Hi,
New to the forum and glad to find it. I bought my 168 from EVTA in 2005 and have about 1000 miles on it. Last September I pulled out of my driveway on a hot Texas day, got about 10 yards, and the bike quit on me. When I turn on the ignition it makes a high-pitched whining noise similar to the startup beeps, then the low battery (red) LED flashes, and that's it. I checked the batteries and all have 12V, the stack registers 48V. I'm new at this, but a pretty handy guy. Can anyone think of what I can try?
Thanks.
Oh, and I think EVTA is out of business, at least as far as the 168 is concerned. No one there will return my messages, and when I contacted the factory in Taiwan they sent me to Bravo.
A fully charged 12v battery at a resting state will read 13.2v. If your batteries are truly reading 12v they're nowhere near fully charged. That may be why the low battery lights are flashing?
- David Herron, The Long Tail Pipe, davidherron.com, 7gen.com, What is Reiki
Hmmm... something I did not know! So, I tried charging it, and after 10 hours the batteries now read between 12.45 and 12.75 Volts. The light on the charger is green (I really don't like red, yellow and green. I'd rather have numbers.)
I charged the batteries until everybody was happy at a little over 13 Volts, and then turned the key. Still no response from the vehicle - no headlight, nothing except the occasional high-pitched sad noise. I checked the batteries while the key was on, and lo! One of them read negative 30 volts. I thought this was somewhat odd behavior for a battery (and no, I didn't have the leads on the voltmeter backwards). I took them to an auto store to have them tested with a load, but the tester wouldn't run at 50 Amps (the guys at Alien Scooters in Austin told me to test it at 50.)
I guess I'm going to have to either buy a load tester that goes to 50 A, or drive the bike up to Austin.
Hmm....
Any other thoughts? Anyone else have a battery do this?
Thanks,
Rob