New kit more or less DOA! Need help!

[JonMcClain]

Just finished installing a GM Hub kit, 48v Regen Contoller.

First, the wheel was surprisingly true! It only required minor adjustment with spoke wrench. 

While I intend to use LiFePo4 batteries, I hooked the bike up to set of freshly charged SLA batteries.  Low and behold the thing actually worked out of the gate.  I took a short ride and, although I had some brake drag the bike actually performed fairly well for about 1 mile.  Then it cut out and then started again,  This occured several times until it would no longer go anywhere.  My assumption was that the 7AH battery pack was not up to the task.  I check the pack voltage and got a 47v+ reading.  I checked for loose connections and all was well.  I hookup the battery pack back up and began to check voltages and continuity.  Batteries were OK, but no power to the motor when test on a stand.  Activation of the thumb control produced nothing.   My conclusion is that the regenerative controller controller is bad! 

Anyone have any ideas as how to confirm this diagnosis?

Thank in advance for your help!

Jon   

[Nicobie]

You might try checking if the safety switch inside both the brake levers are working. Just pull them in until you can get your finger on the little plastic switch and give it a push while cracking open the throttle (be carefull! the bike will move). Both of mine were bad. I just glued on a tiny washer so the switch got pushed in further when the brakes were off.

[biohazardman]

I would not think the controller would go bad that fast. You may be dropping down into the Low Voltage Cutoff with your batts.  Sounds more like you now have a surface charge on the batteries that you can measure but doubt they stay there when a load is applied.  Try putting a load on the batts while you measure the voltage.  Check the brake switches mentioned in the other post.  There are lots of things that can go wrong. You can also try recharging the batts and see if you get anything then although I would expect it would be short lived.  Yes 7AH of lead acid is not much but it's how much of a load you can draw at one time that counts. I would expect, just a guess, you need somewhere near an 8-15 amp draw to run the bike on a level surface.

[OneEye]

At 47V resting voltage, you probably only have 5V available before the Low Voltage Cutoff kicks in.  Any kind of draw on that few Ah will probably give you a 5V sag.  You should hook up your voltmeter and read it while riding.  That will tell you if you are sagging down to the LVC rather than have a bad controller.

[kickinz1]

Hi, I'm from France, so please excuse my bad english...

I've got a regen 36V500W and it is working great.
A neighbor of me bought a 36V250W motot kit with batteries.

And the same happened:

Worked great a few km, but then make noise and cut offs, like bad battery, then doesn't worked anymore.
We have tested every of his component on my system and mixed things to be sure to test everything out.

Result: a bad twist and a defect controller!

I don't find the relation between the twist and the controller...


BTW on his battery when fully charged, there is still an illuminated led, that stays always on even after a very long charge...Dead Cell?