AliExpress vs eWheels?

[Duf]

It's all about risk tolerance I guess.  Your wheel may never need any parts or work but if it does, for me, I like having someone that actually gives a damn about my satisfaction or lack there of.  Hence, I buy from EWheels.  Nevin from Tec-Toyz has a good reputation as well and I have bought a wheel from him in the past.

[mrelwood]

The shipping time is indeed one consideration as well. 4-5 weeks of eager waiting for your beloved new wheel can be rather frustrating.

While I have no problem doing any repairs myself, if we had a Jason in Finland, I’d have bought some of my wheels from him, even for a few $hundred more.

[Chriull]

On 5/4/2019 at 1:07 PM, nickysneids said:

I'm currently looking to buy an MCM5! Super stoked about, been researching my balls off any although I'm a little apprehensive about the 14" wheel size, everything else seems on par with that I want and I figure if I end up needed to make some long treks in the future I'll just deal with the smaller size. But just found the Tesla on AliExpress with 16" and only $1,122 (sigh), I'm conflicted again...

Anyway, as far as I can tell, eWheels offers a 1 year warranty that's pretty contingent on part availability and voided after any user attempts to repair or dissemble the wheel. Which is fair, but it's a $200 price difference and it doesn't cover accident protection.

With AliExpress, there's no warranty or repair included but the price difference for the MCM5 is ~$200USD and for the Tesla it's ~$300USD.

Does anyone know if it's worth saving the $100-$300 by purchasing through AliExpress and then either DIY repairing or finding a different repair service in the future? Or alternatively, are there any 1-2 year protection plans like this plan at SquareTrade that would be worth looking into? I'm trying to minimize risk relative to cost and as this will be my first big EUC purchase, any help is appreciated!

Just remembered another maybe (financial) advantage, :

Could make up a bit with your cost comparison, if you once sell your wheel within the US.

[nickysneids]

6 hours ago, Chriull said:

Just remembered another maybe (financial) advantage, :

Could make up a bit with your cost comparison, if you once sell your wheel within the US.

Thanks for adding this, that's pretty cool of him!

[nickysneids]

18 hours ago, Jason McNeil said:

There's various advantages & disadvantages to selling/buying either domestically & from abroad. On the one hand, the Ali-Sellers cost of shipping by UPS runs to $250-$300, because of the batteries, they have to be sent as Dangerous Goods. We have the advantage here, in that containerized freight is about a tenth of this cost. Where we're at a disadvantage is the 25% tariff, whereas Customs may not be scrutinizing single packages entering the country from AliExpress... 

Running a parts/service center isn't trivial, with two [currently] full-time employees, site, storage, etc runs into the low five-digits/month— there's still a lot to do to increase efficiency & capability of the facility. For stocking spare parts, our inventory is about $200k; from an Accounting standpoint, this is mostly unproductive capital, since turnover for parts is much slower, & these type of purchases are typically not very lucrative. 

Obviously there's recognition that we have to be in the same ball-park as the AliExpress sellers. With King Song there's confidence that we're getting fair pricing vis-a-vis domestic CN sellers, but with Gotway I'm not so sure.  

Thanks for the reply! You've clearly done a great job producing a quality service and product and I do plan on buying the MCM5 from eWheels. I just sent over an email with a question I have, looking forward to doing business

[Mike Sacristan]

On 5/5/2019 at 11:44 PM, KingOsmos said:

About a month ago I ordered the Gotway MSX 1600wh from Aliexpress for 1 700USD, its been exactly 35 days since the order and I am still waiting. Bought it from an EUC reputable store "Green and fashion travaling store." I am also pretty confident that everything will turn out ok. Although, I am suspecting that I may be paying  some fees this time.

How did this turn out? Did you get your wheel? What was the total waiting time?

[themyst]

Also consider eWheels offers free extras in some cases which shrinks the price differential significantly. 

I’m looking at buying a Gotway Monster 100V $2550 from Aliexpress, vs $2850 from eWheels with free shipping.

eWheels includes a second fast charger and seat, which are worth $180 +/- if purchased elsewhere separately. 

[Mike Sacristan]

2 hours ago, themyst said:

Also consider eWheels offers free extras in some cases which shrinks the price differential significantly. 

I’m looking at buying a Gotway Monster 100V $2550 from Aliexpress, vs $2850 from eWheels with free shipping.

eWheels includes a second fast charger and seat, which are worth $180 +/- if purchased elsewhere separately. 

During singles day the Monster 100v was down to $2000 and it's this that ruins everything for me. I have so much trouble paying more for something when I know that it was cheaper. What used to be a good deal is no longer a good deal because there was a time when it was cheaper.

However... if I did have the luxury of purchasing from eWheels I would definitely do it as long as the price difference wasn't too large. In your case it's a good deal and a no-brainer to get it from eWheels.

[KingOsmos]

On 6/12/2019 at 11:36 AM, Mike Sacristan said:

How did this turn out? Did you get your wheel? What was the total waiting time?

@Mike Sacristan Everything turned out great  Waited exactly 2 months, no extra fees. 

Maybe the only minus is that I got it 3 weeks ago and I got the "old" version without the new light. Hopefully, that's not a big deal in terms of support and spare parts in the future.

The 84V 1600w/H is amazing. Your videos have actually been an inspiration for me and I have to agree with all the points you made in the videos.

What do you think will be an approximate total mileage for the battery before it has to be swapped?

[Mike Sacristan]

1 minute ago, KingOsmos said:

@Mike Sacristan Everything turned out great  Waited exactly 2 months, no extra fees. 

Maybe the only minus is that I got it 3 weeks ago and I got the "old" version without the new light. Hopefully, that's not a big deal in terms of support and spare parts in the future.

The 84V 1600w/H is amazing. Your videos have actually been an inspiration for me and I have to agree with all the points you made in the videos.

What do you think will be an approximate total mileage for the battery before it has to be swapped?

Awesome man! Great to hear and thanks so much for your kind comment.
Don't worry about not getting the new tail light it's a total non issue. I'm pretty sure that the rest of the MSX 84v is the same.

Your battery will outlast the MSX.

If we look at it from the worst case and count a 100% to 0% discharge as 50km and battery degradation setting in after only 300 full discharges/charges that would be 15000km.
Degradation means capacity goes down to 80% but would only be getting 40km per charge.

If we make the numbers more normal we would get 75km and 56km.
Also we will never really do 300 full discharges unless we ride the battery from 100 to 0 every time.

My MSX is now approaching 3500km. I truly doubt I will still be riding it after 15000km (assuming 50km per charge) and with the normal number (75km per charge) 22500km. That means that I will have to do everything I have done with it 4 more times. Which will take 16 more months if the world is linear. It will likely take 2 more years.
January 11th until May 11th was total 2000km. May 11th to June 11th was another 1000km.

No matter what I do the battery will surely outlast the wheel.

https://eunicycles.eu/en/news/wszystko-o-bateriach-li-ion-w-monocyklach-elektrycznych

[mrelwood]

On 6/20/2019 at 11:54 AM, Mike Sacristan said:

No matter what I do the battery will surely outlast the wheel.

In principle, yes. It doesn’t seem to be a perfect world though, as I’ve learned that my 16S seemingly has it’s second dead cell despite me having used all my knowledge about preserving battery life: I only charged to 100% if I was going for a ride in a few hours, balance charged at least every ten cycles, and stored at 40-60% for winter months.

The wheel has 9000+km on it, and has been used very little for the last 12 months (spent at 40% charge).

The only thing that can be learned though is that even taking good care doesn’t ensure a long battery lifetime.

Just bad luck? I don’t know.

[Mike Sacristan]

1 hour ago, mrelwood said:

In principle, yes. It doesn’t seem to be a perfect world though, as I’ve learned that my 16S seemingly has it’s second dead cell despite me having used all my knowledge about preserving battery life: I only charged to 100% if I was going for a ride in a few hours, balance charged at least every ten cycles, and stored at 40-60% for winter months.

The wheel has 9000+km on it, and has been used very little for the last 12 months (spent at 40% charge).

The only thing that can be learned though is that even taking good care doesn’t ensure a long battery lifetime.

Just bad luck? I don’t know.

Exactly. So trying to preserve maximum battery by wanking around and using it between 80% to 20% is a waste of time. Other things beyond our control will happen before the battery dies because of usage cycles. Then of course it never hurts to learn a little about basic battery care such as not storing it in a warm place at 100% charge for one year. Or storing it at -10C.

I was riding my Onewheel+ XR and when the battery was at 22% it said "i'm out of juice". Lovely. One or more of the cells had a deeper discharge and so the board just quit. According to Future Motion this can be resolved by keeping it in the charger for 48 hours. I tried it and it worked and was able to use the Onewheel down to 3% on my next run. It happened another time after that where it said it was out of juice at 17%. This time I charged it up and left it in the charger for an extra 2 hours which I figured would be enough to balance it out. It worked fine as well and I was able to run the board down to 7%.

How did you determine the dead cell and did you try to to leave it charging for a longer duration?

[mrelwood]

8 minutes ago, Mike Sacristan said:

How did you determine the dead cell and did you try to to leave it charging for a longer duration?

Charged it overnight and loaned it to a friend, who then got lousy mileage compared to another 16S on the same group ride. The guys weigh roughly the same.

A few days later this friend overleaned on the wheel, despite riding more carefully than usual since the bad range had already hinted us that something was wrong.

I will examine and measure the cells once I get the wheel back, but I guess he still gets some use out of it while waiting for a new board for his main wheel.

[Planemo]

25 minutes ago, Mike Sacristan said:

Exactly. So trying to preserve maximum battery by wanking around and using it between 80% to 20% is a waste of time.

Possibly the best quote of the year.

[Lucas Alexander Oliver]

I Just bought a 2000$ nikola from @Jason McNeil  at Ewheels.com and only got 60 miles on it before the board died... i emailed him while on the side of the road and called an uber.. he called me within two minutes. thats customer service like i've never heard of. He had my wheel 100% repaired and back to me in 9 days!!!!!!! If that security and convenience isn't worth a cpl hundred dollars(not to mention you get your wheel in 2-4 days instead of 4-6 weeks) then I don't know what could be better!!!!  Thank you so much Jason you went above and beyond, and i will never buy a wheel from anywhere but from jason at Ewheels !!

[Mike Sacristan]

2 hours ago, mrelwood said:

Charged it overnight and loaned it to a friend, who then got lousy mileage compared to another 16S on the same group ride. The guys weigh roughly the same.

A few days later this friend overleaned on the wheel, despite riding more carefully than usual since the bad range had already hinted us that something was wrong.

I will examine and measure the cells once I get the wheel back, but I guess he still gets some use out of it while waiting for a new board for his main wheel.

Ouch. My greatest annoyance in life is things that don't work as they should. My second is the fear of things breaking or getting ruined. This even applies to clothes in some cases. Like an expensive leather jacket for instance. I am slowly recovering though and I am getting better at accepting things as they are despite their imperfections.

[mrelwood]

13 minutes ago, Mike Sacristan said:

My greatest annoyance in life is things that don't work as they should.

Meet enough of those things and one is forced to let go. Unfortunately I’m pretty familiar with the subject.

15 minutes ago, Mike Sacristan said:

getting better at accepting things as they are despite their imperfections.

In this light, you were surprisingly cool with your MSX review already! 

[fryman]

2 hours ago, Lucas Alexander Oliver said:

I Just bought a 2000$ nikola from @Jason McNeil  at Ewheels.com and only got 60 miles on it before the board died... i emailed him while on the side of the road and called an uber.. he called me within two minutes. thats customer service like i've never heard of. He had my wheel 100% repaired and back to me in 9 days!!!!!!! If that security and convenience isn't worth a cpl hundred dollars(not to mention you get your wheel in 2-4 days instead of 4-6 weeks) then I don't know what could be better!!!!  Thank you so much Jason you went above and beyond, and i will never buy a wheel from anywhere but from jason at Ewheels !!

Wow, keep up the great work @Jason McNeil

[erk1024]

On 5/5/2019 at 8:39 AM, HarpMudd said:

Jason was awesome last summer when I was trying to make a decision to buy my first wheel.  Talked to him on a phone and exchanged a few emails.  He usually bundles a freebie such as wrist guards with his wheels and also works to cut you a deal on a fast charger.  My experience was excellent. 

+1 vote for the fast charger. The eWheels fast charger is 3x faster than the stock one and has the option of charging to 80% or 90% (although you should charge to 100% once in a while to balance the batteries!) As has been mentioned on this forum, 5A is not really "fast charging". There are parallel banks of batteries, and each bank could take something like 10 amps each. So it's like the stock charger is a SLOW charger at an anemic 1.5A, and the 5A eWheels charger provides more normal charging rate for the batteries.

Edited June 23, 2019 by erk1024
fixed text issues

[MaxLinux]

1 hour ago, fryman said:

Wow, keep up the great work @Jason McNeil

@Jason McNeil has earned his success through countless stories like this one. His stellar service and support is the element missing from most companies nowadays. I hope someday an article or book will be written about Jason's company, or maybe a chapter in a business textbook.

[HippoPig]

On 6/20/2019 at 9:40 AM, KingOsmos said:

@Mike Sacristan Everything turned out great  Waited exactly 2 months, no extra fees. 

Maybe the only minus is that I got it 3 weeks ago and I got the "old" version without the new light. Hopefully, that's not a big deal in terms of support and spare parts in the future.

The 84V 1600w/H is amazing. Your videos have actually been an inspiration for me and I have to agree with all the points you made in the videos.

What do you think will be an approximate total mileage for the battery before it has to be swapped?

I’m waiting for mine from him at the moment.

 

reassuring to hear it arrived 😂

 

confirmed mine has the new front and rear light, but it’s not a difference to worry about I don’t think.

[ride INMOTION]

this is a good topic thread

[Planemo]

Holy thread resurrection batman!

[FiZ_]

I get 2 wheels: Inmotion V10F from AliExpress, each for 1000$. Here in Poland price is 1500$+. So decision was clear. Waiting for 45 days for delivery, but everything works well. I'm happy!