Motobecane DS Fantom, BMC 600W torque and now Lipo build

kfong

100 kW
Joined
Sep 2, 2008
Messages
1,957
Location
SE Michigan, USA
This is a build I started last year, but ended up stopping till I found a motor that would pretty much keep my bike intact. That build ended evolving into a Cyclone motor on an old solid frame bike, soon to evolve yet again into a Tidal Force frame with front suspension.
http://www.endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=6348

I really enjoyed riding this bike in its original form and didn’t really want to modify it, unless it was an enhancement. It took me a while to pick out the motor, since I needed a motor with lots of torque for hill climbing. When I heard about the 1000watt BMC motor, I waited for it. But the reports I kept hearing didn’t sit well with me. From what I could decipher, the 1000w motor only comes alive if you put more than 48 volts. If you don’t plan to run such a high voltage setup, there is very little difference between the 600watt and the 1000watt. My plan was to run it at 36volt to 40 volts. It's really due to the amount of batteries I can fit in the triangle portion of the bike. The other thing I heard was, controllers were having a hard time with the 1000watt motor. The current recommended controller is the Kelly that alone turned me off on the motor since I wanted a compact and light setup for the trails. Another thing, is the gears are the same for both motors. I was thinking the 1000watt would be more durable, but that is not the case. My over all goal is to keep the bike under 50lbs. I wanted 40, but it didn’t look possible.

I finally got my BMC motor. It's the 600 watt torque version. The phase wires look too thin, so I plan to beef them up, once I check everything out. I'm disappointed with the wheel build. It was not dished properly. Actually it was not dished at all! This is a common thing that bike shops do for rear tires. I picked up the wheel from Ilia; He needs to get a better wheel builder. Looks like I will have to find a place local to redo it. I was hoping I didn’t have to deal with this part of the build. Has anyone done there own dishing, how difficult is it? Here are pictures of the wheel mounted on the bike. You can see the wheel is not centered and is off to the left a noticeable amount. This is really unacceptable, the spokes also seem like they are not tensioned enough. My original wheel has a higher pitch.

Here are picture of the cycle analyst, the 35amp/72 volt crystalyte controller and my CNC battery tray. I will anodize it black once the parts are finalized. The controller will be mounted below the batteries. Trying to keep the weight close to the center of the bike. I originally was going with A123's but thanks to Doctorbass, I have 2 sets of konions for this bike. The cool, thing is the battery tray I plan to build will allow me to swap out packs. This means I can make a custom A123 pack as well. If I add a rear rack, I can set it up for long distance as well as speed. For now I'm focused on keeping it light for trail riding.
 

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Does anyone know of a source for a hall effect half twist throttle that will work with Shimano Rapid Fire speed trigger shifters. All the ones I see are just too wide and get in the way of the index shifting. My current plan to mod the current throttle, remove the voltage indicator and see if that gets me the space I need. If not I will have to create my own custom throttle.

The good news is I was able to install the 9speed freewheel I picked up from ebikes.ca. I will only need to add a spacer to allow for clearance of the freewheel. I was concerned that the overall spacing needed was too wide. I am happy to report that the Motobecane’s can be setup with BMC motors and 9 speed cassettes. I wanted the 11tooth sprocket in particular so I can assist as much as possible.

Currently, I need to CNC a bottom plate for the controller as well as some custom Torque arms. I was quite happy with how the battery tray turned out, I still might try to remove even more metal to lighten it even further. It's pretty solid as it is now.
 
Took the motor to REI, they have a pretty good bike repair shop with full time mechanics. They dished and tightened the spokes in one day. I was able to pick it up later that evening. I t costs me $22 for the fix since I was a member. Ilia was kind enough to reimburse me for the repair.

Looking around, most of the throttles I see are just too wide. I decided to just modify the one I have since it looked possible after taking it apart. I knew I could get rid of the voltage indicator since I have the cycle analyst for that. Besides, the indicator would have been useless with my battery setup. The best way I found to take down the plastic is just to put it on a belt sander and sand away. I have it mounted on the bike in the picture. The rapid shifter clears and all the controls feel great. The area I took down was where the indicator had been. The throttle now is actually upside down. You can see the three wires that were cut for the indicator The only drawback is the exit wires are now shown above the bar. I can live with this since blends in ok. I should be able to pot over the opeining, once I finalize things.
 

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Kfong said "I finally got my BMC motor. It's the 600 watt torque version. The phase wires look too thin, so I plan to beef them up, once I check everything out. I'm disappointed with the wheel build. It was not dished properly. Actually it was not dished at all! This is a common thing that bike shops do for rear tires. I picked up the wheel from Ilia; He needs to get a better wheel builder. Looks like I will have to find a place local to redo it. I was hoping I didn’t have to deal with this part of the build. Has anyone done there own dishing, how difficult is it? Here are pictures of the wheel mounted on the bike. You can see the wheel is not centered and is off to the left a noticeable amount. This is really unacceptable, the spokes also seem like they are not tensioned enough. My original wheel has a higher pitch."

It's not difficult to dish a wheel. Simply start at the stem hole and tighten the spokes on the side you want it to move towards. Say one-quarter turn at a time. You should loosen the spokes on the other side an equal amount prior to the tightening sequence. If they are all loose to start with you may want to tighten them all evenly first. Only takes a bit of practice to get it down then you can do your own. Knowledge is power.
Duane
 
Yeah, sounds easy enough. Next time I will definitely try to dish it myself. Just glad it’s done now and I can put my skills in more familiar territory. I need to get back to machining parts for the torque arm and the controller. I’ve been riding my cyclone setup during the good weather we’ve been having lately and have not been able to do much with the build; at least I’ve got the throttle worked out. Hit another snag. I cannot get one of the screws out holding the motor plate. I want to change out the phase wire. I might have to just wire it up as is for now, but I know how difficult it will be to remove the freewheel afterwards.

It was a great buying from Ilia. I would buy from him again. Very happy with the setup.
 
Often if the screw is to tight to remove a large flat ended punch, near the size of the screw head, can be offered up to the screw head and a good rap with a hammer will loose things up and make it possible to remove. Great that you can machine things makes it easier to get it on the road. Good luck on your build and take your time as your life depends on it.
Duane
 
I gave up on the phase wires. I did finally get the screw out, but it was a long process. The BMC’s now use “C” clips to secure the motor, but for some reason I was not able to get the ring with magnets to slide out. Tried tapping on it lightly, but decided it’s not worth the trouble. I will wait till it actually requires repair. I did add more lithium grease to the gears. Time to move on to the mounts. I would of taken some pictures of the internals, but my hands were pretty greasy from the process.

Note: from reading other people attempt at the phase wires. The newer BMC are much harder to do this mod to. I would not recommend you try it unless it actually needs repair. The best approach is to keep the wires coming out of the motor as short as possible. The phase wires are Teflon coated so they should be able to take the heat. Keeping them short will is the best approach currently.
 
I just completed the battery mounting system. It took a while to draw out and CNC on my mill. The plates are curved to conform to the 2" tubing. Very solid, happy with the final results. Once I have things finalized, I will get it cleaned up and anodized black. The controller is mounted to the bottom of the tray. Next is to build up the Konion packs so they fit in the triangle.
 

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Finally hooked up the setup, had to be sure everything is working before I start to hardwire it all. Noticed the throttle wasn’t working, realize the board I removed used the ground wire. If you notice in the earlier pictures, I ended up with 3 wires from the removal of the voltage board. The colors are 2 black wires and one dark blue wire. The black wire is ground and ground for the hall sensor. I needed to connect these two wires together. The dark blue wire is the battery voltage. I ended up putting heat shrink on this to avoid having it short to ground or anything else.

Everything checked out, still have to verify the speed sensor. The thing I did notice while the bike is off the ground and power is off. The wheel has quite a bit of resistance. I notice this even before I mounted the motor. Is this typical of BMC motors? I’m wondering if the bearings are bad, or if the tolerance is off. I can spin the tire, but it only goes around 2 times and drags to a halt. I have clearance for the freewheel, so that isn’t an issue. I expected the wheel to spin freely for a while, but perhaps this is normal for such a motor?
 
My BMC 600 (90 miles on the build) spins more free now than when new but went around twice as many times as yours. Are you spinning it the right direction? I did it wrong at first and it does not spin free backwards. It's new could be simple like grease just needs to spread around or I pushed mine a bit faster to start. Unless it's making noise I doubt you have a problem.
 
Looks like this is normal, since Ilia confirmed it as well. I do recall there was a rubber seal when I took the motor apart. I should have greased the axle where that seal came in contact. I still might do that since I have to take it down one more time to put in the torque arms. The main thing is everything checks out and is running great. The throttle response is really good. I’m impressed with the Cycle Analyst, a definite must have component. I can now cut down the wires so they fit to the bike. The current shunt value I ended up was 1.27mohms. Currently working on the battery packs. I will be milling out battery connector plates.
 
I have not yet installed my CA, second battery pack, headlight or the brake light so lots to do yet. No mill to make cool brackets and mounts with, as you have done though, so will have to find something close to what I want and mod it with a file and other hand tools as usual. Frame is not round so difficult to make stuff fit good. You are doing some nice werq I’m anxious to see the finished product.
 
I finally started on the batteries. I had to CNC battery connectors out of .01 mil copper. 2 of the shiny ones in the picture have been dipped in a solder pot to pre tin them so they look a bit messy. Copper oxidizes so pre tinning is needed to assure a good contact. So far I'm happy with the results. Be sure to put a layer of insulation between packs if you do it this way.
 
I've been busy with other projects, but back on track. I wasn't happy with the battery build. The insulation around the konions is rather thin and can easily be punctured. I ended up taking them apart and added more insulation. Kapton tape was put near the edges and bidirectional packaging tape down the center for support. The part that took the longest was cleaning off the tape residue left on the Makita packs. Next up is to secure the packs to the bike. The first pack pictured will fit in the frames triangle. The second pack will be used for distance riding and will be mounted on a seat post rack. Can anyone recommend a strong enough rear seatpost rack for batteries? The pack will weight 8 pounds, but if I take it in the trails I would be getting a lot of stress on the post. The battery configuration is 10S8P for the triangle and rear seat post rack. This would give me 24Ahrs. This is plenty of distance for riding. I only plan to use the triangle pack for most of my rides while the added rear pack for trail exploration and traveling long distances.
 

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I had to do some more battery reconfiguration. The triangle area is proving to be tighter than I had planned due to the cables and rear suspension. I wanted to be sure both had plenty of clearance. Here is the final layout. Next is to secure it to the G10 board and mounts.
 

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I've been busy with other projects as well as riding my Diamondback as much as I can in the trails before the weather here gets too cold. One of them was upgrading my CNC micromill so it could cut stainless steel. I had to do some research on this to be sure it was even possible. As soon as I was able to get the right feed rate and cut. It became apparent the mill needed more torque. The stepper motors we have been using to cut aluminum were no longer enough for stainless. The stainless steel used was 403. This is the torque spacer I cut out. I will be cutting torque arms as well to stack up with the spacers. It looks rough since I went through it with a file to get rid of the sharp edges. It fits perfectly on the Motobecane. I wanted the torque arms stainless since I will be riding the bike mostly in the trails.
 

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Finally found some time to work on the bike again. I’m still having fun on my Cyclone so the priority on this hasn’t been urgent. The weather here in Mich. is starting to get cold. I rode a few days ago on my Cyclone ebike in the trails in 45 degs, but we will be getting 40deg weather and below now. Here are pictures of the battery mounted on the tray. I used Kevlar tape to secure the bottom section. The finished pack will be wrapped in heatshink or tape. For trail riding, I intend on having the pack as secure as possible. Had enough crashes on my Cyclone and know this will be very important if you don’t want any electrical issues.

You can see how it will be secured to the bike with bolts. It should be able to take a good crash. I plan to build an outer shell out of carbon fiber to hide the batteries. It will keep the rain and dirt out, provide some crash protection and match with the color of the bike.

I plan to make an A123 pack for high current hill climbing, the tray will allow me to easily swap the pack out. There is also a konion pack being build for the rear rack for distance riding, seen in earlier photos. Having a Topeak seatpost rack ordered. Had to remove the controller for now. Will be anodizing the alumumin black as well.
 

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indeed, nice work both on the pack build and fitting, makes a world of difference having them there, the bike will handle much better than a rack mount.

D
 
very very nice konion pack.fits perfect.going to look good with carbon cover. :D
 
Thanks, guys. More progress. The weather here is just too cold so I had to bring the bike indoors to work on. This is good, since I’m more motivated to complete it. I CNCed a template had to go through several revisions. It’s a tight fit and I had to make sure the rear shock had clearance as well as clearance for the cables. The nice thing about having a CNC is I could tweek the design till it fits. It practically drops in now. Here are pictures of the templates and the final foam block. I still have more sanding and need to prime the surface. I plan to make a mold from the block. It’s a bit more work but it will allow me to make more than one battery cover, and the results will end up fitting and looking better.
 

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That is going to be a beautiful enclosure! What will it be made out of? Fiberglass? Carbon Fiber? I admire your patience and attention to detail, outstanding results!
 
Qwiksand said:
That is going to be a beautiful enclosure! What will it be made out of? Fiberglass? Carbon Fiber? I admire your patience and attention to detail, outstanding results!

beast775 said:
very very nice konion pack.fits perfect.going to look good with carbon cover. :D

Guess I should read before I post! Can't wait to see it in carbon :twisted:
 
I picked up a rear rack over the holidays. It took me a while to find one that fits the rear packs without being too big. I had to get a seat post rack due to the rear suspension.
The Topeak rack system chosen is capable of 20lbs. The batteries are around 8lbs. I like the rack system. It seems sturdy enough to handle the weight. I am worried about the rack swaying. This was mentioned in a couple of mountain bike forums. Most seat post racks have this problem if the weight in the back gets too heavy. I’ve heard some using bungee cords to reduce this. I really won’t know till I get the bike ready to ride. I'll have to wait till I finish the CF covers before I wire the packs. Need to add an isolation diode as well. I did pick up an electric relay recently. Thanks DoctorBass for the heads up in the for sale forum. Hopefully I will be able fit it into this build.
 

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