1000 km Reports: XM-3000 and XM-3500

I have an XM-3000. How would I go about "wicking some solder onto the controller shunts to increase current"? I'm not sure what the controller shunts are but I'm handy with solder! Appreciate any help you can give. Thx! Rod

If you do this just make sure to disconnect the battery first! Just turning off the breaker won't do it. I did this and it works, you get more pickup but no more speed in my experience. But don't increase the voltage of your pack by more than 4 cells or 72v nominal. (adding batteries in series) if you do this or you may fry your controller on fast starts.

I have an xm 3500li and just passed 1000km. Everything is working fine exept the minor problems that have always been there. Squeeky brakes that drag a little, wheels aren't balanced,handlebars out of alignment,speedometer reads wrong(gets worse with increased speed) but she's still going strong.

Hello,

First of all, sorry for my poor english.

I received my Vespino Sky Evolution on 20th October. It’s one of the many brands of Xtreme XM-3500Li and came actually with the same instruction manual. Thank to ViV forums, I was able to choose this particular moped, knowing most of the soft spots.

I’m not a genuine motorcyclist, my only experience stem from a 50 ccm Piaggio Typhoon. I bought the Vespino as a replacement for the 2 strokes scooter (actually, I hate 2 strokes engines). It is intended for my daily commute (about 10 miles total).

The only real contender was the Vectrix, but it is far too expensive for the purpose, too heavy for my peace of mind and too long for my garage (to be shared with my car). The Vectrix seems a very nice piece of ingeneering with better buiild quality, but it has three major drawbacks : it looks very complex (not on the safe side for failures), so you need to study the instructions booklet well; I think the NIMH battery doesn’t offer the advatanges of LIFPO; the range is a bit disappointing for the price.

As any XM-3500 owner, I faced an optimistic top speed, very unprecise tacho, touchy gaz gripp and few other minor points. All in all, I’m happy with it, and even if it’s scarcely faster than my Typhoon, it accelerates faster and is very pleasant to use.

Unlike in the USA, the Vespino is sold by motorcycle shops and I was lucky as the man at the shop had my Vespino seriously checked before passing it to me.

I just passed the 1100 km mark few days ago. Except for a dead dashboard bulb, I had almost no problem so far. The tacho will be adjusted later and the gaz gripp replaced at no cost. The only change was to buy a set of real tires (Michelin brand), as I found the original tires very slippery on wet roads (not to mention tram rails).

I intend to make few improvements surch as a better lightning (35 W Philips Motovision HS1), LED tail/break, LEDs for the dashboard). A taller winshield will be welcomed.

On the other hand, although the Vespino is well adapted to my needs, I have so much more pleasure to ride it than my previous scooter that I would now enjoy using it for longer trips (70 km and back with recharge) at a true 80 km/h, Of course, this means at least 60 AMP batteries, more volts an maybe a more powerfull engine. Upgrading it seems expensive, so I’ll see how the new XM-5000 performs.

Regards

Yves

Sadly while I am quite a patient person when it comes to new products or technologies, I have not had a great experience with my xm3000. My problems have been:

poorly mounted brake calipers: they required grinding so that they stopped rubbing up against the disc
Poor electrical wiring from controller to motor: this wire is far too small a gage for 50 amps.
Poor paint job: I have lots of places where significant rust has formed
Poor design of wiring harness: more on this in a second.

I did not mount an BMS as soon as I got it, for two reasons. First I wanted to examine what the difference would be in length of ride and battery life and second, I wanted to get riding when I got the thing an get familiar with it before taking the thing apart.

So I got about 20 rides out of it before a battery croaked. It appears that if you ever go into the red without a BMS, you are done for. Ok fine. it was a pain, and I had to pay for the shipping, but xtreme replaced the battery.

But before the final death knell of this battery I had ridden the bike for a few more rides. On my very last ride I lost my 12V line. no lights, no horn no turn signals. Bad news (as this was november and I was riding home in the dark. The motor controller was working.

I found that water (from wet roads I guess) had gotten into the compartment where the 12V DC converter is. Now the fuse on the 12V line was blowing. The original fuse that was there didnt have a marking as to what current it was supposed to be. I replaced it with a 5A. I limped home.

I have not ridden this bike since november becuase I'll tell you its a total pain to take apart to get at the wiring harness to diagnose what the problems are. Even getting at the headlights is a nightmare. I replaced the Dc converter with one from thindersky and can see that I have a good 11.9V coming out of it. I had a horn, and one light. but after turning on that last good light, it blew too.

I now have 2 blown head lights 4 blown turn signal lights, 1 little white running light and a blown brake light.

What the heck?

How can these lights all blow if the voltage is only 12V?

So, I find that the workmanship on the bike is very poor. But I do say that when its working well, it is pretty fun to ride. I hope to get these lights replaced, pray they dont all blow again and have fun again.

I have two XM3500li and have had no problems with the things you mentioned. (not that I doubt at all) My turn signals on one were real sticky till I lubed them. There was less tire balance issues with the second one. I would say my experience has been mostly good but trying at times. The electric scooter ride is really fun and unique for sure though. I just got my first ticket on my scooter for going around a road closed barricade to avoid having to go on a long detour into heavy traffic and bumpy roads. I just wanted to go see if I could get through and the guy writes me a ticket?

Hello,

Few days ago, I passed the 3'000 km mark with my XM-3500li (actually a Vespino Sky Evolution 3500). I experienced a 12V DC-DC converter total failure in May. It was replaced under warranty, but I had to wait 4 weeks to get the new converter. The representative extended the warranty by another 4 weeks. The only drawback was that we had a very dry weather in May but my XM-3500li was unavailable. I noticed that the new converter was different from the original one (it is smaller), so the old series might have been a bit weak.

My representative also replaced the controller with a new one.

Soon after that, I experienced dashboard's bulb failure. After a quick investigation, I noticed that the negative wires were poorly soldered to the common negative wire. It's a real pity because most of the wiring seems Ok, using water tight connectors. I rebuilt that part and everything is OK since then.

All in all, the XM-3500li is really pleasant to use. As time flies, the only weak point is the 40 AH battery pack : it would be nice to have twice the range to allow a wider use of my scooter. Maybe if John Harding consider exporting later to Europe his CuCoMo EV, I'll consider buy one!

Regards

Yves