Custom built trike

[Bluefang]

Hey guys and girls,
    I am planning to build a light weight Reverse Trike(2front 1rear) using a Hpm5000b BLDC motor. I like the idea of a simple light weight 1 to 2 person transport to go to work and back, a electric motorbike fit the bill but I don't really like the idea of only 2 wheels and building something with 4 would either mean tons of money to custom fab something that was roadworthy to obseen lengths or build something out of a current production car which would be way to heavy.

So enter a trike, legaly registered for the same cost as a motorbike and no where near the same roadworthy nessesitys as a 4 wheel car. To make the trike as light as possible I am building it to be sat on like a motorbike idealy running the thinest car tires I can on motorbike rims. The overall idea is very similar to http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTTyvz6TwE0 but with a much more powerful and quieter motor

Onto a few questions, would it be benificial to build the bike as front wheel drive to take advantage of the regen ability of BLDC motors(the area I live in is VERY hilly and a 20min drive to work), I can get a light weight LSD for a gokart that can handle 160lb of torque and mate it to the motor with a simple belt drive or is that overkill and having the motor on the rear wheel enough to use regen?

Can the motor handle 72V 100amp continuesly? Aiming to be able to do 100km/h with 17" motorbike wheels+tire.
 
What type of controller is best suited for the HPM5000B motor, I have heard of 2 types, I think they are sinsoudle and trap wave(probably WAY off on those names) From what I have heard you can get alot of noise if the motor and controller don't match properly.

Can the motor be over voltaged for a short time, ie 96V to overtake someone driving at 95km/h with out getting squished by on comming traffic?

Would 4x the 48V LFP-4820 battery packs be enough for a 45min round trip?

[muzza.au]

If I was going to do an electric 3 wheeler, I would convert one of these:



It appears to have independant suspension on the two from wheels, but:

On top of all this, the MP3 also offers some quirky features; most notable is the tilt-lock. Normally, as you roll to a halt at the traffic lights, you prepare to put your feet down to balance the scooter. But not on the MP3, you have the option of flicking the tilt-lock switch so that the electro-hydraulic system locks-up and stops the scooter from falling over; your feet never need to touch the ground. It takes a little practice to perfect, but once you get it, you won’t believe how many people are amazed by this feature.

I think its cool,

Muzza.

[Bluefang]

Yeah I have looked at that, and to me that's only slightly more stable then a motorbike. Plus been a fairly new bike it would cost a bit just to buy one even with a dud motor, my total build for the trike is likely to only run up about $500 with about $2.5k to be spent on motor/batteries/controller etc.

 I don't want to have to lean in corners I am more looking for a very stable, safe, light and fast transport that doesn't look like a bubble car. 

[Bikemad]

I would advise rear wheel drive for simplicity and traction on steep hills:





Alan
 

[Bluefang]

Yeah I will be going rear wheel drive, worked out that the diff I was looking at using would have made the trike unroadworthy as its a part designed for a offroad racer.  I ll use pulleys and belts from the front of a car engine seeing as they are rated to handle well over 10KW so should be more then adequate for my application and a hell of alot cheaper then belts from a motorbike+ pulleys which would run over $400 just in parts. Probably a short belt from the motor to the pivot point on the rear swing arm, and then from there another belt back to the wheel.

But back to my questions, I keep noticing that the HPM5000B motor is referred to as a 5KW motor, yet its listed as able to handle 72V and 100amp continuously. Is this because the controller GM supplies for it atm only produces 5KW continues.  Can it do 7KW continues?

[gestalt]

Do you have the motor in hand allready? I got mine a few months ago and up untill you coming allong the only other person using this motor was some dingbat trying to make a wind turbine out of it. I'm currently in the proccess of taking the motor apart for informational purposes. I love the concept, a while ago an idea crossed my mind involving a reverse trike version of kanedas bike in akira. Thought that would be pretty badass. Anyways, I'll keep a close eye on your build and wish you the best of luck.

[Bluefang]

No I have not bought the motor yet, I am holding off buying it untill my car sells and I get some feedback as to how much continues power the motor can take with adequate cooling. Pretty much want to know if it will be able to match like the Mars/Etek motor as that has currently been used in alot of conversions of motor bike and has a well documented ability to power a bike to 100km/h with a reasonable acceleration 0-100.

[gestalt]

Yeah, I bought mine for it's similarity to the mars bldc.  Good luck etting info outside the spec sheets they have posted on their sale webpage. I'm trying to get golden motors to send me some more info or instances  of this motor being used. I finnaly got connected with the ev team at MIT doing some volenteer work and they are going to put a link to my build blog on their site. Personally I'm totaly stoked to have some access to some of the wealth of technical knowlege those guys have. So if Yao can't help me out I'm sure someone there will be able to help me out. I'll do my best to keep you posted on what this motor is made of as I discover more.