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New bike, what would you mod first?

A

ashwright

100 mW
Joined
Oct 1, 2011
Messages
42
Location
Brisbane, Australia
Hi,

I have been browsing this forum for about 2 weeks now, there are some interesting ideas floating around.

I have just bought a new ebike, and been on a couple of rides. This is my first ebike, and am enjoying it. However I have already started thinking about what I want to change, to make it mine. I am good with electronics, but not so much with mechanics.

The bike has a 200W Tonaro motor at the pedals. A 36V 10Ah Lithium Polymer battery (which has a model number matching RPC.com.tw), and a generic controller, labeled 36V, 15A max, 7A Rated, 29.5V Low Volt Protect. and throttle 1.2v-4.4v.
It also has 8 gears.

So I have been looking and thinking what do I want to change?
- I don't want to buy a new battery just yet, so going stick to 36V. However when this battery starts to go, thinking about an upgrade to 48V.
- I like the pedel assist, but wondering if I can improve it.
- Thinking it would be nice to get 15A@36V or so, rather then the 7A@36V.
- A Cycle Analyst seems useful.
- and the Nuvinci CVT sounds just cool. (An automatic transmission on a bike :)

So I want to ask the question. What would you change first? And any ideas?
 
The motor (at least 600watt) battery (at least 50v 15ah) controller..12fet Lyen Infineon...and a cycle analyst...

KiM
 
In general, a prebuilt ebike is not so easy to modify. Yours has a bottom bracket motor that drives the pedals? I'm not familiar with those. It might be able to take 48v though. Opening the controller box for a peek inside is a starting point. If the capacitors that look like little cans inside say 63v on them, they 48v is likely to be ok.

But even left stock voltage, more range at 36v is always good.

AJ's list is a good one, especially if you also add a nicer bike to the list. In other words, building a really good second bike might be a much better approach than trying to make a ford into a ferrari. Lots of good ideas in the picture thread, for all kinds of uses, long distance commute, fast commute, off road, etc.

I resisted getting a CA stupidly long. Now I know better. It's the first thing you should get, if you want to know what effect any modification had. Really good for spotting bad things before you take off riding. Sometimes a battery you thought was charged wasn't.
 
Yep. what they said. Bigger motor, new controller, new bike to put it all on. Cycle analyst is awesome, but get the controller first that can handle a direct plug in CA, as they are twice as usefull as a stand alone.


But untill then, enjoy what you have. Modding it will be pointless. Spending that time and money later on a high performance bike will make you much happier in the end. So ride what you have and learn what it can do, and it will give you a better idea what you want in your next bike. Everyone eventualy gets another bike. :D
 
So we have more power, power, power ... and a Cycle Analyst. :)
New bike and a CA.
and a new controller and a CA.

Starting to see a pattern here :)

I think I will order a CA. Any recommendations on which controller to pair it with? Thinking 36-48V @ 15-20Amax (Don't want to cook the motor). It looks like Lyen's smaller controller will do that.


Still wondering if there are any ways the pedal assist can be modded. Was thinking perhaps you could have the motor speed match the pedal cadence. So as you pedal slower the motor slows down. And if you want to go a bit faster, just pedal faster (not harder), and have the motor take the work out.
 
Hey ashright, looks like we bought a couple o duff bikes mate. Not to worry seem to be plenty others on the same wheels and mebe theres a few out there who dont get the point of a crank drive . Derestricted it should do 20mph+ and a throttle, which I havnt yet fitted, will be nice. Tendency to do a wheelie up steep hills is a mixed blessing I guess. Let us know how u go eh?
 
Well, maybe you got the wrong impression. I think the bike as is, fits certain niche very very well. But making it fit another niche is going to be costly and somewhat difficult.

So we advise the purchase of a kit that fills the other niche quite well without modifications . Rather than trying to wring a few more watts out of a motor designed for low watts. And then finding out those extra watts just murdered your small low c rate battery.

See what we are getting at? You now have a VW bug. It does the bug thing great. But you can take that bug and spend 10 thou ubgrading it into a fast bug. Or for 6 grand you can just go buy a used subaru. The subaru will off road better than a fast bug, and It's water cooled engine descended from the bug engine can have it going down the highway at 100 mph on cruise controll. What would you rather have? the modified bug, or the improved design of the subaru.

Get the CA. you won't regret it. I have two of the stand alone ones since the majority of my controllers don't have the plug for the full featured direct plug in type. But don't spend too much money on trying to upgrade your current bike, sell it, or keep it as a spare. I suggest just keep it, and ride it for now. But think about a more powerful kit for next christmas, so you can power up next spring. By more power I don't mean crazy power like many of us love. I just mean a decent 1000w kit and a 15 ah battery for it. Then you have a bike that climbs, and doesn't run out of juice on longer rides. Then you have a truly useful ebike that can substitute for a car a lot more.

Duhh, just realized you are south. Now IS riding season. That puts a bit more urgency into getting it riding better soon. No prob if you got money.
 
ashwright said:
I think I will order a CA. Any recommendations on which controller to pair it with? Thinking 36-48V @ 15-20Amax (Don't want to cook the motor). It looks like Lyen's smaller controller will do that.
Still wondering if there are any ways the pedal assist can be modded. Was thinking perhaps you could have the motor speed match the pedal cadence. So as you pedal slower the motor slows down. And if you want to go a bit faster, just pedal faster (not harder), and have the motor take the work out.
Click to expand...

If you order a CA, make sure that you tell them you want the large screen one. Some sellers are selling the old small screen one at the same price. Be careful.
You idea about linking the power to the cadence is no good. I know because I have some controllers that work like that.: You come to a hill, so your cadence goes down, you lose power, so you have to change down a few gears; you cadence goes up and so does the power, so you accelerate and can't keep up with the pedalling; you change up and lose power so your bike slows down again. In summary, you spend all your time changing up and down and it's impossible to pedal at a speed you want.

You didn't say what you want to improve on the bike. Do you want more speed, comfort, range, reliability, power, looks or what? Your controller can already give 15 amps, even though it's rated at 7amps. If you want more current (climbing power), you can add a bit of solder to the shunt in the controller. You should be able to get it up to 20 amps, but then you're taking a bit much from the batteries, which will compromise their long life and the range. When your batteries have had it, you can get a 10.4aH pack of 12s lipos for a nominal 44v (actually circa 48v). They'll give about 5mph more and are able to provide as much current as you want from your soldered controller. If you want more than 20 amps, you need a new controller.

Sorry, I forgot that you had the Tonaro, so what I said about speed doesn't apply. You just get more power. To use the power to get more speed, you remove the little magnet from the rear wheel.
 
Biger, programmable controller and twist grip throttle. That is the way to go for more power and better control of it. When upping the voltage for more speed, chose batteries for better C rate, so you can add speed and power altogether.

Then, you might want better brakes and tires, to stand the new performance. Upgrading is a chain reaction: The more you upgrade performance, the more components you'll want to upgrade to match it.
 
Heavy modding, particularly BB drive systems will rarely work out well. Sure, do a few simple, easily reversed mods to tweak what you've got but usually best to accept it is what it is, learn from what you can and move on.

Using these great suggestions, 'suggest you assemble a nice kit based eBike. At least you can either keep or sell what you don't use instead of a hacked-up bike that's worth little to nothing.

I had a mild Panasonic pedelec for years, the temptation was strong to mod it and do this or that - I'm so glad I left it pretty much alone and enjoyed it for what it was. It sold for more than paid when it was time to part ways.
 
Thanks for all the ideas. That is why I asked a broad question.

The bike currently does 28-29km/h on the flat, with no pedaling (tested last night). Pedaling only adds about 3-4 km/h, as I have run out of gears. Which I am happy with. We have a 200W legal limit here, so I am not interested in going too high power. I also don't like riding above 40km/h, as it is too hard to stop when a truck pulls out in front of you. (Which has happened, didn't hit it, but I ended up flat on the road.)

The bike already has a half twist throttle. And is not speed limited. (We don't have speed limit in Aus, just a power limit.) I am pretty happy with the performance, it is able to easily climb all the hills we have around here (slowly, in the lowest gear).

I was thinking about keeping most mods, electrical (controller, battery) or standard bike parts (brakes, gears, tires etc.). I don't want to change the frame or motor. (If I need a new motor, will go a kit on a new bike.)

Could of questions:
- What does BB drive mean?
- The battery is currently 10s LiPo (36V) 10Ah. Do you know what the discharge rate (C) might be?
 
I have a similar model (R Martin R10 / Tonaro Big Hit) with the same drive though they mark it 250w in the us. One upgrade I've been looking at is an SRAM DualDrive (24 speed rear: 8 speed casette, 3 speed in hub.) Convieniently, while the BB drive limits tinkering with the motor, it makes rear wheel changes easy.
 
ashwright said:
Well ...
36V@7A = 250W
36V@15A = 540W

So I am already a bit over :oops: But I have not changed anything, so it is not my fault. :)
Click to expand...
I have an Aprilia which is very similar but has a brushed motor (not sure about yours) driving the bottom bracket, with pedelec only control. Originally 250W 24V, I changed the controller to a "350W" model (limited to 28A), changed the battery to 8S LiPo (from NiMH) and installed a thumb throttle (didn't like the twist type). The performance increased at least double and made it 4x more usable.

If I were you I would just get a 30 or 40A controller with a throttle of your choice and suck it and see.

Cheers,
GT
 
I think I am going to look for a programmable controller to pair with the CA.

Any recommendations? I have been looking into Lyen's, just wondering if there are any others worth investigating.
 
For price and service an infinion from Lyen is hard
To go past, if you're dead set with staying in the vicinity of
Legal power limits a 6fet would do the job.
I wouldn't stress top much about the 200watt limit though
I'm also a tad over myself but haven't had any issues with the Police..

KiM
 
I wouldn't stress top much about the 200watt limit though
Click to expand...

Not so much concerned about the 200w limit, more that I don't want to change the motor. So I don't think running 2kW though it is a good idea.

gtadmin has a different motor (mine is brushless) but said 28A@28.8V=806W, and there is a review of the Bighit on this site, running at 20A@48V=960W (Apparently a little hot).

So I think I will look for a controller around 20-30A@36-48V, where I can program the current limit. This should suit me find for this bike.
 
If you are on a budget, I wouldn't slap a lyens 21 fet 40 amp on it. Too likely to melt down, and besides, it will murder your current battery. But a 20 amp controller from lyens would be a decent approach if you insist.

Still think that the really low power ready made bikes are a poor platform for modifications. Just like I like my subaru a lot better than the modified bugs I once owned.
 
I did ask this before, does anyone know?

The battery is currently 10s LiPo (36V) 10Ah. (AE7288195PMHRE). Do you know what the discharge rate (C) might be?
 
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