Just got my XM-3500Li

Hey Lenny-- Here is what is going on here: I have been meaning to give you guys an update on the mod. I checked out my credit card and the scooter shop charged about $920 on it for the new controller and DC/DC converter.

Thanks for the update! One question, though. That $920. Is that straight cost for the DC/DC Converter and Controller, or are there other charges involved? Once we hear how it all turns out you'll have to let us know model numbers and such as well.

Lenny Zimmermann
Metairie, LA

:) there is something that you can do . Get a 10 watt .150 5% resister and put it across the high cell for about 5 min. after you discharge the highest 2 or 3 cells , charge the byke agin and re test till you are happy LaTeR

I'm not sure I see what that would accomplish, other than making sure the cells are balanced before riding, which I find happens anyway after just a few minutes under load, it seems to me. Or is that doing something else that should boost top-end speed?

Lenny Zimmermann
Metairie, LA

Figures. And I just had mine die on me on the way into work this morning. I had a fairly strong headwind and going up a bridge, just as I hit the peak the throttle just went dead, although the rest of the bike still had power. I pulled over and the breaker was tripped, but I couldn't get it to reset. I have a spare in there, but I only had the screwdriver that comes with the bike and I couldn't get enough torque on the screw that holds down the negative lead to get it out. I'll grab someone from here at the office to take me back to it in a bit and see if replacing it works out for this.

I'm really, really hoping, after reading this, that it isn't some kind of heating problem or something really oddball. (After all, I did try to get some extra current across the bridge like eped suggested I might try.) I guess I'll see and report back later.

Mike, on modification details, I was mainly looking for what model controller and DC/DC converter you ordered and such, but if things are getting this hot with those versions maybe we're just SOL where we stand now. I wonder how long it will be before Mountain has his new motor ready. Or maybe we could get a replacement motor from the R. Martin folks since there motor/controller set-up seems to be getting them up into the 55 mph range (like the XM-3500 was originally advertised to be.) Having that extra headroom on the speed sure would be nice. Then again some reliability would be nice too... grrr....

Ok, now for a stupidity update. The new breaker I put in didn't have the holes in it to screw into the plastic like the original breaker had, so I used wire ties on it instead. Well, stupid me I didn't realize that one of the ties was just barely in the way of my being able to push the breaker all the way to the "off" position so I could reset it so it would stay in the "on" position. Just a tad extra force was all I needed to reset the breaker and it's working just fine now. Boy, do I feel stupid.

Although it is a bit annoying that the breaker blew on that bridge to begin with (even with a headwind of approx. 15 mph.), the grade is the steepest I deal with, but it isn't more than maybe 20 degrees, if that even.

I should add, though, that before doing the additional wire mod on that bridge in the controller (see earlier in this thread) that even without much of a headwind I was often only getting about 34 mph going up that bridge. After the mod, and with a headwind, I was getting 36. So maybe it did make a little bit of difference in torque.

I guess now we know why you've been so quite on the forums lately, John! Nice tease, though. I can't wait to see what you come up with and will definitely be watching with great interest on what you start coming up with. I'll try to check on the amp draw and the mod is easy enough to pull off (a little touch of the soldering iron and off it comes!) I'm not sure it's making enough of a difference to leave on there anyway.

It works well enough for now. I see I just need to have a little patience for those of you with more know-how than I have to work out some kinks on good ways to mod this puppy up. ;) I think my biggest concern for now might be getting away with using the same batteries or just adding a few more in without having to replace them. Replacing the motor and controller and such I think I can live with, though. I think I'm getting a bigger tax refund this year (especially since I think there is at least a small credit for having bough and electric vehicle on the Fed side) so maybe that will go a long way towards financing some future upgrades.

Thanks again for the update!

EDIT: Hey John, which controller are you using for that? I'd like to get an idea of some of the overall costs and such if I tried to go that route.

Ok, a few things to jump in with. First a big thanks to Mikie, eped and John for sharing their projects with us. I'm going to be watching all of those very closely and and see if I can maybe work off what you guys find out for the right balance of performance and range.

BTW, John, maybe an XM-3500 "upgrade kit" would be something you could add to your distribution chain? You know, something like a mounted motor with tire (so it's easier to just put in place, maybe) controller, DC/DC converter, BMS and such and maybe an instruction manual or something for doing upgrades. Stuff that would work for any of the bikes on the XM-3500 style frame (I know someone mentioned the actual gas scooter that this bike is built off of, but I can't remember it.) Just a thought, maybe.

On the other things I've been doing, I decided to remove that piece of wire I put on the bridge. I've been having a few anomalous breaker trippings so I figured I'd try that first and see if it makes a difference. If I still get those trips I may just replace the American-made breaker I bought and put in the Chinese replacement I eventually got from Xtreme. I'll let you know how it turns out.

Lastly, I got in the 1" grips, but they really are just too big. So I took a Dremel tool with a sander attachment on it and just started going to town on the 7/8" twist grip I had and was able to sand out enough material (it was pretty easy to do) to get it to fit up on the throttle. A little grip glue later and I've got new grips. They don't really look as nice as the originals, but they feel a lot better in the hand. Now that I know the right size I may look at some black and chrome ISO grips or something. Maybe someday I'll get some pictures taken if anyone is interested in how it's all shaping up with the little add-ons I've got on it.

Pictures depend a lot on my actually remembering to toss a camera into the trunk and then remembering to stop someplace scenic, like on the lakeshore, and snap a few. I keep meaning to do it, I just never remember to. ;)

The circuit breaker popped again this morning (about halfway to the office, call it 6 miles, slight acceleration, not even full-on, and it just tripped.) So I think I'll switch back to the Chinese one and see if that helps any. I'll let everyone know if it does as it should help us figure out what does and doesn't work for replacement parts. It may just be the fact that it is no longer mounted vertically, which makes some sense for the times it trips when I miss seeing a dip or pothole in the road, but maybe it makes more difference than I realize. We'll see if the original brand has any of these issues.

The grips, though, I'm not too happy with. They are great at being stickier in the hand, but they are also a bit smaller in diameter, and with gloves that can start to cramp up your hand some. They are also the soft kind all the way through, so I can't as easily use the full grip on the throttle, but really just the first two fingers and my thumb on the actual throttle mechanism. Although there are some advantages to that in that if I clamp down a bit more on my ring finger and pinkie I can use that slight bit of grip that is soft around the handle to better maintain a set speed on the throttle. So soft grips don't seem to be the way to go with this in general, though. I'll need to look more at a hard grip but maybe with a rubberized outer layer or something. I'm just not fond of the relative slickness of the original grips so I don't want to go back to those.

55mph would probably be the better end than 50 I would think as well. The brakes are fine, I think, maybe just a better composition pad would be all you'd need. But 50 could be a tad low. I'm thinking mainly that the top end speed limit (at least around here) for a non-Interstate road is going to be 45mph. Of course not a lot of folks will do 45 there, but will instead be do 50-55 and you'll want to be able to maintain a safe speed. Add in the fact that you'll lose some of that if you're going uphill or have a strong head/side-wind (yeah, I noticed today that a strong side wind was knocking off 2 mph off my top end, while going headlong into it took of 4-5!) and you'll need that extra 5mph just to make sure you can hold 50mph when you really need it. For slower roads it's also very nice to have some room to speed up into because sometimes it's better to accelerate out of a bad situation than it is to brake out of it. Our current top-end just doesn't give you that wiggle room and a 50mph top-end on a 45mph road would put you back into the same boat.

Overall it seems solid enough to me, but maybe if I rode it at a higher speed I'd change my mind. But so far I think it's all good enough to handle 55mph pretty well.

The preliminary update on the circuit breaker is that the Chinese breaker did just fine. No real wind this morning, but the scoot had no problems even with the little bridge I come across in the morning where it was tripping. So maybe it really needs to be an 80+ Amp rated breaker, it seems to me. So, while I think the breaker I bought will work in a pinch, it looks like the UL489A for DC Current, 1 pole, Trip Current 60A, Voltage 120/240V breaker isn't quite the right option to go for. If I do run into issues on the Chinese breaker I'll let folks know, though.

Plenty windy today (my usual top-end 39mph was down to 36 a lot of the way, all the way down to 34 driving on the lake front!) and the usual bridges and such(down the 32 with that wind!) and still no trips on the Chinese breaker.

I also got new grips, ISO 7/8" grips (http://www.motorcycle-superstore.com/3/13/121/15258/ITEM/Kuryakyn-Universal-7-8-ISO-Grips.aspx) that work a LOT better. I still had to remove some material from the throttle grip, and the inserts are real rubber, so be prepared for a bit of stinky smoke if you dremel them down like I did, and it does take a bit of work to get there, but remember that if the fit seems a bit tight that the grip glue will, counter-intuitively, provide lubrication to slide on before it sticks tight. Still, they were more expensive, but they do look a lot nicer and work well. I'm pretty pleased with them as they have the support to work well with this scooter, are more comfortable and provide decent grip in the hand for much better control, including throttle management. You will need the spacers that are supposed to come with them because they are longer than the ends of the handlebars and the rubber of the grip does push down into the grip, so you need the extra support in there. I also got a 4" horn to replace the 2.5" one that was in there, just for the heck of it to get a little extra volume.

I took a couple of pics (not of the horn, though) so I'll try to post some when I get home later.

I'd been meaning to mention this, but keep forgetting. I do have a semi-persistent squeak that I'm starting to wonder if it's a poorly lubricated axle or something. It sounds like a metal on metal squeak at any rate that only happens on the roll... I mostly notice it when just pushing the bike into or out of the house, really. I couldn't find what the problem with the voltmeter was, so it's still not working and I'm not too convinced it's worth the hassle trying to go through xtreme to see if they can figure out what it might be. Maybe I just need to actually open the dash and see if there's a loose wire or something in there, since all the connections look good.

The wheels do rotate fine on the center stand, though. The brake (I think it's the front) still chatters when applied, but it's not a problem when the brakes are not applied. It's just a little annoying, but the guys at the motorcycle shop even checked it out and the brakes all looked fine to them. I'd LOVE to find a way to at least get another 5mph out of this thing, though. Maybe I can have the guys check out the wheels and bearings and such better and see if I have something going there. That'll likely have to wait until January, though.

At any rate, I don't have anything connected to measure voltage, beyond manually checking each cell with a voltmeter (which I can't very well do on the move.) I've considered something like a Trak-Pakr, but those things are not cheap. Still, I may try to get one later. I have check the cells several times since those measurements earlier in this thread, but nothing stands out on them so far.

I just checked the pics I took and I didn't realize when I took them, but they are really out of focus. So fine, I'll just take pics here in the "garage", aka my front room. ;)

Here is a shot from the left of the bike:

You can see there is a line going from the helmet to the GPS, since I put speakers in the helmet. It's easy to disconnect from either the GPS or near the base of the helmet so it never gets in the way and I can put it away if I don't want it. It's nice to have some tunes, though, since the GPS also plays MP3s.

One from the right:

And one of the accessories, which shows the GPS on the left with the usual screen I have up that put the speedo right in the center and easy to read, a cup holder (better than nothing, but with roads around here the general shakiness still means I get some spillage), and the new grips. You can also make out where the helmet hook is with my helmet hanging there for your convenience.

(EDIT: not sure why those pics aren't showing up, but the links below should work.)
(EDIT by reikiman: fixed your code)

If you want to see higher res versions I've also put them at:

http://members.cox.net/zarlor1/images/XM-3500Li-L.JPG
http://members.cox.net/zarlor1/images/XM-3500Li-R.JPG
http://members.cox.net/zarlor1/images/XM-3500Li-Acc.JPG

Sorry about the yellowish tint, that's just the faux finish on my walls (which, trust me, looks a lot better in person and a lot less yellow than in the harsh flash of that camera.)

The squeak is likely not a brake squeak. In fact I had the guys at the motorcycle shop reseat the rear brake (if you read earlier in this thread you'll see that I asked them to just do a mod that I saw on this forum in another thread) and I had them check the alignment on both while I was at it. They said the discs did not appear to be warped with testing while the wheel was mounted, but if we REALLY wanted they could test them off the bike to find out exactly how close to true they were, but I didn't bother. I trust their mechanic pretty well on that and his measurements looked good in suggesting they discs were fine. One of the guys at the shop mentioned on one of his motorcycles (ICE-type, not sure of the make and he has several anyway) that he had the same persistent chatter in the front brake that I have and he'd just shoot it with brake cleaner once a week to help keep it from being too annoying. But that's a chatter that shows only when the brake is applied and it's not a squeak in any case. I'll have to do some more digging and see if I can narrow it down any.

Also on the figure for front brake stopping power, according the Motorcycle Safety Foundation (and other literature I've read on it) it's more like 70% of stopping power in the front brakes, and they highly recommend the use of both brakes in any case (although it's a good idea to start letting off the rear brake after you start braking and as that weight shifts to the front of the bike, therefore making it more likely that the now lighter weight on the rear tire means you'll need less brake there so it doesn't lock up.) The mod I mentioned actually kicks the rear brake down to where it should be so more of the pad can contact the disc on the rear brake to give you that extra braking power if you need it.

Finally I should mention that as I was doing my usual check routine between mirrors, GPS (for speedometer) and the dash (mainly just to make sure my signals are off) I noticed that my voltmeter all of a sudden was now working. The scoot must have thought I was talking bad about her or something. ;) So I noticed that under full throttle with probably standard wind resistance (I was getting it up to 39 on the GPS at that point) the needle was right at the High arrow. When I let off the throttle it went up to the middle of the H itself, maybe about the 45 degree mark (I'd say the arrow is at about 40 degrees if we call the mid mark the 0 degree centerline.) Getting onto full throttle form a stop drops the needle about 3 degrees below the arrow and going off throttle on the upslope of a bridge then hitting full throttle after slowing a bit (figuring I'd put just about the most voltage drain as I would normally expect to put onto it that way) it dropped maybe 5 degrees below the arrow (call it 35 degrees up from the mid-line). If that means anything to anyone. It looked pretty good from where I was, especially since that was also after my normal 12 miles into the office this morning in the cold (it was 42 when I went in) and 8 and a half hours later (I took a short lunch) that was how it was reading after maybe only a mile (and weather up to 70 degrees, it's been a roller coaster around here!). EDIT Addendum: Just FYI, looking at the now working voltmeter this morning after a full charge, the needle at full starts above the H, about 50 degrees off the midline, to give you and idea of where my topped off end appears to be on that gauge.

Thanks for all the input guys. I definitely appreciate hearing about them and all the mods other folks are doing. It's good to know I may have some options for kicking up my top end speed.

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EDIT: I forgot to add in on the charger question. I asked this on one of the other forums here and I think what is happening is that the charger is going into a "float" or "float charge" mode (whatever that really means, I think it's something to do with they way you charge up batteries beyond a certain point, I just don;t know the details, really.) At any rate the charger is setup so that if it determines there is a condition where the batteries (or at least, I would guess, the main battery it's sending a charge into) go into something like an over-voltage state then both lights will go red and the charger will completely stop. I think we determined that it's probably good to let the charger continue for maybe a couple of hours after it reaches the initial shutdown state and then turn it off. I've also seen other folks suggest that once you have an idea of what that timing is you may want to actually just us a timer and set the charge to start off about that much before you want to use it and then turn off after that usual charge+ time. You know, so you have fresh electrons and all. ;) I'm sure there are more knowledgeable folks here who may be able to provide more enlightenment or better ideas on this if they might read this thread.

Sweet! I know I'll be waiting diligently to hear all about your experiences going forward on this project.

And a Happy Holidays to all you EVers out there as well!