Vectrix battery
Ok so I actually bought a vectrix vx1 it was very cheap they seem to be that way now so I bought one, the battery is pretty much dead, but hey it's a project.
I have discovered something about the original vx1 battery that I haven't see posted anywhere else.
Each row of batteries are reading zero volts ok battery is done for right, wrong.
The thing I discovered is that if you pull out the rows of batteries and zap the whole row with a 12v car battery booster you can actually revive the row of nimh batteries enough to charge the whole row with an imax b6 ac charger.
This will charge the whole row of batteries in one go no need for a special charging system.
As they are out anyway you can check them over for damage, but bloody hell are they a pain to get back into that steel band thing that holds them together.
At present I've gotten up to finding around 6 bad cells out of the pack the other cells so far all seem to charge fine.
Any ideas where to get hold of some nimh batteries for scoot would be most welcome, otherwise i'm looking at bodging together some kind of battery replacement for each cell.
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Re: Vectrix battery
where are you located?
there's heaps of the old nimh batteries available for free around the place
a quick and dirty way to check for bad cells is to see if they have bulged on the side
run your finger down the side of each 8/9 cell block - it should be smooth, if any are buldged, swap them out
Daily Ride:
2007 Vectrix, modified with 42 x Thundersky 60Ah in July 2010. Done 194'000km
Re: Vectrix battery
Have you found any cells / modules? Not the easiest thing in the word to get. Most of the people who have a VX-1 swap out the 125 volt pack with Lithium. If you just want to get it going on the cheap, do Lead 20 AH Gel Cell pack. Eleven or twelve batteries will get it going. But Lithium is the best way to go. If you go the Lithium route , then make sure you have a BMS for they have to be matched up for all the series differences. I left the battery temperature modules in tact and hooked up Gel Cell pack and got 9 miles range. Not enough AH to make it worth anything. But a learning experience anyways. Model airplane hobbyist like the NiMH pack for use in the field. 1.2 volt is nice for glow plugs. For EV use they're not to great since they aren't made any more. Plus the other thing is the battery charger does 10 or 11 amp for 3 hours. Constant current charger Lead and Lithium require terminating voltage and current to taper down. 26650 cells burn to easily.
KB1UKU
Re: Vectrix battery
Yes it did find some NIMH batteries but even with these best I managed to get was about 20 miles and that was being generous, more like 14 miles.
I have been considering buying some of those lipo motorcycle batteries and connecting them up, but at the moment they are still too expensive to try out.
I don't really use the bike much only in the summer when I feel adventurous, I had to push it once cos the batteries just up and died on me. Still the bike just kept on trickling along with a little help jumping off and then back on push then ride then push and so on till I just managed to get home with it.
Range anxiety I had none until that day, now the bike sits waiting for summer again when I will be back with it having another go at finding good batteries for it.
For now I use my petrol bike, which never gives me range anxiety.