wrandyr

I have recently turned 11,000 miles on mine, with about 7,000 of that on the hub battery. Before that I used a now recalled LiPo battery. My hub battery has recently become flaky. Most, but not all, of the time the charge indicator does not show a full charge after getting a full charge cycle. Usually it is 3 or 4 bars, but I have seen it as low as 2. Sometimes it rides sluggish, sometimes not. This all started after I did a low voltage cutoff/ recharge cycle, and has continued after I did another. I am wondering if anyone has any experience with the end-of-life characteristics of NiMH batteries. Do they fade out gradually, or just tend to quit altogether when they are worn out?

powell

wrandyr,
NMH deteriorate slowly, internal resistance grows as capacity decreases.
Deep discharges, high temperature, charging in extreme temperatures, all this shortens life of NMH.
Remember EPLUS 36V needs 30 cells in series and such pack is as good as the weakest cell in the string of 30.
EMS , manufacturer of EPLUS used the best NMH available - GoldenPeak brand, but still chemistry is chemistry.
From my last conversation with Rick Ruggiero who still services EPLUS /I am afraid not for much longer/ he wants $1,000 for new front hub and
$700-$800 for used ones.

wrandyr

Thanks for the perspective. The way mine is behaving, I suspect one cell is going bad.

If Ric does quit, I hope he auctions off whatever inventory he still has.

powell

You welcome,
going back to your first post.
Of course SOC indicator shows only 3 bars out of 5, because BMS chip does the Columb count of charge going into cells and based on this count SOC displays bars.
Old cells accept less and less charge as they deteriorate. Less charge count, less bars displayed.
I found Eplus SOC display very accurate.
No cheap useless voltage based 3-light battery "indicators" so popular with.....
Sorry but in technical world everything is about comparing. Ebikes are no exception.

Metal Man

Last year my original front hub started to shut off if I ran it on about 7 or higher, below that was fine. The first battery level bar would drop off pretty quick, but the last one would go a VERY long time. My extra (rear) battery has acted normally until recently. I can only run it on maybe level 4 now and it doesn't last real long. They were both doing reasonably until pretty recently. They both have always showed all 5 bars after charging.
I sent Rick an email last week with no response.

wrandyr

I am seeing the same kind of thing. I can go farther if I run it at a lower power setting, and I don't think it's just me pedaling harder. That appears to be the key if you have to nurse a weak battery.

powell

I am approaching 8,000 km on my EPLUS, roughly 1,000km of it on original NMH hub which is history now.
When I did conversion to Lithium A123 my front hub was quite sound charging to 5 bars but showing signs of deterioration.
Even when new my EPLUS felt really strong for first few kilometers , after that I could feel slight reduction in acceleration and max speed dropped.
After conversion to A123 20Ah my EPLUS has insane acceleration in level 9 even after 20km runs and even in level 4 I feel distinctive acceleration.
This acceleration is very well modulated,
far different from lifting wheel, it never happens and why it should??? To injure rider?
Only primitive, badly designed DD hub drives allow for it.

Metal Man

I got my replacement BMS today and have it all put back together. It's nice to have my bike working the way it should.

powell

MetalMan,
so how is your experience in powering your EPLUS on A123 battery?
Comparing with factory NMH.
Also did you touch motor after rides?

powell

So now you have spare hub sitting idle, it is treasure, because of electronics it contains.

powell

So the weather was fine and I took my EPLUS for a ride.
On this very ride my EPLUS reached 8,000 km millage.
It was after work in addition to daily trips to work and back.
Temperature 17C-18C , light wind maybe 10km/hour ,me 66kg with maybe 2kg load, tires pumped to ONLY 50 PSI, no more.
EPLUS moving in complete silence with precise control throttle.
According to CycleAnalist statistics after ride:

DISTANCE: 37.03 km
Ahours used: 8.79
ENERGY/KM: 9.3Whours/km
ENERGY USED: 380.09 Whours
REGEN Ah: 0.890Ah
Amps max : 26.58A
Max. speed: 44.9km/h
I was on power level 4 for half of the trip and on power level 5 on the other half.
Mostly flat with few mild uphills.
What amazed me was almost 1Ah of regen Ahours returned to battery.
It clearly shows advantage of regen breaking, also
pads on my disc BB7 brakes are still very thick , hardly used.
Regen braking - Hardly any gimmick IF properly implemented.

350htrr

Yes, re-gen braking works noticeably on my bike too... One trip where I paid attention to the re-gen feature on my bionX went like this... A 44.4 KMs total trip with 1 bar left on the gauge that it just clicked down to the one bar as I finished the ride. But it also just clicked down to 1 bar at the 36.0KMs part of the trip right at the top of a 4 KM long hill that I was starting to descend, it went to 2 bars and stayed there till 44.4KMs. That works out to 4.4KMs worth of "free" power that I used for the rest of the ride left after the hill, a 10% fill up of the battery in the middle of riding the way I see it.

Sfli3

I just purchased 36v 750 Eplus system. The previous owner had lost the charger. So I had to charge each battery pack individually. I was able to ride for only .5 miles. I recharged the batteries and I was able to travel .75 miles before the display started to blink and shutdown the system. After recharging them again. The display would only blink a couple of times before shutting off. Would this have to do with the PIC? Do I need to have the original Eplus charger?

powell

Sfl3,
Wait
Use only Eplus charger of course
I hope you didn't damaged battery electronics
where are you located?
was the Eplus you bought sitting unused for period of time?
i am the one who converted my Eplus to Lithium
Are you technical person ?
We can work together to make your Eplus work
Battery electronics goes into so called "safe" mode after voltage drop below certain level
EPLUS drive is one of the best in the world - do not give up and sell it, big mistake
if you read all this thread you know that Eplus has still support/service in USA

Metal Man

Has anyone had contact with Rick lately? I sent an email with no response.
I have an extra charger I may sell, I paid Rick a fortune for it last year.

powell

I spoke with Rick Ruggiero in July asking for prices of front hubs.
I called and emailed him.

Sfli3

Hi Powell and Metal Man,

It is great to be able to find someone who has knowledge about these kits. Congratulations to the both of you for the amount of miles that you guys have put on. Very impressive.

Powell, thank you for your response. Here is some information about my kit. The guy that I bought the kit from said that he use to own a business that sold these. He went out of business in 2011. When he moved, that is when he lost the charger. He said that the kit has only 50 miles max on it but it has not been used since 2011. I do want to get this to work but I am scared that I did damage the battery electronics. I used a nimh charger and trickle charged the batteries. Then I was able to charge them again with them hooked together because the charger will charge 30 cells at once. I have been able to get the batteries up to 41v. After the batteries have sat there for a couple of days the charge had dropped to 37v. Is this normal? I have disconnected the batteries from the circuit board about 4 times. I think the after reconnecting the batteries fully charged after 4 times I might have damaged something. The other strange thing is that the battery meter on the display only showed 3 bars each time it worked. I really want to get this to work but I think I'm going to need to buy a new circuit board for the front hub and I have just about reached my budget that I wanted to spend. Was the quote that Rick had given for the new hub with the batteries? I live in NY by the way.

powell

First
Does your Eplus powers up normally when you press POWER button?
Fully charged or not
Once there is no communication between Nickel batt electronics and display/controller /error displayed/- that is indication of damaged Nickel batt electronics

powell

About charger
Every NMH charger should have separate connection to thermistor probe
NMH charging is terminated based on detection of voltage increase and temp incrincrease
So charging without temp probe can be damaging to NMH cells
Yes voltage of Eplus hub can drop quite fast
ISOLATE Allen keys and screwdrivers with el tape except very tip before doing any job on the front hub!!!
Hope it is not too late
Again tell me
does you Eplus power up normally?

Sfli3

Hi Powell,

My nimh charger does have a thermistor probe. I had taped it to the cells when I charged them. Also I had taped the allen wrenches when I had disconnected the battery from the circuit board. This was a very good tip. Unfortunately the display does not power up when it is connected to the battery. I think we have our answer of what is wrong. Do you know what i can test to find out the bad component? Another bit of information is that the battery drains very fast when it is connected to the cicuit board.

powell

Sfli
I see that you know your stuff.
So you disconnected 30 cell string 4 times.
You probably know that every time you disconnected you reset PIC chip on top board/can call it computer or processing board/ or we should think so. .
I also disconnected 30 cell string several times and after connecting back I had several instances that system didn't react to power button press.
Reason? Bouncing connection.
Simply you must make sure that connect ONLY once , no bouncing.
So you press ring connector, hold it firm , insert Allen key and turn until tight with NO bouncing.
PIC chip has several types of resets. But when you bounce connection it becomes confused.
So try it again.
IF you did not cause obvious short like spark, you NMH electronics should be fine.
Just try again.
I must say that it should be very difficult to troubleshoot top board.
When you top board is "done", you would have to buy used hub from Rick Ruggiero who still services Epluses.
But it is I would imagine $500 for used hub.
For new he wanted $1000.
Unless you are really electronic tech with rework station and tons of experience.
EMS designed those electronics really well. State of art I must say, how else those 30 cell strings would last that long?

Sfli3

Hi Powell,
I tried reconnecting the battery as you had mentioned but I didn't have any luck. I suppose the first thing to do is to see how much Rick would be selling one. Maybe he has just the circuit board. Another option would be to buy a controller and use the motor. Have you heard of anyone attempting this? I tried to take apart the motor to see if this would be a viable option but I cannot get the cover off. I know that there is a snap ring but it seems like I might need a puller to take the cover off. I didn't try a puller yet because I didn't want to damage anything. The other thing that I'm concerned about it how to bypass the eplus controller electronics. On a good note, the batteries have been holding a charge of 37.5 and it has been almost 2 weeks since I have charged them. I would say that this is another sign of a bad circuit board.

chvid

Hey Metal...I enjoyed your photo of the cargo hauler. Carrying all that metal is the sort of thing that makes me smile because normal people find it so implausibly impossible. Enjoy the vibe. I'm the same way with my Bob hanging off the trike. It's fun to carry all that stuff.

chvid

Hey Metal...I enjoyed your photo of the cargo hauler. Carrying all that metal is the sort of thing that makes me smile because normal people find it so implausibly impossible. Enjoy the vibe. I'm the same way with my Bob hanging off the trike. It's fun to carry all that stuff.

powell

the way to go with your Eplus is to modify it to work with Lithium just like I did.
You would want to ask Rick to sell you really worn out, weak hub for cheaper.
Of course NMH electronics must communicate with display/controller on RS485 protocol for Eplus to power up.
It means Eplus NMH electronics must be incorporated into Lithium pack.
Quite simply electrically, read my posts?
Wait
I will attach schematics and pictures with instructions.