How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

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jmap
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How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

A friend of mine have a Vectrix that does not charge above the 4 bars. It stops when the voltage climbs above 150V.

Does anyone have a clue what can it be wrong?

Here is a photo:
CIMG0293.JPG

moccasin
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

Looks like MAYBE his bar guage is out of sync. Needs to do a couple of back to back deep discharges (red battery light and no bars left) to get the bar guage back in sync with the volt meter.

Never seen a bar guage that low on a full charge, but I've also never seen a 150 volts on display either! Could be something totally screwy going on, but it doesn't cost anything to deep discharge and at least attempt to get the parts all in sync again.

AndY1
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

This happened to me, when my battery was almost completely dead. It was probably just one failing cell, but that cell had only about 10%-20% of it's original capacity left. That's why it empties so quick, that the bike senses to low power from the battery pack and resets battery bar gauge to 0. But when it's charging, since all other cells are at 80% capacity (because the failing cell had only 20% capacity left) failing cell, with 20% capacity, charges up real fast (4 bars as fast) and reaches the sum voltage of 150V really quick.

I don't know, if that's the case with your friend, but it was in my case.

R
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

I've also never seen a 150 volts on display either!

Umh.. BUT I have seen those voltages very often...
In cold weather my vectrix turned on the cc-153 and CC-154 programs, and 150v became usual. Once my voltage display hit 153v!!
The day when I could take some pictures the voltage only reached 152v. I believe in cold enviroment these voltages are ok.
152v SNC00109 (Medium).jpg
152v SNC00110 (Medium).jpg

I have a pair of questions:

1- Has the bike the newest firmware?
2- When the 4 bars drop and the display range shows 0 km, does the bike mantain a nice voltage and it still can perform brilliant accelerations? Do you think it has normal range?

jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

Looks like MAYBE his bar guage is out of sync. Needs to do a couple of back to back deep discharges (red battery light and no bars left) to get the bar guage back in sync with the volt meter.

Never seen a bar guage that low on a full charge, but I've also never seen a 150 volts on display either! Could be something totally screwy going on, but it doesn't cost anything to deep discharge and at least attempt to get the parts all in sync again.

I think that's not the problem because the user already done that and because the 4 bars are right for the time spent.

jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

This happened to me, when my battery was almost completely dead. It was probably just one failing cell, but that cell had only about 10%-20% of it's original capacity left. That's why it empties so quick, that the bike senses to low power from the battery pack and resets battery bar gauge to 0. But when it's charging, since all other cells are at 80% capacity (because the failing cell had only 20% capacity left) failing cell, with 20% capacity, charges up real fast (4 bars as fast) and reaches the sum voltage of 150V really quick.

I don't know, if that's the case with your friend, but it was in my case.

The batteries are new (were replaced). It came from the workshop like that. Maybe a bad connection of the battery can produce these symptoms? Or the batteries arrived in bad shape (that wouldn't be the first time)? But seems to be some similarity on the situation that you've described...

jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

I've also never seen a 150 volts on display either!

Umh.. BUT I have seen those voltages very often...
In cold weather my vectrix turned on the cc-153 and CC-154 programs, and 150v became usual. Once my voltage display hit 153v!!
The day when I could take some pictures the voltage only reached 152v. I believe in cold enviroment these voltages are ok.

I have a pair of questions:

1- Has the bike the newest firmware?
2- When the 4 bars drop and the display range shows 0 km, does the bike mantain a nice voltage and it still can perform brilliant accelerations? Do you think it has normal range?

I think that the cutoff voltage is 153V. This is a normal procedure of the software and that's what it happens.
Answers:
1 - It should have, it came from the workshop and previously it had the latest firmware;
2 - The 4 bars are right for the time spent in charge and the bike performs like a normal 4 bars charge.

Mik
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

The batteries were replaced. It came from the workshop like that. Maybe a bad connection of the battery can produce these symptoms? Or the batteries arrived in bad shape (that wouldn't be the first time)?

Now you have given us the important bit of information!

I have seen this before.

Take battery out, work on it for a long time, put a charged battery back in - and then sometimes the electronics think the battery is empty, when in fact it is full.

The fix for the problem is to drive until the battery is empty, long past the time when it shows zero bars. But with a "new battery" you risk damaging cells if the battery is not balanced.

Therefore, I would take it easy, and just do progressively longer rides, avoiding any hard accelerations when the charge indicator shows zero bars.

But maybe it will not even get to zero bars when the battery is full. I have only seen this with older firmware. It might behave differently with the newer firmware which I assume has been installed along with the new battery.

Poor service that this was not explained to the customer after the battery replacement! Better even, they should have reset or synchronised the charge display to coincide with the real state of charge of the battery!

This information may be used entirely at your own risk.

There is always a way if there is no other way!

R
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

The batteries are new (were replaced). It came from the workshop like that.

I assume the bike has the latest FW. Maybe the batteries are new, but the system doesn't know that the batteries have been replaced. In my opinon the system is simply out of sync. Your friend should ride the bike until red battery light turns on (tell him he must not care about 0 km est. range, keep on riding until the safe limit voltage is hit and the red battery light is displayed) and then recharge it again.
The safe voltage limit depends on the weather. In cold weaher I think it's 122v, in hot weather it's around 117v. Damaged batteries can experience a higher safe voltage limit, we've seen in raimon's vectrix a 126v limit (in winter).
Mik
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

This information may be used entirely at your own risk.

There is always a way if there is no other way!

jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!
The batteries were replaced. It came from the workshop like that. Maybe a bad connection of the battery can produce these symptoms? Or the batteries arrived in bad shape (that wouldn't be the first time)?

Now you have given us the important bit of information!

I have seen this before.

Take battery out, work on it for a long time, put a charged battery back in - and then sometimes the electronics think the battery is empty, when in fact it is full.

The fix for the problem is to drive until the battery is empty, long past the time when it shows zero bars. But with a "new battery" you risk damaging cells if the battery is not balanced.

Therefore, I would take it easy, and just do progressively longer rides, avoiding any hard accelerations when the charge indicator shows zero bars.

But maybe it will not even get to zero bars when the battery is full. I have only seen this with older firmware. It might behave differently with the newer firmware which I assume has been installed along with the new battery.

Poor service that this was not explained to the customer after the battery replacement! Better even, they should have reset or synchronised the charge display to coincide with the real state of charge of the battery!

They cannot explain what they don't know... Unfortunately the guys from the workshop understand a lot less that I do, and I do not know much. They don't know how to operate the diagnostic software. Maybe this tool can help to find the answer...

jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

The batteries are new (were replaced). It came from the workshop like that.

I assume the bike has the latest FW. Maybe the batteries are new, but the system doesn't know that the batteries have been replaced. In my opinon the system is simply out of sync. Your friend should ride the bike until red battery light turns on (tell him he must not care about 0 km est. range, keep on riding until the safe limit voltage is hit and the red battery light is displayed) and then recharge it again.
The safe voltage limit depends on the weather. In cold weaher I think it's 122v, in hot weather it's around 117v. Damaged batteries can experience a higher safe voltage limit, we've seen in raimon's vectrix a 126v limit (in winter).

He already done that and nothing changed.

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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

He already done that and nothing changed.

You mean that when de red battery light turns on, the display gauge does not reset?
He starts charging with 0 bars, and for 90 minutes no bar grows up in the display while charging until the end part of the recharge?

jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

He already done that and nothing changed.

You mean that when de red battery light turns on, the display gauge does not reset?
He starts charging with 0 bars, and for 90 minutes no bar grows up in the display while charging until the end part of the recharge?

When the bike stops, it has 0 bars. Then the 4 bars in the reacharge take the usual time (about 30-40 minutes?). The charging process then stops because it reaches the cutoff voltage (153V?).

AndY1
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

What is the starting charging voltage? How fast does the voltage rise when it's charging?

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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

This is pretty important: please ask him:
1- how far can he ride with one single charge until the bike stops.
2- at what voltage the bike stops.

jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

1.JPG
After 24 hours left on charging...

2.JPG
Restarting to charge...

3.JPG
Finishing first phase (3 o 4 minutes taken)...

4.JPG
After the recharge...

PT-Volt
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

Hi guys.

First, I wanna thank you all for your help and concern. Especially jmap.

This is pretty important: please ask him:
1- how far can he ride with one single charge until the bike stops.
2- at what voltage the bike stops.

1- 5 kms (or so).
2- 133.

How fast does the voltage rise when it's charging?

Really fast. In the photos you can see that (in the second recharge) the voltage went from 140 to 150 in less than one minute (00:00 in the left). When the second phase started it dropped also very quickly.

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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

thanks for the info.
01:13 hours charging.
CP 152 program, the bike is in winter season.
141v after 24h, quite hi drop but still can be inside normal parameters of self discharge.
However 5 kms of range starting with 140v is not normal.
Cut-off voltage of 133v is very high! I believe that new battery has one or more fried cells which block the flow of electrons, this V needs a new battery under warranty. It is quite astonishing that they replaced your battery without checking the cell's voltage... But even worse they didn't check that the bike range was OK after installing the new battery!!

AndY1
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

This are EXACTLY the same symptoms my Vectrix had when my battery was failing.

As I described earlier: One cell is dead or it has only 10% of capacity left. The rest of the pack's cells are fully charge, failing cell is full, but only 10% full compared to other cells, because of it's failing capacity. You drive 5 kms. All cells but the one, that's failing, empty to about 90%, the failing cell is at 0%. Because cells are in series, almost no current is passing through the failed cell anymore, that's why BMS thinks, the pack is empty. All battery bars are erased, bike stops. Pack voltage is at 133V, because this is the voltage of the healthy pack at 90% minus one dead cell's Voltage.

When you start charging the bike, that the whole pack gets to cut-off voltage in 10% of capacity. Healthy cells are charged from 90% to 100%, the failing cell is charged from 0% to it's 10% capacity. Because it's 10% capacity if full capacity, it shows full 1.5V. BMS thinks the pack is full and that's it.

I don't know, what kind of 'new' pack you received, but if I'm correct, it's almost useless. I say almost because, you can still do what user Megendez(?) did. Find the dead cell and shunt(right word?) it. Basically, you make a connection through the dead cell's + and -. You'll have 1.4V lower voltage on the whole pack, but at least it will be usable pack.

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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!
jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

Here it is: http://visforvoltage.org/forum/7834-shunting-damaged-battery-cells

Humm, it seems that we have a bad pack here or... maybe bad battery connections can simulate the same problem?

R
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

maybe bad battery connections can simulate the same problem?

I don't think so.
A bad battery connection would:
A) not transmit any power at all. The vectrix would be death.
or...
B)limit the discharge power due to small contact surface: that faulty connector would get very hot, and accelerations would not be brilliant, but if the cells are new and ok, In the first rides the vectrix would have normal range.
jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

Then it must be a bad pack since the discharge option have been tested without results...

jmap
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Re: How can it be? 150V=4bars?!

Well, bateries replaced and the problem has gone. No conclusions were retained.

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