Do you have a good top charge board from the 2nd bike? I don't know if anyone has spare boards. The former employee, Rick, has some parts and knowledge but charges considerably for parts and services. Lots of E+ were sold in S.Cal so whole bikes with dead batteries are the best source.. Some on this forum have several. Some original owners, bought several hubs/batteries when they were available, since rebuilding with new NiMH is so expensive and difficult.

I converted mine to Lithium (with Powell's help) and it's my favorite ride, but it has some quirks. Charging a lithium battery using the charge boards in the front hub won't work as lithium charging is more complex and dangerous. Continuing to use NiMH is too heavy and limiting. I use Li batteries that must be mounted on an external charger (Makita), so the charge boards don't have the continuous voltage they expect. But, the consequences are manageable.....usually an error message when power is restored and the state of charge display doesn't work. Disconnect/reconnect the display ususally clears the error and a simple volt/watt meter gives SOC. Otherwise the bike performs all other functions perfectly. I'll ride and enjoy, but if a charge board, the display or the controller inside the hub breaks, I have to scrap the bike. No parts or documentation. Since I've never been able to open the hub motor I couldn't even use that: bypassing the internal controller replacing with an external one. I've opened and repaired dozens of hub motors, got all the tools but this one stumps me.

My recommendation for you. If you got a 2nd bike with a good top charge board, use it. If not, see if Rick has any. Powell understand circuit board components, maybe he'd look at your board. Have a good EE see if he can find the damage on the board. Please report any successes.

If you get a good board and all works with your new NiMH cells, use the bike. If you need more than 16-20 miles, you can connect a lithium battery in parallel. Before I got rid of the front hub, I connected 36v10.5ah lithium battery in parallel with the NiMH. The bike already has the wiring for a 2nd battery. It worked fine and more than double the range. See earlier post in this thread for details.

If you have a good board, you'd be welcome to drop in. I'm less that 2hrs south in San Diego. Good luck.