing "can't" happen, and may be able to charge at higher rates, or be weather resistant, fanless, or other useful features.

To really have reliable 30 mile range, you'd need a 48v (13s) or 52v (14 cells in series) battery of 20 ah.

That is not to say you cannot get 30 miles out of a smaller battery, say 12 ah. But 30 miles riding at a brisk pace, 20-22 mph, will take more than you might think, due to wind resistance, and the lesser % of the total energy provided by pedaling as you go faster and faster.

But you can pedal, and ride 15 mph, and get that 30 miles easy, from a 12 ah size. 15 mph will only draw 250-350 watts. while 20 mph will take 400-600 watts. That's with pedaling. Above 20 mph, most e bikes don't have gears high enough to pedal hard. You can still pedal, but if you look at a watt meter, then stop pedaling, you may see your pedaling really did not change the wattage, unless you pedal a very high cadence like a racer. For most of us normal folks, 18-20 mph is the fastest pedaling does much good in terms of adding range.

For many, the joy of riding 25-30 mph is what ebikes are all about. But because batteries cost so much, my advice is to buy a very high quality 12 ah pack, vs a cheap ass 20 ah from ali express. ( I got a grind with cheap batteries btw)

But my new battery is 52v 12 ah, and I am loving that pack. Its just stronger than any others I have had. The strong cells make all the difference. It does not have the paper capacity of the cheap ali express battery, but in fact, because it does not sag under load so much, it actually has very similar real world capacity to that cheap 20 ah pack, that ended up burning my garage down. My new pack is the wolf pack, from Luna.

I pull 30 miles from that luna pack any time I need it. But when I don't need 30 miles, I ride 30 mph as much as I want to. That's usually just a half mile here, or there, to keep up with traffic on a narrower road. Rest of the time I pedal, and cruise 20 mph.

dogman dan said:

To really have reliable 30 mile range, you'd need a 48v (13s) or 52v (14 cells in series) battery of 20 ah.

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I'd think that should be 48V (13s LiCoO2, 15s LiFePO4) or 52V (14 cells LiCoO2 or 16 cells LiFePO4 in series.)

And as you point out in the same post, this is assuming you want to ride 30mph so much that you're ready to pay for twice as much battery to get it. For me, one of the things I like about switching from a motorcycle to an electric bicycle, is that I don't feel any need to wrap myself from head to toe in armor - heavy helmet, armored jacket and pants, armored gloves, motorcycle boots, bleah. I dress lighter, get there in plenty of time at 15-20mph, and have a more relaxing time and a lot better range.

I know, there are reasons why we need unlicensed electric motorcycles, but just want to reassure anyone who isn't sure about whether that makes sense -- 20 is plenty for the vast majority of electric bicycle riders, and even a few on endless-sphere.

Appreciate all the great info! I especially like Dan's points regarding speed. I want a setup that can do ~30 mph every now and then because, well, it sounds super fun (and something a store bike won't do), but for most of my regular usage (especially on bike paths, etc) I don't need that kind of speed and I'll be happy to pedal along at a reasonable 15mph, giving me some exercise and extend my range considerably. Since I do plan on pedalling, does getting yescom's kit with PAS make riding more enjoyable, or do most folks just set the throttle where they want and pedal when they want (the PAS doesn't add much to their kit price, so mostly just curious if people find having it redundant or not)?

I've got a limited amount of experience tinkering around with microelectronics and have been reading up and pricing out what it would actually take to build an 18650 pack with quality cells (if nothing else I find it neat learning what goes into these packs). But, if that end's up not pencilling out or building a spot welder and pack ends up seeming to time consuming, I'm okay investing in reputable pack.

Yescom doesn't list the max controller amperage, but from reading up here I gather it's limited to ~30A without modification. EM3EV has several 52V packs in the 15-20Ah range I'm looking for at a price I'd be okay with. Most of those are rated for 29-34 A continuous (and closer to 50 A peak). Assuming I'm not going full throttle all the time, I imagine that will be plenty of discharge capacity to not run my pack too hard and maximise it's life? Also, their hard-case rectangular packs seem to give the most WH/$. Anyone come up with easy solutions for frame mounting these besides sticking them on my rack or in a pannier? I've got access to a cnc and 3d printer (thanks Eugene library) and imagine I can could improvise something (but haven't actually taken any measurements). Curious if others already solved that one.

Thanks again.

If the pas is required where you are, put it on. If it is not required leave it off and pedal when you want. Unless you want to force your self to pedal then put it on.

If you want to build a battery add $150 to $350 to the price of the cells to account for everything you will need to build a spot welded battery. Less if you are going to solder them together. Unless you screw up the soldering and ruin a few cells from the heat. If you build more then one battery, spot welders become cost effective.

I am all for building a custom battery, but get a bike built first and then branch out to more custom stuff.

The battery should, IMO always be in the triangle of the frame for best handling. If it is on the rack, the ride gets unstable. I broke a rib in my first week of e-biking when I crashed my e-bike. The weight of my battery pack (which was on the rear rack) contributed in pulling me down and my left side was whipped across a concrete curb breaking a rib. Put the battery in the triangle of your bike!

BTW, what kind of bike are you converting and how big is the triangle?

watts / volts = amps.
1000w / 48v = 20.8 amps.
1500w / 48 = 32.25 amps.
1500w / 52v = (fill in the answer here.)

I gather your question may be more about the yescom PAS setup in particular. Their site is real vague about what you get, so I assume it's a "cadence" sensing system, where the motor voltage goes up or down according to how fast you pedal. As opposed to "torque" sensing, where it responds to how hard you push. I won't say much more about them because I don't use either, but I will say that I could understand how it might be a simpler experience that's more satisfactory in some ways, to control the motor with the same inputs that you're already used to for propulsion. Combined throttle and pedal, operating different power sources, can be a little awkward and takes some extra attention, and while you're going to be using the throttle anyway, you might like to have the PAS option. I've never regretting skipping it myself, but not everyone is like me, you know?

Anyway, the possibly humorous result I got when I checked yescome's site on PAS: a review of their motor kit:

Brendan M said:

Pedaling with the PAS device installed also charges your battery.

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From what I can tell, PAS isn't required here. And pretty sure yescom's is just cadence setting with a 1-5 assist setpoint. I may throw it in to have the option but am undecided (and I assume I can always wire an after-market PAS into the controller?). Interesting comment about charging the battery while pedalling. I can't tell if it's in jest, but I believe the stock controller can do regen breaking (possibly with a mod, although I don't know if that typically charges or just dumps the heat somewhere).

Yes, I'm discovering that between the spot welder, all the connectors and other odds and ends, I'm not going to end up with all that much savings. Plus, it will put me back another month or two and I'll loose out on lots of good riding weather. But, I may just get a pack on the lower Ah of what I've been considering, and build a spare later.

With the em3ev rectangular packs, I was hoping to figure some way of securely mounting them in the triangle, but I haven't really looked into the dimensions and how feasible that would be. Alternatively, they have some ready-made triangle packs that aren't that much more (although everything seems to add up).

For bikes, not quite decided but I've been focusing on 26" steel frame hardtail mountain bikes. I've got a ~15 yr old steel trek 820 26" in my garage that I'm considering (full-sized triangle, but it's been my "I don't care if it gets stolen" beater bike versus my other, nicer frames). It rusty and needs some work, but I've got experience and tools for fixing up bikes. Have also been watching craigslist to see if I can find anything more suitable. If having a steel frame isn't essential for a 1000W motor, I'd have a lot more and better quality bike options with older aluminium mountain bikes. Originally, I was mostly going for "ghetto ebike that can do about 30mph". However, after ruling out lipo's, it's no longer going to be quite such a budget build, so I may end up picking up a somewhat nicer used frame with more style.

As far as batteries, is one rated for ~28A continuous (40-50A peak) discharge capacity sufficient with the 30A controller assuming I'm not constantly hammering the throttle (or should I be looking for a higher discharge capacity to be sure I'm really babying the battery and extending its life)?

valleygoat said:

Since I do plan on pedalling, does getting yescom's kit with PAS make riding more enjoyable, or do most folks just set the throttle where they want and pedal when they want (the PAS doesn't add much to their kit price, so mostly just curious if people find having it redundant or not)?

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It depends on how you like to ride, and how the PAS works on a particualr controller.

For instance, on my SB Cruiser trike, I have PAS that I presently use to "cruise" 'hands free" at the speed limit I've set (usually 20MPH), and use the throttle to override that when necessary. Eventually it'll have finer control, and be able to fully control the power of the trike with just pedals, leaving me free to concentrate on other things (since my legs already know how to control power/speed without me thinking about it).

But not everyone likes to do that. Some don't want ot pedal at all.

ALso, the PAS on every controller isn't the same. Some are just something that enables the throttle. Some just push the bike to the max speed (or power level) allowed in the particular level the controller is set to at that time. Some give cadence control of hte bike's power or speed, so the faster you pedal the faster it goes. Some actually have torque sensors, so they can detect how hard you're pedalling and control via that. Other methods, too, but those are the ocmmon ones.

I don't know which kind is on the Yescom kits.

If you find you don't like the PAS on a kit, and want something different, or the options of trying different kinds, you can install the Cycle Analyst v3 from Grin Tech http://ebikes.ca , which can be setup with torque or cadence sensors.

I will say, I would be somewhat less happy with throttle-only, if my controller didn't support "cruise control". That's also an option with the Cycle Analyst computer; for this (and for PAS, mentioned above), you'd plug your throttle (and PAS) into CA instead of your controller. Cruise control works more or less like in a motor vehicle, you hold the throttle at a constant for a few seconds and let go, and the voltage stays where you were.

If I have any kind of a stretch in front of me, I'll get into cruise control and forget the throttle. At this point, as always with the throttle, pedal input is in essence subtracted from the motor load, so the basic difference between this and PAS is that the speed is more or less constant. Without it, I don't think I'd like holding the throttle open all the time. The throttle on my old motorcycle was a little more ideal, ergonomically, but even there, after a while I'd get stiffness kind of creeping up my arm to my neck and shoulders.

The controller with my rim brake YES is 30 amp and AFAIK, the disc system is 26. I've used a Luna 52V, 10 ah battery for four years and it's still going strong (qualitatively). Charge fully before using, then leave at 20%+ until the next. The battery is also used for a BBS02 off road.

The controller with my rim brake YES is 30 amp and AFAIK, the disc system is 26. I've used a Luna 52V, 10 ah battery for four years and it's still going strong (qualitatively). Charge fully before using, then leave at 20%+ until the next. The battery is also used for a BBS02 off road.

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Thanks. Any idea what the rated discharge capacity of your Luna pack is (or what cells are in it)?

I'm planning on just rim brakes and want the 30A controller. Their website doesn't mention it anywhere in the description and the picture's angles aren't't great, so to be safe, I assume this is the disc hub:

and this is the rim version:

It's been four years, but the cells (AIR) were 26 "something" ("q" maybe). I purchased it when Luna first started offering batteries and it was very reasonably priced, but I don't know the performance data.

Aluminum alloy frames are ok if you don't need to stretch the rear stays (seatstays / chainstays) to get the motor into the dropouts. You would also need a good torque arm in case the dropout/s fractured and broke off while riding. I have run steel and Aluminum alloy and I prefer alloy. I would though highly recommend at least front suspension because with batteries and a motor, the weight of the bike magnifies the feeling of bumps and potholes etc.

My first e-bike was a Trek 800. I felt what felt like explosions under my bike every time I hit a pothole. Also the rake of the front forks made it unstable during turns at higher speeds. It was too abrupt.

valleygoat said:

Their website doesn't mention it anywhere in the description and the picture's angles aren't't great, so to be safe, I assume this is the disc hub:img]

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Those both look like they have disc brake rotor mounting holes around the axle (six bolts).

It's more likely those are different versions of the motor; perhaps different power levels or just older model vs nwere, or possibly front vs rear?

The PAS is worth having if for no reason but to try out and see if you prefer it. It is an inexpensive option. Laws changed here in AZ and I reconfigured my LCD 5 controller to make my bike Class 3 compliant and that means using the PAS. My throttle still works if I'm pedaling and I use it for instant full power if/when needed. Overall, I find using the PAS system just fine for my commuting. I change back and forth from the various PAS setting 1-4 based on the situation and how I feel. I never use 5. The throttle is there for that.

I agree with Dogman Dan that if you want a reliable 30 mile range, you should have about 1000 watt hours of battery storage.
My bike has a pretty beefy aluminum frame, but I recently bought a Trek 820 that I intend to convert to a cargo bike. I would expect it to be a robust ebike frame given the large steel tubes. That said, after making my Trek 820 base bike roadworthy, I did find the steering a bit "twitchy". I'm not sure how much of that is the bike or that I'm so used to riding an 80lb ebike For reference, my Trek 820 is a 2005 model.

I'm at nearly the 9,000 mile mark on the same or similar 9C clone motor you are looking at. It is doing fine.

Thanks all.

It's been four years, but the cells (AIR) were 26 "something" ("q" maybe).

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Thanks 2old. I actually searched your post history and it looks like Samsung 26f cells, which Samsung rates at 5.2A max continuous discharge. So, 20.8A rated max continuous discharge on your 10Ah 4p Luna pack. If you're getting good life using those with the yescom motor/controller, I think any of the 28-32A rated pack's I'm looking at should be fine.

Based on everyone's input, I plan to go with the PAS kit just to have the option. Only snag right now is sourcing a frame. I decided against building on my current late 90's Trek 820 frame (it's a bit small for me and the fork is partly seized). Unfortunately, Craigslist absolutely sucks for used bikes in my city (I've dealt with it before, but literally half the ads are from the same 2-3 sellers asking $200+ for crap department store bikes. I'm really curious who they are and where they're getting their bikes, but they seem to have cornered and inflated the market, making a good deal hard to come by). We'll see if one pops up this week. If not, I'm seeing lots of suitable used frames at reasonable prices in neighboring cities (one classic lugged steel mid-90's Bridgestone MB-1 with an old RockShox fork that I've got my eye on), and will take a road trip next weekend if need be.

Anyone experimented adding a modern, somewhat longer travel fork onto these old mountain bikes for use as e-bikes? I'm not looking to make a major change and mess with the frame geometry too much. But, a longer fork typically gives slower steering. Usually that's a negative, but for a commuter bike traveling on pavement at e-bike speeds that might actually be a good thing. Anyway, just a thought as I'm looking at suitable frames/bikes (especially since a lot of the mid 90's steel mountain bikes I'm looking at will probably need a fork rebuild anyway).

I'll keep you posted as the build comes along.

valleygoat said:

Unfortunately, Craigslist absolutely sucks for used bikes in my city

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So I had to look, and it looks pretty good for recumbent bicycles, though. Not that you wanted to know that, but ... I just have to mention, someone out NW of Salem has a Lightfoot Ranger, a really rare and no longer produced but well regarded "rough country touring recumbent" -- with an electric rear hub!

My Burley Limbo was made in Eugene, but it looks like you'd have to go to Corvallis to get one via craigslist. I drove to Portland for mine.