New Requirement? And What About...

[philf]

As I await some indication that my goodies will be shipped sometime soon, I've been lurking in the forum here.  All of a sudden, it appears that I've had to make myself a registered user in order to continue to access the site.  Is this a glitch, or an indication that something more sinister is afoot?

I'm in Canada (Ontario), and ordered a 26" rear wheel kit directly from the GM site via PayPal.  I was promptly copied on the instruction from Philip Yao to "smartbikecanada", in BC, to ship (a week ago), and have since had no further correspondence.  Being a guy who makes a statistically significant number of online purchases in any given month, this strikes me as an unusual process and just a bit unsettling.  I sent the Canadian outfit a note to be sure that all was well, and haven't heard back from them, either.  In fairness, this was just before the weekend and the original "copy" from Philip came only last Tuesday.

The smartbikecanada site doesn't appear to have been updated since last November (one of the "gotchas" of posting "news" on your site - it looks stale if you don't keep it up).

Anything I should know, here?  I realize that the North American "distributors" of GM conversion kits appear to be pretty... "low key", is probably a polite way of putting it..., but the communication (automated or otherwise) seems weak when compared to similar online retail experiences.  I'm already keen to order a second kit, without having seen the thing work yet, but wonder if there is a more positive way to get an order processed.

Cheers!

[Draggin]

Hang in there Ive dealt with them on a number of items.  They really came through in the end.  I don't think they hang over their email.  I had to send them a reminder once.  Putting in your order through their Smartbikescanada website might get a quicker response.  I think they run out of kits on ocassion.  They may be waiting for a delivery.  Having said that you should be able to get the DHL tracking number.   

[philf]

Thankies for the feedback.

In all fairness, and to make sure that my earlier post doesn't give anyone else second thoughts about ordering one of these things, I did get a message from Brandon at sbc today.  My kit actually shipped on Friday (before I posted my earlier message), and they gave me the DHL tracking number.  The obvious assumption, based on the size and weight of one of these kits and the low shipping fee charged, is that this is a "ground" shipment, and will take about 4 business days to make it from BC to Ontario.  Should see it by Thursday of this week, is my guess.

I'll be sure to share anything noteworthy as I go through the experience of getting this puppy up and running.  My motivation for playing with e-bike conversion is probably different from that of most people - I purchased two fairly upscale Giant "comfort" bikes a couple of years ago for myself and my GF.  My GF has MS, and we quickly discovered that stressing her body (with long treks on a bike, for example - and especially in the heat) exacerbated whatever symptoms she might be experiencing at the time.  I'm 48, and in good enough shape to ride fair distances without thinking twice about it - but the last couple of years, due to the MS, my rides with the GF have been limited to the odd low-speed toodle about the neighbourhood.  Ultimately, this has resulted in the bikes just staying parked in the garage, unless I get inspired to go for a decent trek on my own.

Anyways, I'm hoping that - with the assist - the GF can keep me company for a ride of reasonable length without having to worry about keeping up or triggering any sort of flare-up.  Or, worse, experiencing those moments when her energy has completely flagged and we realize we're still 10km from home. 

Meanwhile, the more I read about these kits, the more I think I'm going to immediately order another one - it just seems like too much fun for such a small investment  :-)

[Draggin]

My buddy at work just built a EVOX with a Bionx for his wife with MS.  I guess the first time she passed him, the grin on her face was worth the price of admission.  She had a pretty rough six months as she had problems taking needles.  I guess she has come round a bit as not only is she biking but I think also the run for MS.  Your gonna love your GM almost as much as your GF.  Make sure you read the instructable about the axle and dropouts on the forks.  There is a surprising amount of torque in these units.  And be carefull.  I went off the edge of the pavement last week and when I hit the sand left from winter I did the biggest speed wobble ever.  The speed wobble wasnt the scarry part, it was the guardrail and the 30 foot drop down to Lake Ontario that I thought about for a while after.  4 days for shipping might be a bit optomistic, I think more like 2weeks.  But then mine came general delivery.  SBC doesn't give the batteries with the kit anymore.  What you gonna do for a battery?

[philf]

Tell me about the needles...  The GF has to do 3 of 'em a week, and I'm not convinced they're really DOING anything...

Falling into Lake Ontario?  Sounds like we might have the same opportunity.  I live just off Lakeshore at the west end of the lake :-)

As for batteries, I'm going to start with SLAs because they're cheap and I happened to have a few kicking around for a solar project that I never finished.  I have three each of 9Ah and 12Ah units.  The 9Ah units, at 3/4 the capacity of the larger units, are exactly 2/3 the size and weight of the 12Ah ones.  Will evaluate runtime of both packs when I have a working kit.

SAYAL Electronics is a good source for SLAs.  Currently (no pun intended), they have used ones that have only been used briefly in a backup-type of application (never, or at least rarely, deep cycled).  Most of them are 7.2Ah to 9Ah units, but they've been stored fully charged, and they're selling 'em off at $11.95 each.  I intend to try some of these, as well.  The recycling guys at the Halton landfill are going to give me some looks when I ultimately show up with a few hundred pounds of dead batteries...

[philf]

Ugh.

Whole family was over here today (advance birthday celebration), and I went to show 'em the bike mod.

It was raining, which meant nobody could really go out for a ride (technically, they COULD - but I just got the bike gleaming clean :-).  Didn't matter, anyways - when I picked the back of the bike up and gave it the throttle to show everyone the wheel spin...  it merely spun slowly, in a juddering sort of way...

Controller?  Hall Effect sensors?

*sigh*

Further diagnostics will tell.

I may just park it until my second wheel kit arrives (having parts handy that permit quick swap-outs is  far more time effective than circuit-level testing...  Especially when you haven't a shred of documentation or schematics).

[Draggin]

     Philf  sorry to hear about the problem.  Look back at shakkan's post from a couple of days ago.  Perhaps he could let us know what he found out about the shuddering problem.  Draggin   

[shakkan]

hi philf-sounds like what happened to my motor-did a test on the hall sensors and one of them is not working.stripped it down to day and after some pulling and digging I have got out the hall sensor holder and im about to connect new ones.
It took me ages to find a seller here in the uk but have got 18 ss40a-smallest amount I could get.
if you test yours and cant get any I will send you 3
glenn

[shakkan]

just fitted new hall sen. and connected up then...........nothing.Bummer.
not sure what to do next
surley not 2 controllers that have failed on me or have they??
not sure philip will send me another replacement even if I ask nicely?
do g/m sell the controllers on there own?
are the regen cont. any good?
any idea anyone??

[Draggin]

     This seems to be a comon problem.  Back on page five chris talks about juddering and found the power leads shorted together.  I had the same problem.  Incidently shorted power leads made my hall sensors seem faulty.  There is a link in that thread that goes to endless sphere and a shematic of a crystalite (very similar to GM).  Don't give up you can do this.  smartbikes does does sell the controller separate and there cheap.  Email them and they'll get back to you in a couple of weeks.  Andre 

[philf]

I was pretty sure I posted the result of my Hall sensor problem, but I don't see it here and can't find it in my history.  Maybe I walked away from the computer without posting, or slid my comments into one of my other megaposts in another thread.

Anyways, just to keep this in context, here's what had happened...

The six pin Molex-like connector that brings the five hall sensor leads to the controller has a lot of play in the way the pins are held fast.  When I had last plugged the thing together, one of the pins went around the outside of the connector body, instead of into its intended receptacle on the controller side (yup, there's room inside of the plastic connector to allow this - nasty, nasty, nasty).

When you pull the connector apart, there is enough play that the pins all woggle around and nothing really looks wrong.  Until you put your glasses on (getting old, here) and have a closer look.  THEN you see the pin that looks slightly warped at the bottom.  Once it's that shape, it'll keep missing it's intended slot every time.  I had that connector unplugged a number of times and looked right at it - never saw the problem because of the way the connector is built.

I quick straightening with the tweezers, and all is well...

BUT - now I had a mitt full of Hall effect sensors that I ordered from DigiKey before seeing this.  Good to have hanging around, I guess.   I bought a dozen of 'em, which got the price down to around $1.25 each, or somesuch.

Cheers!

[emarty]

I had exactly the same problem. Put my bike kit carfully together, tied all the wires down.  Went to test it and got ziltch!  Took everything apart and could find no problems.  Then I carefully looked at the hall plug going to the motor.  One pin (red wire) ever so slightly off.  I centered it with tweezers and centered all the other pins while I had everything apart.  Plugged everything in again and WOW, we had lift off.  You really do have to do a good QC on these kits before you tie everything down.