throttle wires

[Thomas]

Should the motor work if only the 3 wire black throttle connector is connected?
I get no power with only the throttle black connectors plugged in.
With the 2 wire LED yellow connected I get battery gauge indicator.

Is the brown two wire connector required to be connected... if so to what exactly.
sorry to be dense, but I'm unclear what the brown connector cable is supposed to be connected to.
Can the red button on the twist Throttle be left disconnected?

tom c

[Leslie]

So we understand what is happening can you explain to us what you are doing and maybe provide some pictures of the wires.

You need to test voltages on those wires.  The battery indicator wire can be dangerous to the throttle IC if it has been connected even once.

No need to worry though as its just a throttle.  Unless you start short circuiting things, your controller is fine. 

Test all wires from your battery ground point as black could mean something else.

If any wire is 42v or 52v it is for the battery indicator. Always connect the high voltage wire last and make sure it is kept away from your work..

The throttle needs power to operate and it is 4.8v.

Without more information your question is hard to answer as we could be wrong and cause you more problems.

[Thomas]

So... my simple question is:
Should the motor work if only the 3 wire black throttle connector is connected?
That refers to the wiring harness of the GM Magic Pie II DIY kit and the black connectors being that of the Throttle cable and the matching connector on the tangle of connectors leading to the 8 pin connector.

So, the question is given the wiring of the harness: should the motor work with only the 3 pin throttle wires connected?
Mine doesn't.

Given that the gauge shows a change just before the battery shuts down, The gauge seems unnecessary except to indicate power on.

Therefore, I would simply connect the throttle, and brakes for regen.
But, no go with only these two connected.
Why's that?

many thanks,

Tom c

[Bikemad]

Hi Tom,

So... my simple question is:
Should the motor work if only the 3 wire black throttle connector is connected?

Yes, you motor should work with just the three pin throttle connector connected (with the battery plugged in and switched on).
If it's not working, you may have a poor connection somewhere in the wiring, or a problem with the controller or battery.

It might be a good idea to check that the motor side of your throttle wiring is working correctly by doing a simple test with the harness disconnected.
A small piece of wire (reshaped paper clips work well for this) inserted between pins no 4 and 6 on the motor socket should make the motor run at full speed:



Make sure the wheel is raised off the ground and that the power is switched ON before you insert the wire.
Be very careful to only put it into the correct holes or you could damage the controller or wiring.

If the motor spins correctly, this will indicate that the battery, speed controller and the throttle wiring in the motor harness are all working correctly. Therefore the fault must be somewhere in the main harness or the throttle control itself (or one of the connectors).

If the motor does not spin when 4 and 6 are linked, you will do some further testing to pinpoint the fault.

This diagram shows the wiring on my early Magic Pie and should help you identify the wires to check for poor connections.
Please note that the red, orange and black wires that link to more than one plug, may not necessarily be connected in the same sequence as shown here:


Click image to view full size.

Given that the gauge shows a change just before the battery shuts down, The gauge seems unnecessary except to indicate power on.

The battery indicator gauges were originally intended for use with lead acid batteries, so they may not be very accurate with the lithium packs. With lithium batteries, the voltage tends to drop much less noticeably while being discharged than with lead acid batteries. But when they are almost completely exhausted, the voltage drops quite quickly:



The meter can be slightly adjusted to give an improved operation. Check out this post for more details.

Is the brown two wire connector required to be connected... if so to what exactly.
sorry to be dense, but I'm unclear what the brown connector cable is supposed to be connected to.
Can the red button on the twist Throttle be left disconnected?

I've not seen a brown connector, but if it uses the yellow wire shown as not connected in the above diagram, it's probably for Reverse.

The red button on the throttle is used for either Reverse (not available on all Pies) or LED lights, if you don't want to (or are not able to) use it, you can leave it disconnected.

Alan
 

[Leslie]

Hi Tom,

So... my simple question is:
Should the motor work if only the 3 wire black throttle connector is connected?

It might be a good idea to check that the motor side of your throttle wiring is working correctly by doing a simple test with the harness disconnected.
A small piece of wire (reshaped paper clips work well for this) inserted between pins no 4 and 6 on the motor socket should make the motor run at full speed:



Alan
 

Alan is most excellent at this advice and I don't know where we would be without his service here.  Like this stuff exhasts me as the site is starting to bloom recently.

But hang on I just thought of this when reading one of Bruno's post about a week ago.

Bruno GM Brazil dealers made complaint about paper clips possibly damaging the plugs causing intermittent issues.

Any bend or edge extruding on the paper clip or even the angle of insertion may create problems inside the female contacts.

Can I suggest using a 1k 1/4 watt resistor that can be bought for 20c from an electronics store.  The wires are are more fine and maybe adequate for this test.

The 1k resistor will stop the jerking of the wheel at full speed to.

So exactly what Alan said but use the 1/4 watt resistor instead.  I think we should listen to the dealers here.

Thanks Alan.  

[Thomas]

Thank you for the info and direction.
Unfortunately I get nothing... no spin when shorting pins 4 and 6.
Battery's on and connected.

This implies a controller issue?

Tom c

[Bikemad]

Unfortunately I get nothing... no spin when shorting pins 4 and 6.
Battery's on and connected.
This implies a controller issue?

I've just been looking at a previous post of yours:

I checked the voltage before putting it on the charge; it measured 33.6v.

Have you rechecked your battery voltage after charging (it should be around 42 Volts) just in case it's a charging fault and not the controller, as several customers seem to have been suffering from charging problems recently.

If the battery voltage is more than 40V, then it might be a faulty controller or a broken (or shorted) wire in the motor harness.

Have you heard any beeps when you switch on the battery, and if so, how many beeps were there?

Alan
 

[Thomas]

Alan, thank you for your direction on troubleshooting this.

The voltage is fine. On a full charge the battery reads around 42.

So, here's my history with the GM kit.
When I originally set up the bike, I got nothing with only the throttle wires connected; simply connecting the throttle didn't work. Connecting the gauge wires, I had LEDs but still no throttle.  
There was only one other set of connectors that fit. This is the two wires from the red button whose connector fits the brown connector on the tangle of connectors leading to the 8 pin plug. But the diagram indicated this to be the reverse connector. I thought that perhaps this was about having ground, so I connected this. And, wallah! push the button twice and the throttle worked.

I turned reverse off in the software setup, before connecting the reverse? connector and also set the battery peak setting to 16 amp and continuous amp to 12 or so.
 
With the amps turned up, it's obvious that this isn't correct, because the wheel on a full charge spins with some force without any turn on the throttle. This wasn't obvious when the continuous amp setting was at 12.

If the brown connector (reverse?) is connected to the throttle's red button, when depressed the motor would beep 3x or 5x. Pressed twice quickly, there's no beep and the throttle works.

The bike is incredible; it seems the throttle has never worked as intended. With the amps turned up and a full charge, it's obvious something's not right.

SO... my question is why does this work - sort of - and what's going on? Cruise control? why no power on pin 4? but, how does the throttle work anyway?

Tom c

[Leslie]

Hello again.

If you have a volt meter do tests all the wires.  And post details..




Are these voltages correct.  I mean have I desecrated Alans very nice diagram accurately.