Newbie Questions for 2008 VX-1
I've recently purchased a used 2008 VX-1 (my first EV!), and I have some questions for maintaining it:
1. I set the delay to charge in the middle of the night, and ride the bike to work. I've noticed that the voltage in the mornings is consistently 136-138V. After charging at work, the voltage is 138-142V. Any way I can kick up the voltage?
2. The battery light comes on occasionally during my morning commute (on mile 8 or 9 of a 12 mile trip). I make it there, haven't been stranded yet. Is this related to lower voltages I'm seeing in the morning? The light never comes on during my return trip.
3. I've read that I need to run the batteries down every month at least. Can I do this from a partial charge (not plugging in after work on Friday and driving it down on Sunday), or is it best starting on a full battery?
I know it's a lot of questions, but I'm committed to making this baby last as along as I possibly can. It was bought with only 800 miles, and it's in pretty great shape.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Welcome to ownership of a Vectrix.
There's a lot to learn and enjoy.
First thing is if the battery lights are coming on - ride VERY gently from then until your destination that will if nothing else prevent damaging the batteries.
Second thing is that the bike actually works better run regularly than it does being sat for days / weeks and ran occasionally. Therefore your range and also your performance MAY improve over the next 2-3 weeks.
The voltages are ok (we'll look at that another time), don't panic on that front at this moment in time.
Some of the information that is needed for us to help you and for you to learn is how many KM/Miles the bike has done with you riding it ? how long ago it got those 800 miles ? What your average riding is like (commute) for speed and terrain.
Also of course where you are in the world.
Feel free to PM Me
I am also sure there'll be many more replies from other longtermers here.
Cheers
Chris
Chances are there are some battery cell issues (anti-scab and Mik both on here are the masters of all things cellular)
Best way of charging that i have found is two fold.
1. buy a cheap electronic timer plug so you can just program in the time you want it to start charging (i start mine around 2am) and the benefit of this is two fold. Firstly by not having a bike programmed delay you can program the plug to provide power at any time of day. It will also kill the power after its charged if you give it long enough. And the reason you would want to do this is because having mains power constantly running though your charger in your vectrix is (due to a poor design) a bad thing and can and does eventually kill it. Therefore having a mains timer plug you only give the systems power for approximately the amount of time it takes to charge.
2. Without a shadow of a doubt get a copy of the lairds revised charging firmware for your bike. Sadly this means you might need to borrow a can-bus cable from someone near to you if you don't have one. However people have seen improvements on range for starters and lower charging temperatures which is a known problem with the vectrix std charger algorithms (trying too hard to get as much power into the batteries as they can too fast just to make the stats look good).
Daily use is best and running it to the red light doesn't have to be done in one go and can be done over the weekend. However some here might suggest that you do it twice in succession. over sequential days Fri/Sat ?
Oh and the other advantage to the lairds revised charging firmware is the fans are on during riding (constantly ) and for an hour after riding.
Basically if you haven't gathered... heat is the Achilles heel of these batteries.
If you are good at making stuff but can't get a can-bus cable i'd recommend the ABCool adaptor cable which allows you to run the fans on the bike after riding running them off a 12v source (plug adaptor or battery) allowing the bike time to cool with care rather than just turning it off not knowing if the core temps are actually escalated.
Wow, sorry got on a soap box there............ Its a passionate subject
Cheers
Chris
Can you provide some info on the battery voltage and temperatures after your ride when the red light comes on? (kill switch off, pull left brake and check left dash)
This is useful info and can provide some indication for cell imbalance or cell failures. If it is imbalance than there is hope for improvement.
If the voltage is above 120V after a ride to the red light you can do a very, very careful ride until the voltage drops to 120V. You can do this by riding really slow and often check the voltage by stopping, kill switch, left brake procedure. Did I already mention to do it very carefully? Ensure the temperature does not spike.
Also try to monitor a charge cycle and use this info to set the timer as mentioned by Chris. Set the timer in such a way that it shuts off before the last part of the charging program kicks in. This last part of the program does the most damage.
Listen to us all LOL.... poor bloke is probably Shi**ing himself now thinking its all terrible...
In reality its not all doom and gloom however we are just trying to make your vectrix the best it can be.
4hrs would be a complete charge so start at 3hr and see how the temps / charge goes.
Or alternatively just keep an eye on it one day by popping out every 20 mins to see what time it takes for your bike.
basically the original firmware tends to throw too much current at the batteries in the final stage and thereby heating up the pack when its already full.
This just isnt necessary or a good thing. Hence the idea to stop it before it does that.
4hrs would be a complete charge so start at 3hr and see how the temps / charge goes.
Would I be right in my thinking that 4 hours for a full charge is only applicable if you have a battery that still has full capacity?
If the fans come on during riding it means the temperature of the batteries is above 37 deg C.
When they come on during the pre-charge delay it means they are above 27 deg C.
Please monitor a charge cycle and time how long it takes. use this info to set your timer. Set it such that you avoid the last part of the charge program.
When you finish a ride check the temperature of the batteries. If they are above 27 deg C and more than 5 deg C above ambient you can use the pre-charge timer to cool them.
Best way for this is to set the delay to 8 hours and occasionally listen if the fans still run. Because they will automatically shut down as soon as the temperature drops below 27 deg C.
At this point you can unplug the bike and connect it to your timer for overnight charging.
It seems that your batteries have regained a bit of capacity if you noticed that the red lights no longer come on. This is good news.
Oh, and from your description it is clear you have the latest official Vectrix software.
A 10 deg C temperature increase on a relatively short ride is not good news. I think some cells are damaged.
Not much you can do about this without opening the battery compartment and custom firmware.
But if you continue to ride carefully you should be able to get some more miles out of the pack in this condition.
It is indeed the 3 amp phase which is damaging. do a search on this forum because there were some excellent posts on the charge sequence.
I've recently purchased a used 2008 VX-1 (my first EV!), and I have some questions for maintaining it:
1. I set the delay to charge in the middle of the night, and ride the bike to work. I've noticed that the voltage in the mornings is consistently 136-138V. After charging at work, the voltage is 138-142V. Any way I can kick up the voltage?
Get a timer and set it to start charging so that the charger still runs when you are getting ready to go to work. Check what is going on while you get ready, you will soon know if the battery heats up or not during the last charge part. A substantial part of the charge is lost due to self-discharge, particularly just after the charge finishes and if the battery is hot. Ideally, you want to stop charging just before the battery begins to heat up noticeably and just when you are ready to drive away.
2. The battery light comes on occasionally during my morning commute (on mile 8 or 9 of a 12 mile trip). I make it there, haven't been stranded yet. Is this related to lower voltages I'm seeing in the morning? The light never comes on during my return trip.
This sounds as if you have a short work day....there is probably less time between the end of charging and you driving off. The voltages at the end of charging are probably very similar, but then they begin to fall immediately when charging stops. After a few hours they settle at around 138V.
3. I've read that I need to run the batteries down every month at least. Can I do this from a partial charge (not plugging in after work on Friday and driving it down on Sunday), or is it best starting on a full battery?
I think you should only ever run down the battery after it has been fully charged and equalised, and without any delay between full EQ charge and start of riding. Otherwise any differential self-discharge rate between cells (there is always some) will cause reverse charging of the cells with higher self-discharge. However, it seems that the capacity of your battery is so close to what you need for your commute, that any deeper discharges are not needed.
I know it's a lot of questions, but I'm committed to making this baby last as along as I possibly can. It was bought with only 800 miles, and it's in pretty great shape.
Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Good luck with it!
Consider 120V as empty tank. running any lower is bad for the low capacity cells.
Avoid hard accellerations and full regen braking too. With a battery in the state that she is now it needs gentle treatment :-)
What is the ambient temperature where you are?
well done! but don't forget:
5) avoid full regenerative braking.
6) enjoy the silence and the ride!
Hi
Your Battery needs attention, 50+c is permanently damaging the cell(s) and probably those around it. I'm surprised the charger got it that hot without a bathot cutout, it must be quite bad.. there are celci dots (small thermal indicator stickers) on all the cells, and that one should have tripped. But every cell that is bulged or puffed up is damaged. I would get the Lairds software into your bike ASAP, it dramatically reduces the heat and therefore the damage done during charging due to heat. If its only one bad cell you could shunt it. But I'll bet its not. You can usually find 10 or 20 bad cells in a 4 year old pack..There was a guy in this forum from the US selling packs on recovered cells, I think hes even on US Ebay..
I live in Brisbane Australia and I have two bikes, my wife and I ride them every day (30km or so each) and it gets hot here in summer (35c,95f +). I have cooked lots of cells in 4 years but I still have many (80 or so in each) of the original cells in my bikes, and the cells I have been using to replace them with are all the same age as well so I just take what I can get.. It only takes one bad cell out of 102 to do what you are experiencing (and it would have to be on, or next to a temp sense point), but the odds are there will be more..Caution but, dragging high(ish)current (40 to 45 mph) through a battery with a badly damaged cell in it can have expensive consequences as demonstrated elsewhere in these forums with a battery fire.
50+C is indeed a bad sign. your earlier reports of high 30's C with the red lights and high 20's C ambient were OK. So something probably happened to cause the spike to 50's. Do you park your bike in the sun? Otherwise it is most likely one or more cells that have failed.
The reason for the temperature to rise at the end of a charge is that the Vectrix charger is forcing current into battery cells that have already reached their capacity. Those cells can no longer convert that current into charge and will start converting it into heat. This causes them to loose even more capacity and pretty soon they will fail completely. This is why we all urge you to keep the temperature low.
The cause of some cells reaching full before others is cell imbalance which is caused by different self discharge characteristics between cells. Over time these imbalances increase because the higher self discharge cells reach empty earlier while riding and continued riding at that point will cause damage to those cells. When you charge, those damaged cells reach full earlier because they have lost some capacity and they will heat up causing even more damage. So it is a down spiral...
If you do a full regen brake it will force up to 50 amps of current into the battery! You can imagine what that will do to already weak cells. Especially when the battery is still full. If you find it difficult to control your regen braking than it is better to avoid it completely.
Two things to consider in case the situation gets worse:
1) start swapping failed cells
2) look for a lithium upgrade
Both require serious work and I would advise you to look at the youtube videos of Antiscab to get an idea of the complexity of opening up the bike etc.
If you are not bothered with some serious DIY work and are fine to use software to flash other firmware into your bike than the best first step would be to start using The Lairds firmware as mentioned in the above post. This firmware will prevent the overcharging and thus heating of the cells at the end of a charge.
Almosts certainly you'll need to look in the battery pack and check the cells for swollen ones and low capacity ones (often one and the same)
There is no need to do full discharge rides if you ride the bike daily.
Full discharges are damaging due to the risk of cell reversal and will heat the cells.
That you are getting more range is because you are now using the bike daily and are getting the hang of preventing the charger to overcharge the batteries. The batteries are reconditioning a bit.
Just keep riding it daily, keep an eye on battery temperatures, prevent overcharging and avoid riding to the red light completely.
This will give you the best life out of the batteries.
How is the battery temperature these days? If they are less than 10C above ambient then you are doing fine.
The temperature has been fine overall. If I charge after getting a red light, I am pretty vigilant on stopping charging if temperatures go above 35°C. Today I went entirely without regen during commute to work and back home, and again I'm seeing I have more voltage to spare. I really don't need the regen to make it the 12 miles, what i need is the voltage to stay above 124V. If I'm a daily rider (Mon-Fri), how often should I do the full discharge rides? Ever?
Can you explain why you're not using regen, please? I don't understand that.
I would suggest this is because it can put quite a large amperage of current back into the pack and therefore not help when you are trying to keep temperatures down.
...and for some strange reason, I end up at a higher voltage and no battery light when I'm not using it. At least in the last two days that's been the case. I've been able to hit 40mph without the light coming on during the commute.
Lower temperature means less self discharge of the cells and therefore a better balanced pack. the better the pack is balanced the better the range.
If you are a daily driver, deep discharge is not nessecary. I stopped doing them 2 years ago and my original battery is still OK after 20.000 miles
-I'm in the Los Angeles area, my commute is on city streets with lights, with speed topping out at 45mph on some stretches. I don't need to go much faster.
-The streets are fairly level: no major hills or canyons. Some unavoidably bumpy spots bc of potholes and train tracks.
-I've put on about 300 miles since I bought it in early August.
-The original owner seemed to have been babying it over the last 4 years, taking it out here and there, no signs of neglect as far as I can tell.
Thanks for the initial input!
Josh