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Firewheel?


525rider

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Looks similar to my F260. I think the names F520 and F528 are used interchangeably (but not sure). If you decide to order a Firewheel, take note of a couple of things:

-The BMS of the battery/batteries needs to be shunted for the wheel to be safe (otherwise, on low battery, it can cut out when you ask too much current from the battery, ie. fast acceleration or going up a hill)

-The top speed is really higher than stated (vee73 had measured 28km/h with gps & bike computer before it shut down, that was before modding the BMS, which might prevent this), I've seen it stated as 22km/h, 23km/h and 25km/h on different sellers.

-hobby16 has a newer gen Firewheel with shunted BMS, I think he said it goes over 30km/h with a weird sudden fast acceleration when hitting 28km/h

-The shell needs to be opened and you must caulk (with silicone or similar) the battery & main board compartments & wire channels, as they're not properly sealed and the wheel will die after enough water, mud and sand get into the compartments. Some sellers claim it's IP65 -enclosed, hell no :D

-There have been lots of quality issues with Firewheels (mostly dead main boards), the manufacturer does provide new parts according to warranty, but you'll have to wait for them & install them yourselves (although if you buy from a store instead of directly, you probably just return it to the store and wait, they'll probably ship it back to China, and that's going to take a while). Once it works, it's a pleasure to ride (see my Newbies first day on wheel -topics' latest post, I just rode the Firewheel for the first time today).

I bought mine used and vee73 had already done the bms -modification and caulked the new shell. The mainboard has been replaced once, but it's been driven over 200 charge-cycles since with no problem (except replacing the broken shells, vee likes to ride rough in the forests ;)).

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Here's a specification sheet from alibaba, note that the F260 is actually 264Wh (I think I saw it somewhere being sold as F264), so it leads me to believe that the F260 and F520 are used interchangeably with the F264- and F528-markings. And again, they claim the waterproofing to be IP65-rated (which it is not, IP65-enclosing for electronics would mean 100% dust tight and capable of withstanding low pressure water jets from all directions for over 3 minutes per direction), and the max speed is said to be far lower than it really is  ;)  Also, I doubt even I, with my <60kg weight, could ride 35km on the F260, more like 20+km.

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To buy the Firewheel, I used the contact for Jessie Shang that vee posted here, and paid by PayPal. Despite the reliability issues, at least they do support the product when it breaks. At some point I would hope they fix these issues, at least the ones regarding control boards that die. Sealing the unit with silicone is messy but easy to do. Fixing that the right way is going to require re-engineering the molded parts.

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You are right 525rider and if you find the reason, let me know! Even the keywords used to land on our site are mostly F779 and F260... And for your knowledge Jason McNeil, we (Wheelster) have F132 and F260 black and white in inventory here in Montréal. We also have Airwheel X3, Ninebot One E+ and H1 from HX. We keep those brands in house as so far, we found them to be the most reliable in the market. We are a trouble free company and don't want any trouble either. So we keep it simple with tested products.

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I suspect the reason for the F260 being popular is that it is a big enough battery for most people. The longest I have ridden on a single charge so far is 12 miles (measured by Google Tracks) and even then I had 28 percent battery free. My 14-inch 132Wh wheel is totally dead after 5 miles and won't go more. There was a post here saying the Sony cells that the FW uses are better than the Samsungs. I can't imagine people buying the F779 really need that much battery life, and looking at the inner compartments I'd be scared to see where they jammed the display controller board to get all those batteries in there. :rolleyes: Plus the F260 is heavy enough for me.

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@Wheelster: Considering you have first hand information on the current situation and Firewheels' bad track record on quality so far, I'd like to know if the current Firewheels have become any better in terms of battery- and mainboard-compartment sealing and are the mainboards still a bit "touch-n-go" in regards of their quality? Do you test ride all the wheels you sell to see that they at least work (yet of course the mainboard could still fry within the first few days/weeks)? Does the BMS-problem (overdischarge protection triggering on low charge) still exist on newest Firewheels?

On a more personal note, I'm also interested if it's possible to replace the batteries on an F260 with bigger ones (like 528Wh) afterwards, or does it also require the mainboard to be replaced and/or different shell? As far as I've understood, at least the motor is the same on all models, correct me if I'm wrong. Not that I'd probably need it yet, or maybe not even in the long run, after I've found out the real range of the 264Wh, but I might upgrade later on if I see the need... same goes for better (factory-) sealed shells, if such are or become available, and I scratch/damage the current ones badly enough  ;)

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We test every brands we distribute. All in normal riding conditions. We don't drop into the water, the snow, jump down the hill, try the cut-off... only normal ride on many days, many kms...

Honnestly, my partner and I, experimented the Firewheel on dozen's km each (him way more than me). We have no issue at all. About 100 different people tested them at the Wheelster's launching party. The wheels went down on the floor very often. There is some videos of people doing ramps at skate park on our Facebook page. With all this we have a lot of scratches (us and the machines) but really nothing to say on the reliability.

I never wait the complete down charge of the battery so personnaly, I have never experimented the cut-off situtation. That being said, there is a video on our Facebook from a guy doing an EPIC fail on it. I believe it's a cut-off but I wasn't the one riding it at this moment. He says wind... Hard to say.

For the technicals questions of your post, we never had to open any Firewheel so far, I can't say. Bunch of people seems to know way out mre than me! Also, there is no demand for upgrading batteries in America so far. People doesn't even know what is an electric unicycle! :) I am daily working on it to make it known...

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@Wheelster: Thanks for the prompt response! Here's @dmethvin 's experiences: http://forum.electricunicycle.org/topic/244-firewheel-f260-good-news-and-really-bad-news/ . I think that the mainboard problem might  be gone on the newer boards (emphasis mine):

The problems started on Sunday. I took it out for another ride at a local park, after doing a full charge. Started the wheel and heard the "Welcome to Firewheel, Sport Mode" voice greeting. Got on the wheel and rode about 5 feet, then it just cut out. Fortunately I just ran off since I wasn't going fast yet. The thing is totally dead, won't show any signs of life.

Just an update, they asked me to check a specific spot on the controller board and it does seem to be fried

The fact that they pointed me to this spot on the board tells me that they have seen it before. It was hidden behind one of the big capacitors and I had to pry that up to get a good look.

Update: The Firewheel maker is waiting until they get an updated controller board before they send me a part.

Here's dmethvin's repair topic with photos of the insides: http://forum.electricunicycle.org/topic/337-firewheel-f260-rebuild/

I waited a few weeks for a new rev of the board from the manufacturer, which has a slightly different design

The fact that you haven't experienced problems with the mainboards anymore also suggests that this issue has finally been dealt with.  :)

The cut-off can be dealt with by shunting the BMS by the riders themselves (of course, this voids the warranty at least on the batteries, if not the entire wheel, and risks discharging the battery too far, but personally I see it as a better option than the wheel cutting out at 20km/h when doing an acceleration...). But a redesign of the BMS could probably help with it (if they'd made it less sensitive or such, or at least make the wheel give a fair warning when there's a chance that the cutout might occur).

The compartment/wire-channel sealing should be the easiest part, they could probably use just gaskets and some silicone or such... But it sounds like it's getting better, which is a good thing, since these wheels seem to be really good once they work ;)

Edit: Vee73 had to replace the mainboard once on the F260 I now own (this was late last year or early this year, I think), so it's probably still the older design, but it has been working fine with him (4 months/200+ charge cycles => no problems) and with me (granted that I've only had it for a couple of days and only done two longer trips with it).  I recall @hobby16 saying that there have been more dead boards in France where there are more Firewheel users.

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Just placed an order for F528, and the waiting has begun.

​The F528 has a 16S4P battery made of 4 packs of 4S4P in series. Two packs are in the left housing, and two packs (one containing the BMS) are in the right housing. Mark my words if, when you decide to shunt your BMS. Remember that even with a big battery, even with the battery nearly fully charged, the F528 still has the cutoff problem.

A guy has had his shoulder broken because of it : the triggering factors was cold temperatures + climbing a hill. He is now ok with a shunted BMS, his mod pictures here : http://trottinetteselectriques.heberg-forum.fr/sutra19456_solution-probleme-bms.html#19456

As a side not, IMHO, splitting the battery in four separate packs is a horrible engineering choice since it means at lot lot lot of wires to link the cells to the BMS for equilibration. It's a nightmare for assembly, for service and for reliability.

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As a side not, IMHO, splitting the battery in four separate packs is a horrible engineering choice since it means at lot lot lot of wires to link the cells to the BMS for equilibration. It's a nightmare for assembly, for service and for reliability.

​Eww, I was just thinking if I should go ahead and get the bigger batteries for Firewheel instead of the Ninebot... now I wonder if I even could get them installed correctly/cleanly. While it's probably a stupid idea from an engineering standpoint, and the wiring required makes it hard, I think the choice was made due to lack of space (to keep wheel slim) and to keep the wheels' balance in check (ie. equal weight on all sides).

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I think the choice was made due to lack of space (to keep wheel slim) and to keep the wheels' balance in check (ie. equal weight on all sides).

​However, the F260 has its two split packs on the same side of the wheel, near your left leg as you face forward. Of the two on the other side, one is totally empty and the other held the battery display controller on my wheel. Dunno where they put that when there are more batteries.

If I were designing the Firewheel I would make the battery bays and control board closed to the inside and accessible behind the black circular wheel pads. That would allow the wire routing between the two half-shells to be through channels that are mostly closed to the inside. Right now the wires are very exposed, see the photos below showing mud running down into the battery bay through the wire channel. I had to make a custom shield to seal this area.

IMG_20150429_232325.jpg

IMG_20150515_134700.jpg

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​However, the F260 has its two split packs on the same side of the wheel, near your left leg as you face forward. Of the two on the other side, one is totally empty and the other held the battery display controller on my wheel. Dunno where they put that when there are more batteries.

Yes, I've studied the pictures of your repair very closely to see how the wirings etc. go. ;) Hobby16 was talking about the 4-battery pack models (F528, F779), where the packs are spread out evenly to the four compartments. No idea where the display controller goes with all the compartments full either...

If I were designing the Firewheel I would make the battery bays and control board closed to the inside and accessible behind the black circular wheel pads. That would allow the wire routing between the two half-shells to be through channels that are mostly closed to the inside.

​Yes, this would be ideal (and hopefully happens in the future), but even with current shells, the problem could be mitigated/solved by the factory just by using gaskets and/or silicone. Sure it would add a bit more manufacturing cost per unit, but shouldn't break their bank. Most end users never take a look inside it, until it breaks.

Even if the mainboard problems are gone, the sealing's not good yet, after a while we're probably going to hear that lots of Firewheels have broken due to water getting into battery/mainboard.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Btw, so that you don't get the wrong idea, despite all the factory quality problems etc. of the Firewheel I've been complaining about, I'd still probably order a new one if my current broke (and of course do the sealing/bms mod myself, unless they've done something about these) ;)   Just love it  <3

padd3.jpg

 

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Yes! I just went out for a long ride yesterday and my Firewheel F260 is so nice. The contoured side pads and big pedals make it very comfortable to ride. It started getting dark so I even used the headlight. I would think the headlight does not get a lot of use in Finland this time of year. :D

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It started getting dark so I even used the headlight. I would think the headlight does not get a lot of use in Finland this time of year. :D

​I use the light when it's not bright daylight, but not so much to show me the way than make me more visible for others on the roads. It doesn't really get dark this time of year, for example today the sun rose at 3:23AM and sets at 11:14PM (23:14). Farther up north, where vee73 lives, the sun rose at 1:36AM and sets 12:57AM (00:57), so it's only around 40 minutes behind the horizon. Even when it sets, it just goes a bit under the horizon, so it really doesn't get dark. Even farther up north than where vee lives, it doesn't set at all for some weeks. Just wish the weather wasn't so crappy all the time, this must have been the coldest spring/early summer for years (last night, I went for a ride after midnight, and it was +3...4C! On a warm summer, it should have been about +10...15C given the time of year) and it's been raining almost daily for the past month or more... <_<

Edit: If the forecast is right, it looks like it's going to rain until tomorrow evening or until saturday... :angry:

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