A couple of new experiences with the Panasonic unit

[Leonardo]

Hello everybody

On the Italian forum we had recently a couple of experiences with the Panasonic unit that I think deserve your skilled attention (hi flecc ).

The first is a full suspension Specialized transformed to accommodate the Panasonic central motor and equipped with two batteries and a Rohloff hub gear. It is not the most beautiful bike in the world, in my opinion, but it seems to behave very well on our Apennines and I don't remember other transformations of this kind. Story & pictures here.


The second news (the bad one) is the first case to my knowledge of "explosion" of a Panasonic battery. It is an 8Ah battery over two years old, quite roughly treated by an owner that used it to test other motors as well. It seems to be victim of an infiltration of water during a transport. Quite impressive anyway. Here.

 

[AndyOfTheSouth]

Hot, explosive and dangerous...

The battery was pretty good too!

Very interesting to have sight of the Italian ebike forum, Leonardo, so thanks for taking the trouble to let us have it.

Best wishes

Andy

 

[flecc]

Hi Leonardo, good to hear from you again.

Thanks for the conversion example which doesn't look too bad at all. I've always thought the Panasonic unit is ideal for a rough country bike with the unit central and insulated from shocks, and the motor being controlled by the pedals on difficult sections is ideal, giving fine rider control in the normal way but with added power.

The battery example doesn't surprise me, I've had experience of how dramatic cell failures can be with NiMh, and it only needs one cell to fail to precipitate a catastrophic chain reaction with explosion and battery casings melting. This was one of the reasons why manufacturers rushed into lithium batteries despite their early problems, though even those suffered fires in their earlier cobalt cathode form.

Once again it's a warning to everyone never to charge any battery indoors while out of the house or asleep, all these rechargeable batteries are potentially domestic bombs.
.

 

[Bigbee]

How can you buy the Panasonic kit to use as a conversion kit?

 

[flecc]

How can you buy the Panasonic kit to use as a conversion kit?

As a spare part. Last price I knew of was £450 for the motor unit only, but that was some while ago and well before the exchange rate changes.

It could easily be £550 now, the battery for the old unit is £250 and te control a few pounds extra, so we are in the higher price kit category at around £850 possibly. Best to source a reasonble second hand working Lafree. I have no price for the new unit but it's probably not much different and the battery for it is at least £395, depending on source.

It's still not a kit of course, the donor bike needs drastic alteration with complete removal of the bottom bracket area and replacement with a mounting channel for the four large mounting bolts of the crankcase.
.

 

[Barnowl]

Once again it's a warning to everyone never to charge any battery indoors while out of the house or asleep, all these rechargeable batteries are potentially domestic bombs.
.

Good point. Something I hadn't considered. Thanks

 

[flecc]

Leonardo, you'll be interested to know that our A to B magazine have had manufactured a batch of new 14 tooth motor drive sprockets for the old Panasonic unit, modelled on new parts that I supplied them with. They are available at good prices internationally from A to B, so you might want to post it on your Italian site and any others you visit.

Here's the post about the sprocket availability, and there are details on my Lafree website also:

Lafree and early BikeTech Panasonic unit sprockets
.

 

[Leonardo]

Many many thanks for this advice flecc: a precious one, as usual.