Well, whatever Drako's Ego had a few weeks ago must be contagious. My Ego began cutting out yesterday. But I don't think it's the key switch since I replaced mine with a new "black boot" model last October. The most common failure mode occurs when I turn the key on then begin to accelerate and the scooter will cut out within 2 seconds. The dash lights remain on but the scooter will not respond to throttle input. When I turn the key off and back on again, it will either go just fine, or repeat the cut out problem. Usually after 1-3 cycles of turning the key off and back on again, it will go for a prolonged period and get me where I need to go. The scooter has cut out while I was moving slowly once or twice, but the cut out occurs most often just after I've turned it on.
I opened the dash up this morning and looked at the controller light. When the scooter cuts out, the controller light remains on without flashing. I did notice that when a cut out occurs, and the controller light is steady on, there is a clicking sound coming from near the controller when I rotate the throttle. The click is not the contactor closing because that has already engaged and it's not loud enough. Just this light clicking sound when the throttle is rotated. Other than that, I checked the power fuse to the controller (blade type) and it was okay.
Given that the controller checks out okay, and both the contactor and key switch were replaced last fall, I'm not sure what the most likely suspect would be.
Any ideas?
All help appreciated.
tedd
It sounds like battery cables. The Anderson power pole connectors used to plug the pack together and into the bike seem to become "compressed" over time. A bad connection will let the voltage sag enough to trip the low voltage cut off in the controller (esspecailly when accelerating). Because this has started showing up we have been making them part of regular maintenence. If you look into the end of the connector where it plugs in to it's mate you see a metal contact enclosed in the plastice housing. It has a spring under it to hold it "up" against it's counterpart in the mating plug. They get compressed down too much and end up not making good contact.
The maintenence proceedure is to clean the top of the metal contact with a q-tip and alcohol. Then using a very small (jewelers) screwdriver you get under the front of the metal contact and bend it up slightly. Just enough that it rides higher and is more visible inside the housing. Then when the two halves of the plug are put together you get that tell tail snap as the connection completes. Good to go for another year or so.
So far it appears to more prevalent problem for bikes with batteries that aren't secured as tightly as they could be. This leads me to belive that it is the batteries bouncing the connector up into the footplate where it repeatedly gets wrenched around compressing the contacts down inside the connectors. It follows also that the white connector between the two batteries would be most vunlerable. In fact, this is where the poor connection is happening most often.
A marginal contactor will also cause the symptoms that you describe. My experience has been that the contactors almost never fail however.
Aerowhatt
Aerowhatt,
Thanks for your suggestion. I cleaned my Anderson connectors last night according to your procedure and haven't had a recurrence of the cut out since.
I might have eventually thought to check these as a possible source of the problem. On the other hand, they looked pretty clean and I probably would have overlooked the possibility they'd become compressed. In any event, your suggestion saved me a lot of time and possibly money if I had tried to replace components. I appreciate your help.
thanks,
tedd
I'm glad that was all it was. I'm happy to help, it's good for my karma ;-)
Aerowhatt