Bad charger?

[RockyTop]

I got up this morning expecting to find a fully charged MSuper.  As I headed to the van I noticed that I only had 3 lights blinking. (60%). I plunged the MSuper back up and noticed that the light on the charger stayed green. ( should turn red when charging). I got the multi meter out and tested the charger. I have 84.2vdc on two of the pins. Nothing on the other two. I am not sure what the pin out is so I do not know if that is good or bad. It is the slow charger that came with the wheel. 

[Rhada]

That's normal. Out of the 4 pins only 2 are used. 

Replaced my charging port yesterday, and there too only 2 are connected with wires. The other are unused.

[Chriull]

33 minutes ago, RockyTop said:

I got up this morning expecting to find a fully charged MSuper.  As I headed to the van I noticed that I only had 3 lights blinking. (60%). I plunged the MSuper back up and noticed that the light on the charger stayed green. ( should turn red when charging). I got the multi meter out and tested the charger. I have 84.2vdc on two of the pins. Nothing on the other two. I am not sure what the pin out is so I do not know if that is good or bad. It is the slow charger that came with the wheel. 

Voltage is ok, pinout seems normal - next to check should be the internal wiring and connectors of the EUC. There were already some reports of bad solder joints at the charge plug of GWs.

[RockyTop]

Thanks , I pulled it apart and silver soldered the EUC connection and now it is good. 

I am still going to buy a second charger. The GotWay brick is cheaply made. I think I will buy a fast charger. I would hate to go on an out of town trip only to find that the charger is bad. 

I was in a panic!! My weekend was shot! How can I live without my MSuper!? It is worse than not having a car!  Well? ......Almost. ?

[Tbx Nicolas]

It could also come from unbalanced cell with a voltage difference higher than the BMS can handle, resulting in a shut-off from the bms to avoid overcharging some cells. But givent that you were at 60% I don't think it could be this because the unbalance would be very high...

[Meekfulrider]

I have a similar situation upon MSuperX  100v arrival I took off right Panel to connect the battery. Turn it on and it had 20% battery life according to the Gotway app which is beginning to be frustrating. Anyhow it came with a fast charger 4amp plug it in in about 2 hours later was fully charge and app read 100%.  Rode the MSuper until about 40% then plugged it back in to charge and the next morning it only charge to 70% with the green light on. I read the voltage on the charger LED,and it reads 94.5v but can not understand why it is only reading 70% in the app. I was told to check voltage in the app but cannot find voltage readout in the GW App? 

[LanghamP]

On 8/24/2018 at 8:52 AM, RockyTop said:

Thanks , I pulled it apart and silver soldered the EUC connection and now it is good. 

I am still going to buy a second charger. The GotWay brick is cheaply made. I think I will buy a fast charger. I would hate to go on an out of town trip only to find that the charger is bad. 

I was in a panic!! My weekend was shot! How can I live without my MSuper!? It is worse than not having a car!  Well? ......Almost. ?

Be advised I have had two Gotway and one KS charger go bad on me, all three in a very distinct way.

As I plug the charger into the wall, I hear a pop, and then the smell of burnt plastic comes up.

On the other hand, new chargers only cost $20 and I have been sent free ones after complaining to the seller.

Solution (sorta): I use this 

Century Smart Digital Countdown Timer with Repeat Function https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01D3QEK4E/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_STuOBbF2YB33D

I've been using these for over a year and haven't popped another charger since.

[Meekfulrider]

2 hours ago, LanghamP said:

Be advised I have had two Gotway and one KS charger go bad on me, all three in a very distinct way.

As I plug the charger into the wall, I hear a pop, and then the smell of burnt plastic comes up.

On the other hand, new chargers only cost $20 and I have been sent free ones after complaining to the seller.

Solution (sorta): I use this 

Century Smart Digital Countdown Timer with Repeat Function https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01D3QEK4E/ref=cm_sw_r_cp_apa_STuOBbF2YB33D

I've been using these for over a year and haven't popped another charger since.

So the charger that came with the unit is not the factory charger it is a fast charger I took a multimeter to measure the voltage coming out from the five pin connector and pins 1 and 5 are reading -95.5v,when I reversed the leads the voltage was fluctuating 74v, 84, 94v but not a steady reading. I then decided to check the battery connector to attempt to get a voltage readout and I got 88.5v no matter what way I placed the multimeter leads. Does the battery readout(88.5v)  does that mean the battery is at 90%? If so why is the GW app showing me 40%!

[LanghamP]

8 minutes ago, Meekfulrider said:

So the charger that came with the unit is not the factory charger it is a fast charger I took a multimeter to measure the voltage coming out from the five pin connector and pins 1 and 5 are reading -95.5v,when I reversed the leads the voltage was fluctuating 74v, 84, 94v but not a steady reading. I then decided to check the battery connector to attempt to get a voltage readout and I got 88.5v no matter what way I placed the multimeter leads. Does the battery readout(88.5v)  does that mean the battery is at 90%? If so why is the GW app showing me 40%!

I just stick it in that doesn't mean I know how babies are made.

@meepmeepmayer?? @Chriull??

By the way, all four of my Gotway chargers are/were factory chargers.

[meepmeepmayer]

@LanghamP It's nice that you believe I'm a charger expert Will try my best...

9 hours ago, Meekfulrider said:

I have a similar situation upon MSuperX  100v arrival I took off right Panel to connect the battery. Turn it on and it had 20% battery life according to the Gotway app which is beginning to be frustrating. Anyhow it came with a fast charger 4amp plug it in in about 2 hours later was fully charge and app read 100%.  Rode the MSuper until about 40% then plugged it back in to charge and the next morning it only charge to 70% with the green light on. I read the voltage on the charger LED,and it reads 94.5v but can not understand why it is only reading 70% in the app. I was told to check voltage in the app but cannot find voltage readout in the GW App? 

• That can't quite be possible. 2 hours won't charge from 20% to full. Ideal case, 2 hours * 100V * 4A = 800Wh which isn't 80% of the capacity (which is 1230Wh). So the 100% reading (or the 20% reading) must have been false.
  Also, the last 10% or so will always take longer (like an hour) no matter whether you use a fast charger or a regular one. That also means the 100% doesn't match 2 hours of charging.
• 94.5V is approximately 70% battery, so that matches up. Also makes sense for the charge time (2 hours to go from 20% to 70% is more realistic).
  76.8V is empty, 100.8V is full, and while it's not an exact match to the formula Gotway uses to compute a battery %, you can go linearly between that. So e.g. 88.8V (in the middle) is approximately 50% battery.
  Maybe your charger is defect and does not charge above the 70% you get? Or maybe it has some setting set wrong?
• I recommend using Wheellog (assuming you're on Android) because it shows the battery in 1% increments instead of 10% steps like the Gotway app. Get the Play Store version of Wheellog, and multiply the displayed (false!) voltage by 24/16 (so multiply by 1.5) to get the real voltage. [This is under the assumption it works like with 84V wheels where you have to correct by 20/16=1.2].
• What Gotway app exactly are you using? The latest I know of can be found here, it's the "GotWay 0213.apk" : https://www.facebook.com/groups/gotway/files I don't think the Gotway app displays a voltage at all, don't see one in mine.

1 hour ago, Meekfulrider said:

So the charger that came with the unit is not the factory charger it is a fast charger I took a multimeter to measure the voltage coming out from the five pin connector and pins 1 and 5 are reading -95.5v,when I reversed the leads the voltage was fluctuating 74v, 84, 94v but not a steady reading. I then decided to check the battery connector to attempt to get a voltage readout and I got 88.5v no matter what way I placed the multimeter leads. Does the battery readout(88.5v)  does that mean the battery is at 90%? If so why is the GW app showing me 40%!

Not sure what's going on. The wheel's charge port should show anything between 76.8V (completely empty, won't happen in reality) and 100.8V (full). The charger should always output 100.8V. But I'm no expert!

88.5V should be close to 50% battery. The Gotway app displays in 10% steps so it might round that down to 40%.

--

I think you should ask your seller about this. Do you have a standard charger you can use instead, to test if it works? For me, it looks like your charger is the problem.