FAULTY eco-brand whirlwind diary

[giguana]

Someone gave me one of these bikes that is brand new pretty much but it got banged around a bit in transport allegedly, it lights up but the motor is silent.

the front light and front battery power level leds come on, but the backlight stays off and so does the motor. the 30a fuse in the battery blows fairly fast. I am guessing the central controller is defunct.

the wiring is a very cheap and jumbled, outside of the controller there are about 30 different wires in spaghetti crammed in a box going to all the different sensors and leds..first thing I will do is photograph everything and compare everything with the good bike. there is a tiny little potentiometer fixed into the controller with a little yellow plastic screw on it, I reckon when you turn it it changes the maximum speed for the American market.

after will have to change the motor around which takes a lot of rewiring to check it on the good bike. don't even know if it's brushless but the axle is over 6 inches so it's a custom-built frame. if ever I have to put in a new controller it will probably just be the basics without the lights and leds and it will be hard to link the motor sensors which are a bunch of wires of different colours.

would love your thoughts

here are some pics, the controller looks a bit fried, it could just be factory grime.

Edit-I have just noticed a really bad design flaw, besides everything being too heavy and cheap, its absolutely not a rain bike any measure. there are mudguards, but if you look where the control box is placed under the pedals, there are finger sized holes at either end under the bars of the frame, so that rain draining from the frame is likely to go down along the wires and straight through the holes into electrics area, not a very clever design at all.

EDIT-it's worse than that! I missed one of the holes and it's possibly the most silly one- on top of the control box at the lowest point under the metal sliding groove, all the water from the back wheel and the battery collects in this area and there is a hole!

on the upside, I realised I didn't have to take the back wheel off to test the motor, simply connect the control box of one bike to the motor of the other, the motor is fine!

 

[HarryB]

The Eco-Brand use simple brushed motors. Have you checked where the wires enter the motor? The motor isn't very well located and can twist and take the wires with it - this is the usual reason for the fuse blowing. You can do a visual check and see if the wires look twisted - if this is the case you will have to take the motor off to check the wiring.

 

[giguana]

Thank you that is ace advice, I think it's okay but I will be on my guards for that, I have uploaded some photos in the original post, the controller box is a bit rusty and possibly fried...

 

[HarryB]

From the wiring the motor is brushless - 3 wires plus the 5 hall sensor wires. It doesn't look twisted so that is OK. I would say you have got your work cut out to find what it is wrong. Best of luck.

 

[Beeping-Sleauty]

wiring troubles ?.....doh

Someone gave me one of these bikes that is brand new pretty much but it got banged around a bit in transport allegedly, it lights up but the motor is silent............

would love your thoughts

QUOTE]

Hi Giguana,

i have a Whirlwind and have had this situation, (all the lights are on.... but there's no-one in) it was a faulty connection in the 'pigs-ear' that is the wiring, although i didn't have the fuse blowing.... this sounds like a short in the power, first, i would uplug each connection in turn, clean or renew the contacts and replug, check that each section of masking tape/ rubber is not hiding a break,

i doubt it will be the controller even tho it looks rusty, if you look inside you'll see all the circuitry is sealed. but if you have checked all else with no joy, there are replacement controllers available, Varissara on eBay had some at £15 recently.

you're right about the little yellow pot being the regulator, if you remove this from the circuit (it should unclip) the motor should spin faster, mine now cruises at 17mph, up from 14.5 and it helps iron out the drop-off / kick-in at the top of the power band.

i think the yellow cables go to the throttle and are the defunct power button on the throttle housing.

good luck, and let us know how you get on.
beeps

 

[giguana]

Hey thankyou, it's awesome fun it is more like a motocross bike that a push bike, it looks like a Harley from the front with so much shiny metal.
I shall have a go with the wiring, will get a multimeter to measure the throttle resistance is okay and basically I would love to keep the original controller although there is a guy called e-crazyman that has a 350 W replacement which may be okay although it might be too powerful.
Find 36V 350W brushless controller for E- bike & scooter on eBay within Parts, Accessories, Electric, Scooters, Sporting Goods (end time 29-Nov-07 18:41:29 GMT)
cheers a lot- I'll have a go fast on the country tracks!

 

[Beeping-Sleauty]

Controller

Hey thankyou, it's awesome fun it is more like a motocross bike that a push bike, it looks like a Harley from the front with so much shiny metal.
I shall have a go with the wiring, will get a multimeter to measure the throttle resistance is okay and basically I would love to keep the original controller although there is a guy called e-crazyman that has a 350 W replacement which may be okay although it might be too powerful.
Find 36V 350W brushless controller for E- bike & scooter on eBay within Parts, Accessories, Electric, Scooters, Sporting Goods (end time 29-Nov-07 18:41:29 GMT)
cheers a lot- I'll have a go fast on the country tracks!

Yes, they are big & bouncy and it's a good strong throttle, i found the 38 tooth chainring too small and fitted a 52, this made a lot of difference to the pedelec and gave a faster smoother ride, then i fitted kevlar slicks, a gel saddle, big soft bargrips and the resulting ride is extremely comfortable, good range too considering the weight.

the new edition controller is made by Tianjin Songzheng Electric, the model is WZKD3615KD-F-HDS and supports the pedelec input from the sensor ring on the axle, i can email a photo detailing the connections if you PM me your address.

best
beeps

 

[giguana]

I appreciate the offer, I have a second one in the garage for reference, this is for starters really I am making a custom one with a crystalite motor which I can try on some different frames.

 

[allotmenteer]

Hey thankyou, it's awesome fun it is more like a motocross bike that a push bike, it looks like a Harley from the front with so much shiny metal.
I shall have a go with the wiring, will get a multimeter to measure the throttle resistance is okay and basically I would love to keep the original controller although there is a guy called e-crazyman that has a 350 W replacement which may be okay although it might be too powerful.
Find 36V 350W brushless controller for E- bike & scooter on eBay within Parts, Accessories, Electric, Scooters, Sporting Goods (end time 29-Nov-07 18:41:29 GMT)
cheers a lot- I'll have a go fast on the country tracks!

I've just purchased one of these controllers from e-crazyman. The controller arrived on Friday about one week after the order (not bad from Hong-Kong). It's exactly the same as my existing controller as I hoped, so now I have a spare in case of failure. I haven't tested it yet though.

The controller is good quality and the MOSFETs are rated at 60V, with the main capacitors at 50V so more than enough for a fully charged nominal 36V (42V actual) battery. I imagine it will work with any brushless hall effect motor and throttle. It also has connectors for brake cut-outs. Also there is a pot which can be turned to increase / decrease wheel speed (for motors in different wheel sizes - or to get about 24 mph in a 26" wheel ).

The only thing I noticed on the controller I just bought was that the busbar (is that the word) which (I believe) limits the max amps of the controller seems to have been partially cut through. (I'll post a picture of this soon) This may be normal and perhaps filling the gap with solder may give a higher amp limit.

 

[giguana]

I've just purchased one of these controllers from e-crazyman.

sounds like a really good deal, would love to know how it performs. Hopefully I'll get to try one out. strong mosfets should make for a strong durability.

EDIT-have just tried the motor on the other controller and it spins really nicely...good news.