Help!!! wiring my new Ping

I have a volt meter. If I plug in the charger and put the positive volt meter prong on the wrong side will it give me a reading? If I don’t get a reading, it will be easy to figure out which side is which with the volt meter? I don’t know enough about electrics.

It should never harm a DVM/DMM (Digital Volt Meter/Digital Multimeter) to hook it up backwards.

If you have an analog meter with a moving coil it won't hurt it either as long as you put it
on a sufficiently high range, but the meter will "pin" to the left of zero, and not give a useful reading
until you reverse the test leads.

The following assumes you have a DVM/DMM:

1. Make sure the red test lead goes to the red (positive) terminal on the meter. If the meter has more than one red terminal,
you want the voltage input (not current).

2. Make sure the black test lead is plugged into the black (negative) terminal on the
meter.

3. Being very careful not to short the two meter leads together when probing the circuit under test, probe the two
pins on the circuit under test (CUT). It does not matter which test lead goes to what pin.

4. Look at the reading on the meter. If it is a positive number (no negative sign) then the red lead is hooked to the positive terminal
of the CUT. If you get a negative reading (negative sign appears to left of digits) you have the leads
reversed. It simply means the red lead is hooked to the negative terminal of the CUT. At this point you can reverse the
test leads and you should get the same reading, but without the negative sign.

5. Once you get a positive (no negative sign) reading on the meter, the red test lead is hooked to the positive terminal
and the black test lead is hooked to the negative terminal of the CUT.

Need Help… I just received my Ping 48V20AH Lifepo4 Battery for my brushless BL36… Now it’s time to wire this puppy up… And I want to be extra cautious (too much at stake)… So I’ve got some soldering and wiring to do… I bought a connector that is identical to the stock connector for the BL-36 setup that plugs to the stock 50A controller. I will use it for the battery output. Wiring the charger bothers me most. The connector that comes with the charger is a bit bulky… I might want to hook up something else (Your thoughts…). Below is a portion of the User Guide from Ping to wire the charger and battery output… He sent me the 2A charger (I guess that’s OK, would rather have the 5A). I’m concerned that I get the positive to the positive and the negative to the negative. I have a volt meter. If I plug in the charger and put the positive volt meter prong on the wrong side will it give me a reading? If I don’t get a reading, it will be easy to figure out which side is which with the volt meter? I don’t know enough about electrics. That’s why I’m sending this… There is a picture of the battery and charger with the wiring below Ping’s instructions. I also have an in-line 30Amp fuse I will wire in on the positive output side to the controller. Looks like I have to splice in a positive wire off the big red wire to use for the charger hook up…

I'm sure you've already opened up your controller and verified that the caps will handle the new voltage (~60V for a charged 48V Life...)...Now proceed:

Here is a link to another Ping connection thread: http://visforvoltage.org/forum/5020-ping-lifepo-4-questions

Basically, yes, use a voltmeter -- any voltmeter-- to establish what's positive and what's negative on your charger. The controller is pretty simple: Red is positive, Black is negative. That's where the large leads from the Ping will be connected.

For the charger, you'll have to splice a smaller red wire onto the existing "Positive" red wire. The blue "Charge Negative" goes directly to the Neg side of the mating charger connector. See if this helps:

Just be really careful and do a lot of sanity checks, etc and you should be fine. A 30-40A fuse inline with your Positive-to-the-Controller line is not a bad idea (purchase at any automotive or boating supply shop).

Enjoy your new Ping! I luv mine :)

Thanks you guys... Feeling alot more confident in hooking the Ping up.... Scotty, I have not opened my controller. I'm thinking to just take my chances but hate to blow the $140. it will cost at BernsonEV to replace it if it blows...

Cheers,
Matt

Matt,
I have an older controller and it was just 3 screws to open it up. I suggest you do this, but it may work just fine. There are a lot of opinions out there...Just carefully open it and look at the caps. You may need a magnifying glass too. The big can caps should be rated at at least 63V for any kind of margin. Let us know what you see in there...

The other option is just hooking it up and hoping it works. It may also work for a while, and then blow. I think it's smarter to chk first.

I went thru the same thing on my very old BL-36 pedal first I bought used. Some said "go for it." Others said it would blow. My caps were rated at 50V, and I looked up their data sheet and found they had a surge rating of 63v. I opted on the safe side and bought a pedal first controller from Justin at ebikes.ca. I think the smartest thing to do is just pop it open and look at the caps...they are the big can caps...you can't miss 'em!

Good luck. by the time I saw this one the others had you covered. Ecrazyman on ebay seems to be the source for controllers. He has ones that can handle more volts. good prices too.

Just in case you hadn't allready read this, The ping will balance better, especially at first, if you leave it plugged into the charger for a long time. So for the first week or so, leave it plugged in all the time you aren't riding. Apparently, even after the green light goes on, and no longer goes back to red and back to green, balancing is still happening while the green light is on. When the light is green the charger is still trickle charging, and leaving it plugged in won't hurt the cells. Go ahead and ride when you want, just leave it charging a lot at first to break in the pack. After the first ten cycles or so, others tell me to leave it charging for a long period once a week or so to fully balance it.

Now we are getting over my head technically, but I'll take a look at em. I'd say ask Link, but now I see on his thread on the sphere that he is thinking about going to the We 50 amp brushless controller himself! Now I'm really confused. In any case over at the endless sphere there is a long thread about connecting these controllers, known there as schezen controllers, in the ebikes tech section.

I only see one 48v brushless controller on ecrasyman's store right now. 48v 600 watt. However, here is where I'm clueless. The new BL36 is a sensorless motor, no hall sensors, so it may be that this controller wouldn't work since it is made for motors that have hall sensors. I really don't have a clue about that. I'm not an electronics whiz at all, just a guy who trys to translate some of this into english, or pass on what I read elsewhere. If your WE controller does fry, maybe Justin at ebikesca could fix you up with something, but not at ecrazyman prices. Hopefully the newer bl36 controller will be able to take the volts. If it has run ok on 36v for awhile it at least was a good one and you will know that it wasn't just a bad controller if it fries.

Hey Dogman, Scotty, All,

I'm Good to Go... YAAA HOOO!!! In fact, I just went... Just got back from the first run with the new Ping. I pulled the cover on my stock 50 Amp controller before the test run and found the larger cylinders inside the controller read 63 Volts on the side... From what I gather, I think that means the controller is going to work and not blow up....

Cheers,
Matt

Congrats Matt! I'm really glad you opened up the controller. Best safe rather than smoke! 63V caps should give you about 3V margin on a full charge. The FETs are probably spec'd at 55V, but that is a bottom sigma, so they are more realistically rated 65V before any fear of breakdown, so you are good (probably) for the long haul. Be aware that you *are* running lower margin than at 36V, so stress may take it's toll... but for now, have a blast!

Yes get some pics. How fast does it go on the flats? Yeah, I suspect that a bit of pedaling is in order up hills..hey, it's not a 5-series Clyte after all!...enjoy!

Excellent! Every time I climb my big hill I think, why didn't I get the 48v.

Good place for wires.
http://www.allelectronics.com/make-a-store/category/116/Cables-2-Cond.-Waterproof/1.html