BL-36, enhancements to standard system

This is from the bernsonev.com website:

Description:Motor mounted in wheel, lighted thumb throttle, controller unit, key switch, battery pack, smart charger, bike rack.
Hub Motor: 600 Watt, 36 Volt DC Gearless, Brushless
Throttle Type:Variable Speed Throttle
Push Button Switch: Push Button Switch
Battery Pack:Sealed, 12 Volt DC, 12 Amp Hour Lead-Acid Gel-Cell Batteries (x3)
Electronics:Electronic 50 Amp Speed Controller Unit
Wheel Sizes Availablity: 20, 24 or 26 inch Front Tire with Front Wheel Drive
Top Speed:Top Speed: 20+ mph
Range:Average Range (Distance) per Charge: 30+ miles. (Rider weight contingent)
Charger:Automatic Soneil Charger: 2 Amp@36vdc 110-220 Volts
Averge Recharging Time:4-6 hours
Payload:Payload Capacity: 300+ lbs. (U.S. Pounds)
Weight:Gross Weight of Kit: 46 lbs
Features:Brush-less motor, 50 AMP meaning you will never have to change the brushes inside it. Brushless motors are more power-efficient than brushed motors, and this one will increase your range by 30 % compared with a similar power-rated brushed hub motor. This motor runs on 36 volts instead of 24 volts, so even though it is rated at 600 watts (continuous power output - 750 watts peak output)

TIRE SIZES AVAILABLE 700C 26" 24" 20

On a 36V I have gone more than 13 miles with no yellow light that was at 20 miles the whole way (OK I let off the throttle on dowhills). This wason alternating hilly flat to real hill. On 48 I haven't tried it yet. I live in California and just took a 6 mile ride on 48V and it is in the high 90's today and nothing got real hot. I did get up to 31MPH though for a second, down hill, with wind. I am having real bad luck with chargers. I just got in my 48 volt charger and it doesn't work. Even less so than the 36 volt charger. I am looking at trying to build my own charger but I am a lowly electronics technician so the leap to engineering is rather large.

Bummer on the charger. I just cooked another one yesterday. My fault though. gotta be more carefull.

The 30 miles range claim doesn't mention how fast eh, I bet it was at 8 mph. 15 miles ought to be possible with carefull riding. My point is, I don't want to have to drive like an ev. Just want to hit the throttle and not worry. That's why my posts allways speak of realistic range. Riding into 35 mph wind yesterday, I still had enough power because I realisticly bought enough battery. The hub got too hot, but my battery was plenty strong to get me home in the worst conditions. We ride in the real world, with low tires, dragging brakes, wind, etc. People dissapointed in their EV have delusions of what they can do, often because of nearly lying ads. I have done 12 miles on 12ah sla's on my bd36 several times. But I can't usually do it, and don't count a ride that drops 700 vertical feet a range test. coming back the other way, I get at most, 8 miles and not at full throttle.

I haven't heard of BL 36 going 20 miles at full throttle, 20 mph from anybody I can remember. It might be possible at 48 volts, and no huge hills. I just don't recall any reports of doing 20 miles on one charge regularly. A little wind at the back on a given day and you can go miles further, a little at the front and you are dead meat. All kinds of claims exist, usually from rides at slower speeds. At walking speed, you can go a loooooong way. Peukerts effect at full throttle is pretty bad, so you may only get 6 ah out of a 12 ah lead battery if you run hard. Let us know folks out there if I'm wrong. Don't forget, 100% discharge on lead batteries, is asking for less than 50 cycles. To get 200 you need to leave 20-30% in the battery every cycle. Once that battery light goes on, you are abusing the battery, though you may be able to go 2 or 3 miles further. All my range figures are given to the battery light going yellow, at full throttle all the way. It's how very many of us ride. At 48 volts, you may make 20 miles, but I don't think you will at 25mph. Maybe at 15 though. For me 15 is a crawl since I ride about 25-30 miles daily.

Hmm...

The ability to go long range (20 miles) is just a matter of a large enough battery pack (enough AH's).

It's of course easier to do lots of AH's with lithium based batteries than lead acid. I think what you say would be accurate with the typical 12v12AH batteries (string'd for 36 or 48 volts) used on a bicycle..

...however... With my WE brushed 36v bike, and using a pingping 36v10ah pack, I'm regularly doing 15 miles though at something less than full throttle. I also have a 36v15ah pingping pack and could parallel them. Carrying the two packs would be simply requiring a rear rack, and I am guessing I could do 35+ miles with little problem other than being saddle sore and worn out at the end of the ride.

I see you're talking lead acid and you're right with all you're saying, don't deeply discharge or it'll hurt the batteries. Which means with SLA you're not really going to get the full rated capacity. So far it seems the lithium batteries are much more forgiving.

So far it seems the lithium batteries are much more forgiving.

Yeah but they are much more expensive. Anyone know what the going rate for a 12AH 48V LiFEp04 battery pack is? I was thinking mayeb if I sold a kidney.........

For what it's worth; I ordered my 36V 20Ah LiFePO4 from foxxpower.com It cost $618 plus $65 for insured shipping :o
They tell me to figure about 86 cents a watt and I think that is for any build request. I think they are looking to branch into the private retail side from their mostly commercial division. I suggested there is at least an EV bike market and maybe more out here. They are unfamiliar with websites like this one.
This week I get my BD36 kit, my battery and last week I bought a 7 speed Townie for the ride to work. I'm getting away from my Piaggio scooter passion much the way I did with flying Cessnas. (you're right about that caution, dogman) Always looking for that cutting edge while I can still enjoy it. Very much looking forward to exceeding the speed limit and may keep my motor cycle jacket!

I do love my Ping battery, and the price I paid for it, but those Fox batteries look real good to me. They will be much less delicate, and apparently will outperform the ping. That means, for rides under 10 miles, people won't have to buy a 20 ah battery. I still advise to buy big though, since you will soon find that on an ebike, a 20 mile ride is no sweat. I get to work after 12 miles and go awww its over allready. Those Fox cells look like they even might be real good for a small motorcycle conversion. About 60 ah would be nice and light in a dirtbike.

The problem is not the voltage that the caps are rated at it is how much current can the motor and controller handle before the fry. Unfortunately there is no information on the average or even peak current that either the motor or the controller can handle and other than them being part of a Wilderness Energy kit there is no brand info to look up the specs against. Basically you could hook 600 12v SLAs if the motor and the controller and associated wiring could handle all the current. Also to our detriment Ohm's law only calculates what your volts, amps or resistance is given the other 2, it can not tell you what your equipment can handle. That is dependent on the physical properties of your equipment ie: wire gauge quality of components cooling etc.

I have one of the new 600W BL36 WE kits with the 50A controller and am planning my upgrade to LiFePO4 . Are you folks that have overvolted the 36v kit to 48v using the stock 36V thumb throttle with the 3 LED's? If so, did you just plug it in and have everything work, or did you disable the LED's by not plugging in one of the throttle wires to prevent a short ?

I'm only 135lbs so the stock 36V sla's are working pretty well for me with over 22 miles on 700c's at full throttle (@ 20mph) and light pedaling on hills. I'd like to push the range to 35 miles at the higher 48v speeds if possible with a 20ah foxx power pack.

Overall the BL36 kit is a lot better than I expected, but I think the charger they're shipping with the kits is of low quality. I'm on my 2nd one as well -- bad fan bearing-- and didn't even take mine on the road with me so no rough treatment. But no complaints at all with regards to warranty replacement: the dealer I bought it from (yosemitebikes) shipped a new one right out.

I found the answer to my LED question at endless-sphere: Will a 36v LED throttle work at 48 volts?

There are two simple ways:
1) Use a resistor R.
With 36 V battery, use an mA meter to measure the current I for the LED branch.
Then R=12/I
Suppose I = 10mA, then R = 12/10m = 1.2 k ohm.
2) Use an 12V zener diode (1/2 watt or 1 watt) as an 12V drop for the LED branch.
Both ways will give you the full functional LED status. Of course it may not be 100% accuracy.

Today I hit the battery cut-off for the first time just as I was finishing the final hill after 15.2 miles roundtrip, towing 100lbs feed home from Agway in a bikerev trailer. Looking forward to a fat 48v 20AH lifepo4 pack :)

i have the older 30amp controller kit....all i did was slap 48volts to the kit and test. did not modify anything.....i have torture tested the unit, and all temps are fine.

The trottle will work fine as is at 48 volts, it just won't ever light up low battery.
With a fox 48v20ah, you won't see the bottom of the battery much, and you won't want to since it will last very much longer if you never discharge past about 80%.

36V to 48V, no other modifications, worked just fine for me for a whole season. It is possible to get the low voltage light (yellow) to come on, even with 48v of batteries. Battery life will suffer if you test the truth of this statement. Even if the capacitors are rated for 63V, it is possible to melt the capacitor's wire if you mess up rebuilding your wiring harness and reverse the polarity. I have no idea if more damage is done to the controller than just trashing a capacitor, but simply patching in a wire did not cure the problem (the capacitor had assumed an interesting shape). Cheapness in Seattle may be my alter ego, but at this point I'm going to pop for the $45 and get a new controller.
-BothellBob

True enough with sla's. You might even notice how slow you are going by then too. I should have said, you don't want to ride till the light comes on like normal. At 48 volts, by the time that light comes on those batteries have to be really discharged. Carrying a voltmeter would work to know the state of charge. With lifepo4, assuming there is a bms, a 48 v pack should shut down before the light goes on. I find that once you know the bike and it's battery, you know how discharged you are just by where you are, on a regularly ridden route.

I hear you RE the damage done by deep discharging the batteries; I'm coming at this from the RC side of things. Seeing the price of low weight high charge density chemistry decrease enough to allow them to leap from smaller watt stuff like RC to energy-hungry bikes has been great. It shows how far we have to go, though, to get it to work affordably with something in the large kW range like a car. It's hard enough trying to buy a LiFePO4 system for my bike.

I'm thinking of going with the cycle analyst stand alone model to monitor the system. I think dogman's right in that you'll get a feel for power levels as your routes get established, but I'm a geek like that.

This has been a fun thread and I'm glad to connect with likewise minded folks.

My battery supplier suggested to not allow my LiFePO4 to run below about 30 volts so I too am going with the Cycle-Analyst
method of a overide / voltage cut-off. I believe the BMS won't have that capability so I'm going to play it safe and have fun doing it :)
This whole process of building my first Ebike is costing 150% more than anticipated but still way cheaper than the E-Volks I was planning! Quality parts have a resale value too in this market. Seems like most places are out of stock of the good stuff.

Cool- you went with the 36v 20ah foxx power pack. Looks awesome, and I'd be psyched to hear what you think of it once it shows up as there isn't much written RE foxx power yet. US based company with a good warranty and reasonable price sounds good to me.

i was wondering if someone can chime in about a lifepo4 pack......im gonna run my sla's this summer....next season i will invest in a new pack, but i really dont know to much about them. as of now, i see ping, foxx and i was wondering if someone can give some feedback.....i will get 48volt for sure....as far as amp hour, no less than 10 and no more than 20. thanks for any input. peace, randy.

Some weights, as I just finished my BL 36 kit conversion.

The motor and wheel itself weighs 16lbs

The 3 X 12.6 Ah SLAs weighed 23.8 lbs

Bike and Motor weighed 46lbs

Bike, Motor, and Batts weighed 69.8 lbs.

I weigh 160lbs.

I got about 25 miles on my first trip,
thought that is with pedalling, and coasting down hills,
and not at 100% full throttle the whole way.

I removed the spring from the thumb throttle,
as it was too tiring to keep it held down.

I also installed a kill switch,
as a stuck open throttle could mean trouble.

I like being able set a speed, and keep it,
and not have to hold the throttle there.

Hi Tad..

I also have a 48V battery pack, BL36 700c motor, Pack is arranged using the same bag, I just put two batteries in the middle (sideways) and the other two (normal) as the bread for the sandwich. The bag doesn't close but the strap that velcros to the front keeps it locked down. I still use the 4 velcro pieces attached to the bag to tie down to the rack. I need something to decorate the exposed batteries and wires, like a camoflague sack or black fabric of some sort.

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I use the 36V charger for 3 batteries and a 12V charger for 1 battery. I'm waiting for my 48V charger to arrive sometime this week.

I went 20 miles yesterday without recharging at full throttle and pedaling.

I like the extra power and speed by having the extra battery. It's not too much and not too little.

I'm now worried about the back spokes because you're having problems. When I first got the front wheel hub, the spokes on it needed to be trued after 20 miles of riding. The front and back spokes seem fine now... But I'll keep an on the back

My front tire went flat too a week ago because of a thorn... I got a slime tube put in both wheels and Mr Tuffy (kevlar) reinforcements... I hate thorns.

I hav had charger problems from day one. The charger (Cansai) that Bernsonev sent out with my kit never worked but after much complaining he sent me out 2 generic 36 volt chargers. Only now I am using a fourth batt so I am at 48 Volts. I have been charging them in parallel for the last 2 weeks at 13.8V and 3A using a bench top power supply with auto current limiting. It goes constant current until the voltage hits 13.8 and then the current tapers off until the batts are full. It seems to be working fine. I only have a 3 mile ride to work but it makes that with ease and I drive it around for about 9 miles yesterday and it was fine, and I ride it like I stole it. So now I have two generic 36Volt Chinese chargers I don't need anyone interested? BTW the parallel 12v charging is not at all fast because I am using a low current (should be about 4.8A but it is only 3) but I have all night to charge them so it works out fine and my batts shoudl last longer.

My cycle analyst showed up - really cool little device. Here's what it observed with the BL36 kit during a 16 mile grocery run:

14 WH/mile. Rider weight 135 lbs plus clothing. Return trip included two panniers worth of groceries. 12ah 36v SLA Batteries were about 50% discharged.

Cruising speed: @22 mph. Max speed 36mph down a hill. Speed dropped to @ 10mph on hills (there are a lot of hills in this rural part of New Hampshire). Light pedaling on hills.

RE Wilderness Energy: Every single one of us is having a problem with the lame Cansai charger that ships with the kit. Their website and ad copy says Soneil charger. Maybe we should start a thread to document faulty WE chargers. Also, the controller was supposed to be 50A but on close inspection it has 36v 40A stamped on it.

I recently got a flat which was traced back to a burr left over from machining on the wheel's spoke hole. Quite a few of those had burrs which I have since smoothed out. I suspect this is not just a problem with my own wheel, so you folks might want to take a close look at yours. Randy, it sounds like you got a flat recently too.

Other little hiccups included a sheared rack bolt down at the hub. This was easily fixed on the road. I'm going to upgrade the rack fasteners.

All in all it has worked out pretty well. Hopefully WE will take care of some of the little detractions that keep the BL36 from being a great kit.

Chargers seem to be the weakest point, after wrong forks, with all ebikes. One thing that happened to me was I shook one to death carrying it around in a pannier. Now I use a messenger bag to carry stuff. But the shipping is too rough on the chargers I think, so a lot of em arrive broken, or ready to go. I wish I was as smart as Link, I could build at least two chargers out of the parts laying about my garage now. Chargers 4 and 5 seem to be working good for me so I finally got a couple good ones. My own inept wiring was what killed the majority of my chargers. I really gotta get off my wallet and buy some proper connectors. I'm out at least $100 for lack of $10 worth of connectors. One is an actual soneil that came with the kit, and the other, a 4 amp 36v from monsterscotterparts.

While you have the motor open, you might consider upgrading the wires leading into it with the largest sise that will fit. When the wires get hot, it causes more resistance and slows you down.

hello fellas, just wanted to update my 48volt bl-36 WE. i have been riding to work everyday for 3 weeks now.....no wind, flat ground speed is a solid 25mph, as of now. i have 170 miles on the set-up now, so i think the sla pack is settled in nice. still have no range data....i am thinking of a new ebike build, cant make up my mind what bike to use. looking at a felt v12, or a worksman. the felt has 12gauge spokes, and the worksman has 11 gauge. any recomendations are welcomed. the payload is my #350 plus the ebike kit. peace, randy.

I did a temporary 64 volt overvvolt on my BL-36.

Got to 30 MPH on level ground !!!!

That is too much speed, but fun.

I took a Dewalt 36 volt and 28 volt battery and put them in series.

I measured the voltage as 64 volts.

It is fun, but a bit too fast for me.

I prob will try to get a 48 volt pack sometime this summer.

But the time my ping battery arrived, I was allready thinking, why didn't I get a 48 volt? But more and more, I am liking my 36. My speedo shows average speeds around 20-22 most days for the whole round trip. That is good enough. My car seems scary fast now. I get plenty of speed thrills in the morning though, going downhill. I'd like a little 60v a123 pack for the one mile of killer hill though. I've got nicad drill packs around, but I don't want to toast em, I use the tools.

The Cansai labelled chargers in Canada are in fact Soneil chargers. Cansai is one of the companies owned by Soneil group.

"The three primary companies of the Soneil Group of Companies involved in the sale of chargers are Soneil International Ltd., ACI Advanced Chargers, and Cansai Chargers. "

Source: http://soneil.com/corporate.html