Used Jump Bafang Hub for Budget Build?

spaceship

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Mar 21, 2022
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Location
Vancouver Island, BC
Just recently built up my first e-bike with a 1500w rear hub & 52v20ah battery and am having tons of fun. I'm looking at making a second e-bike for my gf to use when she visits. She is quite small and won't want to go very fast (20-30 kmph max probably) so I am looking at putting together a bike with a smaller hub. lighter battery, and I would like to keep it budget friendly. Also DIY appeals to me so I am looking at going more of a diy route.

I came across Battery Clearing House and found that they can ship to me in Canada. They have these Bafang 350w front hubs for $23.50 and they also have 10s3p packs of LG cells untested for cell salvage for $23.50. Even with conversion to CAD, shipping, and duty its a fairly small investment to play around with lacing a rim, building a battery pack,etc.

https://www.batteryclearinghouse.com/collections/canada-shipping

Would this be a good option with a bit of DIY elbow grease? How easy is to find a controller that will work with this, are they pretty much all universal as long as I have the wiring diagram?

I've read mixed things about dealing with Battery Clearing House, can anyone chime in with experience buying their products? Are they generally in the condition described? Should I expect a certain number of cells to be unusable?

Thanks for any input!
 
There's some other threads discussing the Jump motors from BCH and other places that also sell them, some of which includes suitable controllers.

One sample thread
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=110408

Any controller that will run other Bafang geared hubs (probably any geared hub) shouldl run these.

Get good torque arms (like Grin's at http://ebikes.ca); without them even a low power geared hub can have enough torque to destroy fork dropouts under the wrong conditions.


My personal experience with BCH's "packing" is that they haven't a clue how to get things to a buyer undamaged, so I wouldn't order from them ever again, even if they could be bothered to respond to my inquiries (which they don't--even before I received my order, they stopped all communications, in the middle of me trying to setup an order for more stuff). If I were to do this again I'd go thru BatteryHookup instead, based on reviews and comments by various ES members. (dunno if BH has the motors though).

Other people's experiences are different, so you should poke around to see their positives and negatives.
 
I bought a couple of the "Jump" clearance motor/wheel assemblies from a vendor in the States that came with Schwalbe tires. Everything arrived in very gd. cond. and it seemed to me they were little used. The whl. builds were quality and the rims were straight, so I mounted one "as is" on my 52 Volt (14S Lipoly) bike and the first thing that was obvious was they were geared pretty fast. Top speed was around 26 - 27 MPH and I estimate the motor-speed range was on the high side of the 260 rpm @ 36 V norm for a mid-speed motor. Probably in the 270 to 280 rpm @ 36 V range.
If I was building my bike for pure economy, I could have just "called it a day" and ran with it, but there were a couple things I didn't like.
These motors are bigger than the typical 2 Kg. mini, I think they are around 2.5 Kg and was at the point where it's size and weight was a little more than I want on the frt. of my Ebikes.
The other thing, more importantly, both motors had a metallic ringing at speed that got me right in the molars like a dentist's drill .
But for a low speed/low power bike, they are fine. 36 Volts is 20 mph, so keep the system at or even below this and the max. Amps at or below 15 and if she can touch the ground, this combo will be gd.
Idealy, this motor would be in a 24 Inch whl. but it's such a gd. assembly that it seem a shame to take it apart, but on the other hand, it's so cheap that it would be NBD.
I use simple non-sine wave controllers this one from these folks;
https://www.pswpower.com/products/36v-48v-350w-brushless-dc-square-wave-controller-ebike-electric-bicycle-hub-motor-controller-with-right-output-31
Just a sm. display w/ 3-speed limiting, an on/off switch and a row of red LED's. You can use the second speed for a top speed around 17 to 18 mph, perfect for her.(Getting it right now would probably take awhile, so be advised)

Just to finish up my story, I bought a new 240rpm @ 36V rear mount SWX02 from here and swapped it's core into the Jump whl. assem.;
https://hilleater.ca/bafang-swx02-rear-cassette-motor-slow-13-turn-winding/?tab=ProductReviews
Not the least expensive route, but I ended up w/ a rear-mounted motor ebike that does 25 mph and has very gd. torque for a smaller hubbie. For some reason, this motor is dead quiet.
 
I'm looking at this for the controller, does it seem like a good option?

https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B09VL822M2/?coliid=I13PSIWF56HNAZ&colid=AGK8LSVYNSE0&psc=1&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it

when it gets here will I have to set any programming to match the motor, or is it pretty much plug and play?
 
Should be
You'll be back wondering what code 28 means

spaceship said:
I'm looking at this for the controller, does it seem like a good option?

https://www.amazon.ca/dp/B09VL822M2/?coliid=I13PSIWF56HNAZ&colid=AGK8LSVYNSE0&psc=1&ref_=lv_ov_lig_dp_it

when it gets here will I have to set any programming to match the motor, or is it pretty much plug and play?
 
I've built more of these hubs up into e-bikes than I can remember at this point. There have been no failures or significant problems so far.

Here's the controller I use: https://www.ebay.com/itm/174100764183
I chose this amp level because it's the same as the 500W Ebikeling kits that I had good results from before, which seem to have basically the same motor architecture. The controller runs on 36V or 48V, which corresponds to about 20mph top speed versus 24mph top speed on flat ground with the original 26" wheel. I'm sure it can run on 52V, but I'm also sure nothing good can come of it.

I recommend not using the controller you linked, because you'll need a 9 pin breakout cable and then you'll need to work out the wire assignments. Use a controller with a 9 pin motor cable and you're all good to go.

I use the KT LCD4 display, or LCD3 for folks whose eyesight ain't so good.

More often than not, I use a Wuxing 130X throttle and a KT V12L pedal sensor. Most but not all installs require a 9 pin extension cable.

Most of the time I use one of these hubs, I relace the hub to a better rim with normal bicycle spokes, to enable the use of rim brakes, to change the wheel diameter, and/or to make the wheel more reliable and balanced. But the stock rim and spokes have been pretty okay so far when they fit the project.
 
Spaceship wrote;
I'm looking at making a second e-bike for my gf to use when she visits. She is quite small and won't want to go very fast (20-30 kmph max probably) so I am looking at putting together a bike with a smaller hub. lighter battery, and I would like to keep it budget friendly.

If you really mean this, the 22 Amp controllers you are talking about are too powerful. They would a great match for the motor for big guys like you or I who can muscle the frt. of a 1000 W ebike. but that combo can bite a 100 lb. girl.
Don't say you want an Ebike for her, then pick a system power based on your ego.
It's easy enough to play it safe and start w/ a 15 Amp controller and as she gains experience on it, and ASKS for more power later, to upgrade to a bigger controller.
 
motomech said:
If you really mean this, the 22 Amp controllers you are talking about are too powerful. They would a great match for the motor for big guys like you or I who can muscle the frt. of a 1000 W ebike. but that combo can bite a 100 lb. girl.
Don't say you want an Ebike for her, then pick a system power based on your ego.
It's easy enough to play it safe and start w/ a 15 Amp controller and as she gains experience on it, and ASKS for more power later, to upgrade to a bigger controller.

The controller I have currently allows me to set power level and even limit max amps and top speed within the programming perameters, are they not all similar in that respect? If I can turn down the power and top speed to suit why would I choose a smaller hardware limited controller and have to replace it later?

Chalo said:
I've built more of these hubs up into e-bikes than I can remember at this point. There have been no failures or significant problems

Doed the controller you normally use allow setting of max amps and max top speed with a display connected? I see it is also a 22a controller.

The hubs I ordered actually are coming without rims so I will be lacing it on to a new rim. Do you have any tips on how to calculate the spoke lengths? I havn't picked a bike out yet so dont know what size rim yet.
 
spaceship said:
Doed the controller you normally use allow setting of max amps and max top speed with a display connected? I see it is also a 22a controller.

Yes, the display I usually use allows several steps down to 50% of maximum current. Top speed can be restricted to any km/h value.

Screenshot_20220406-092707.png

The hubs I ordered actually are coming without rims so I will be lacing it on to a new rim. Do you have any tips on how to calculate the spoke lengths? I havn't picked a bike out yet so dont know what size rim yet.

Use the ebikes.ca spoke calculator. Hole pattern diameter is 145mm, flange spacing is 42.5mm, rightward offset is 8.2mm. Set it for cross-1 lacing, with all the spoke elbows of both flanges on the left sides of the flange (left side elbows out, right side elbows in). You'll get two different lengths, but buy all the same spoke length as close as possible to the longer size (if you use a double wall rim).
 
I too live in Canada and bought four of the jump bike wheels from BCH.com and am very pleased. Put one on the front wheel of a stone age very heavy 250 watt rear hub motor bike. Used a KT 7 tp 15 amp peak controller and display with a Bafang thumb throttle, which I had to hard wire because the connector pin outs in the connector did not match. In practice the jumper does beautifully will pull me along well (240 lbs), with no handling problems or quirks. Planning to use two of the jumpers on a reverse freighter trike and should be getting the displays before the weekend.
Battery Clearance house treated me very well, told them that one of the original two wheels was a bit sketchy, but that it fit my application for the freighter trike, and I would like to order another wheel for my two wheeler, (I had checked the fit and it was good). Made a deal with them that I would pay the freight on two wheels if they comped me the replacement wheel. They did comp me the wheel but would not take any money for the extra shipping on the other wheel.
PS. Now that the border is open will just have parts delivered to a US address & save $100 bucks shipping per wheel.
 
Well you got to be lucky on two parts
1) You are allowed in
2) You live close to the usa/canada border.


ynot said:
I too live in Canada and bought four of the jump bike wheels from BCH.com and am very pleased. Put one on the front wheel of a stone age very heavy 250 watt rear hub motor bike. Used a KT 7 tp 15 amp peak controller and display with a Bafang thumb throttle, which I had to hard wire because the connector pin outs in the connector did not match. In practice the jumper does beautifully will pull me along well (240 lbs), with no handling problems or quirks. Planning to use two of the jumpers on a reverse freighter trike and should be getting the displays before the weekend.
Battery Clearance house treated me very well, told them that one of the original two wheels was a bit sketchy, but that it fit my application for the freighter trike, and I would like to order another wheel for my two wheeler, (I had checked the fit and it was good). Made a deal with them that I would pay the freight on two wheels if they comped me the replacement wheel. They did comp me the wheel but would not take any money for the extra shipping on the other wheel.
PS. Now that the border is open will just have parts delivered to a US address & save $100 bucks shipping per wheel.
 
ynot said:
Now that the border is open will just have parts delivered to a US address & save $100 bucks shipping per wheel.

Up until recently I lived in Winnipeg, 1 hour from the boarder, and it was great for stuff that couldn't ship to Canada or was way more expensive to ship. Got many things shipped to parcel holding services just across the boarder and drove down. Now I live on Vancouver Island and a ferry ride makes that impractical. Shipping's a bitch for us Canadians!
 
Sorry about that, Winterpeg.
Ferry from Victoria on the ferry to the USA is still doable.
Many a drink looking across that strait.
Tell me, whats the best thing to do on Vancouver Island?

spaceship said:
Up until recently I lived in Winnipeg, 1 hour from the boarder, and it was great for stuff that couldn't ship to Canada or was way more expensive to ship. Got many things shipped to parcel holding services just across the boarder and drove down. Now I live on Vancouver Island and a ferry ride makes that impractical. Shipping's a bitch for us Canadians!
 
calab said:
Sorry about that, Winterpeg.
Ferry from Victoria on the ferry to the USA is still doable.
Many a drink looking across that strait.
Tell me, whats the best thing to do on Vancouver Island?

So you must be in Washington, eh?

Well, I just moved here in November and haven't even spent a summer here yet, so I have a lot to discover! That's the best part for me, a whole lot of new things to explore! Being from the prairies I am fascinated by the ocean and love walking the rocky beaches here and picking up fresh oysters during low tide. There are tons of amazing hiking trails through the forests, and lots of amazing biking trails so I hear. I need to find some easy trails, as I am not a hardcore mountain biker but enjoy cruising in nature. I also drive a motorcycle and it seems there are some great roads for riding too.

But, if I had to say the best thing to do on Vancouver Island is to simply NOT BE IN WINNIPEG :lol:
 
Gosh I remember buying a half gallon jugs of cider drink, got so hammered so many times on the rocks looking across and dreaming.
Galloping Goose Trail goes from Shwartz Bay ferry terminal down to Victoria and west along the coast. I have only done it partially from Shwartz Bay ferry terminal (Twassen is the other side) down to Victoria.

Plans have changed for me, I will be getting a vehicle and heading on up there in a month or two, I want to hit it for the summer as I want beaches, Tofino perhaps :lol: Playing it by ear but will have a general plan soon enough. Nainamo I heard is awesome, bringing along the ebike, sleeping in the car, moonlit nights hanging with the hippies in BC.
 
calab said:
Sorry about that, Winterpeg.
Ferry from Victoria on the ferry to the USA is still doable.
Many a drink looking across that strait.
Tell me, whats the best thing to do on Vancouver Island?

spaceship said:
Up until recently I lived in Winnipeg, 1 hour from the boarder, and it was great for stuff that couldn't ship to Canada or was way more expensive to ship. Got many things shipped to parcel holding services just across the boarder and drove down. Now I live on Vancouver Island and a ferry ride makes that impractical. Shipping's a bitch for us Canadians!

Hey and a little off topic.
Daughter lives in Victoria and she and family just got back for a visit to central western Mexico, my Mexican friends gave her a monster bottle of tequila for me which is sitting now in Victoria, a great thing to do there would be to get my paws on that bottle.
Since I live about 75K East of Osoyoos, the jug is off in my future.
Back to the Jumper topic, the last of the parts needed for my trike build are just south of the border so tomorrow will go pick up the displays and hopefully give the jump trike a test drive.
 
On to the battery:

I will be receiving several 10s3p packs for cell salvage. They contain LG 3Ah 18650 cells. I suppose I could try and charge them up as is and try using them with the existing BMS, or simply replace with a new 10s BMS and run them as 36v packs. Even though its more work I like the idea of disassembly and testing each cell then building the desired pack. Also I am leaning towards building a 52V pack, because my main ebike is running on a 52V battery and that would give me the option of using this battery to extend my range on that bike.

This shouldn't be an issue would it? It sounds like this motor can handle 52V, and I can program the controller to limit max speed and max current for desired performance and to not push too many watts.

For the sake of comparison say my options using roughly the same number of cells are 10s3p (36v9Ah = 324 Wh) or 14s2p (52v6Ah = 312Wh). Say they were both being used with the same motor pulling the same amount of watts, 350W, (not at the same time, just for theoretical comparison) would they perform relatively the same, or would there be a difference?
 
Op, BCH is top shelf retailer, I did a uber hub build (my 1st ever) with the wisdom from the guys here. It tuned out awesome.
The hub will work fine with the battery, I used a 4 ah, hoverboard tired 36v and my oldest daughter was able to ride it for few miles.

Please don't forget to get compatible brake sensors or levers and post pics :)
 
On to the battery. i have bought both the Battery Clearing House 30S-3P sticks using the LG MH1's and the Panasonic NCR18650BD, The sticks were long and unwieldy and hard to fit on my ebikes, but one will run the BCH bafamg motor. . I used a KT 20A controller. Here's one being tested on one of my ebikes. 17A controller and ebikeling motor.

PB270510.JPG

These stick batteries are odd. It's 102S-3P, but the stick uses 8 cell groups laid out end-to-end. They put eight 3P cells in each position. Then they distribute group 9 and 10 as single cells in six of those cell holder positions. Makes for some criss-cross wiring, but it's all implement in three printed wiring circuit boards. They're very well made batteries,

long-2.JPG

When delivered, one of the Panasonic packs was a nominal 36V and working. The other was bit low, below LVC, but recovered with a brief manual charge, I also had two LG1 packs, which both were about 33V. BMS was functional on all four.

I took the Panasonic packs, and after figuring out how the BMS was wired, I cut them in half, folded then, and reattached the BMS wires. I haven't done a full measurement, but I estimate a stick is good for 6-7AH. For me, that's around 15 miles on a 36V ebike..

Long Battery.JPG

A few words on the BMS. I can get 22A in peaks out of the battery, but it's a one MOSFET BMS. It probably won't last under a heavy load.

AS for the MH1 sticks, I took them apart. If you care about these things, I got 60 cells from two sticks and I checked the capacity of all of them with a Liitokala 500S tester. The average discharge capacity at 500 mah was about 3050 mah. The typical AC resisistance was .031 ohms. I built a 48V 13S-4P battery out of them, but haven't had a chance to run it on my ebike.

Couple of tips on taking them apart. There are several phillips head screws hidden in the plastic clam shell. Find them and unscrew them. The plastic shell is also glued to the cells. I used a heat gun to heat the plastic, soften the adhesive, and it came apart. I was able to cut the circuit boards where they are soldered to the cell holders. You'll see the joints in the second pictur above.

Then there is a steel rod that goes thru the entire stick. It's threaded at one end, and if you can spin it loose, it comes apart easy. I did that, and I also hacksawed it. I ran the pack down to 30V before I worked on it, but still had some sparks fly.


P2060647.JPG

Here's pics of the bike I have that uses the BCH motor. I used to run it with a pair of sticks, wrapped up in a bag under the frame. With a $45 motor, $40 battery, and $80 in controller/display, makes for cheap ebiking.


PC090588.JPG
.
 
That last pic caught my glaze
I had to go back and take a looksie's
The profile is nice with the bag battery flatter hanging off the top tube.
Aw yea I see now a front hub 500w'ish lets say, for me at 275 I need a minimum of 1500w

The background is the kinda trails I ride, paved, 2 lane 1 way each way and sometimes splits to ped to bikes.
 
calab said:
Aw yea I see now a front hub 500w'ish lets say, for me at 275 I need a minimum of 1500w

It's a geared motor. It pulls nice and hard at 48V x 22A. But it runs out of go at a lower speed than a comparably torquey direct drive motor.

You'd be surprised how strong it is. Keep in mind that these are from rental bikes that were running at 36V and not more than 15A. That was considered satisfactory for public use, and you're not 2X "the public" size.

I've built a mess of bikes with these motors, and almost all their owners run them at partial power.
 
I never did ride a geared hub motor yet, only been direct drives and mid drives.
I may have ridden an old geared brushed motor I burnt the brushes within a ride or two.
That was the first round, a preview before the big melt of another motor years later.

I like the feel of some get up and go right from the get go, even if its from 0 to 20 or 25mph.

What tubes and tires were the Bafang bike rental companies using?

You can't beat the price for a hub or hub wheel.
The size is pretty good to, you can hide it behind a 200+ disk rotor, paint the hub black and your styling.
 
calab said:
What tubes and tires were the Bafang bike rental companies using?

A few came with Schwalbe Marathon 26 x 2 (not the Plus kind), but most of them came with a street treaded Kenda tire that seems a little better armored than the Marathons. If I ever damage or wear one out, I'll cut through it to see what's going on inside there.
 
They probably had a team of A.I. computers and statiticians to figure out the price point to spend on tires and tubes.
Marathon Plus $60
Regular Marathon $35
Bulk discount say 20%
Be nice to know how many hub motors in total, for that company. A thousand or 5k or 25k+, then for tubes and tires double it.
 
calab said:
They probably had a team of A.I. computers and statiticians to figure out the price point to spend on tires and tubes.

Oh yeah, tubes. Schwalbe tires had Schwalbe tubes inside. With a metal Schrader valve stem, and Kenda tire had Kenda tubes also with a threaded metal Schrader stem. They are both a solid notch above the usual commodity tube, which is nice.
 
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