V12 HT issue - sudden tilt back and acceleration

[Vichtak]

I was driving at 20kmph in a straight line on a stable gravel road when it suddenly gave me a tilt back and accelerated alone to full speed: the wheel left on its own in a straight line with the rear end rubbing on the ground (mudguard touching the ground).

The tilt back and acceleration was not progressive, they happen in a microsecond.

Is this problem known?

Is the cause known?

 

Context (the 20 min before the problem) :

10 min ride at 25 max on flat, no strong accelerations.

Then a 10 min break, wheel left on during the break against a bench (not on the stand).

The crash happened just after the break, approximately 1 min after starting again.

 

Battery at the time of the crash: 64%.

Current consumption and graph speeds: see attachment, we see that it goes from a normal consumption to 40 amps

Software update: done by the salesman in front of me in the shop when I bought the wheel 2 weeks ago.

Motherboard version: V2 according to the seller (mobility urban French shop)

 

Main settings (see attachment for screenshot of all settings) :

 

Commuting mode enabled.

Split mode enabled (speeding 40%, braking 28%)

Pedal sensitivity: 10%.

inmotion app details :

 

Activated date : 2022-09-28

Main Board : V1.6.19

Driver Board : V4.104.7

BLE(5.0) Board : V2.1.59

Total distance since purchase: 190 km (including 40km on the day of the crash)

Temperature: I didn't read them in detail in the app at the time of the crash but EUCWorld showed 52 degrees.

Battery balance: OK (0.1 volts difference between the pack, the wheel had charged all night the day before)

 

[Vichtak]

attachements : 

https://ibb.co/Jdk0nZh

https://ibb.co/d4rkvxT

https://ibb.co/Wsd38cD

https://ibb.co/2N7tn88

https://ibb.co/7R9tHNS

https://ibb.co/58VyyPd

[supercurio]

Salut @Vichtak!

The exact thing you describe in full details is what happened to Adam (Wrong Way) twice, leading each time to a crash making him fall on his butt.

Inmotion certainly did not fix the issue he experienced then and it's still an issue with the current production model and current firmware 😔

it would probably be advisable for your shop to open the motor and check if everything is as expected in there (hall sensor especially). I personally wouldn't set a foot on it again until the mainboard and possibly the motor are replaced, or a full QC which identifies the mysterious cause of this issue. It will happen again.

Try to see if Inmotion can extract the wheel data lot also, in case the telemetry for this crash is still in there.

 

 

Edited October 10, 2022 by supercurio

[Vichtak]

additional info:

- the trolley handle has Inmotion logo embossed on it, so should be batch 2.

- i did not perform any calibrating (i should have done it because it had strange behavior when turning sharp at low speed but issue pretty disappeared when I changed the balance of the wheel (+4 degrees )

 

[supercurio]

Yes it's necessary to calibrate the wheel for consistent pedal behavior including in turns, instead of setting an offset.

It was the advice Adam got from Inmotion, and then the wheel ran away from him a second time anyway.

Edited October 10, 2022 by supercurio

[supercurio]

I asked Andrey at MyEWheel about Adam's V12 HT which crashed twice and he said that one had 2 separate issues: mainboard and battery.
Both were addressed, and the wheel is ridden without problem nowadays.

[Vichtak]

5 hours ago, supercurio said:

I asked Andrey at MyEWheel about Adam's V12 HT which crashed twice and he said that one had 2 separate issues: mainboard and battery.
Both were addressed, and the wheel is ridden without problem nowadays.

@supercurioDo you know if the mainboard issue was a software issue or hardware issue ? (because i have the last firmware and the wheel is a batch 2 so hardware issue should no be here). It could be a regression in the software...

Edited October 10, 2022 by Vichtak

[supercurio]

The assumption is that the hardware (maybe the IMU sensor?) was bad on the board, and replacing it fixed it.

But talking with friends who own the V12 HT they all said that pedals have their own mind when split mores are active, and Adam (Wrong Way) pointed out that your description matches his experience: light gravel riding.
So I'm honestly not sure. I would certainly suggest a board replacement since it seems it did the trick for MyEWheel.

Inmotion is in the loop on this now, so that should not be a problem.

[Vichtak]

Last news:

• Somebody from InMotion International After-sales Support Contacted me following my post and emitted the hypothesis it could come from the calibration. I'm not yet convinced by this theory (Real investigation must be done) but It's nice from them to come to me (the support functionality in the InMotion app do not work, it says "network error").
• I bring back the wheel to the shop who will send it back to InMotion for investigation, it will take about 3 weeks.
• I exported the V12 logs using the Android InMotion app but was not able to where are located the logs exported on my phone. Maybe the after-Sale support will explain me where to find it.

[Nostris]

Certainly the OP seems to have had the exact same proble as Adam, and in exactly the same circumstances.  The question is, How many others have experienced this problem?

[Vichtak]

hi, i got a first feedback from the shop and InMotion . i put the automatic translation below. My concern about this anwer:

1) most of the parameters mentioned by InMotion are not the ones of my wheel! 

2) InMotion admit there is some dangerous settings allowed by the app that can cause crashes, but they do not provide any details and it's not mentioned in the App or user manual.  

3) InMotion reject the fault on the user

4) InMotion propose a bill to repair some parts but the bill have no details about what parts are concerned.

i answered them on these different points and i'm waiting for their feedback. I will update the post.

Quote

Hello
When you dropped off your V12HT wheel on 12/10/22, you reported that "the machine suddenly went backwards at 20 km/h the customer was driving at a constant speed without violent braking or acceleration causing a fall. 

We have sent the machine to our European Inmotion representative for assessment.

After a series of tests, he gave us his findings.

The parameters of the wheel were modified in an inadequate way by the customer. Once re-parameterized in a standard way the wheel works perfectly and does not show any sign of non conformity. The wheel was tested in different conditions over several kilometers of acceleration and braking. 

The details of the inadequate modified parameters are as follows:

- Max Speed (17km/h) < Speed alarm (55km/h). 
==> This means that the tilt back is engaged as soon as 17km/h and especially before there is an audible alarm.
    It is recommended to always leave an audible alarm before the tilt back so as not to be surprised and therefore to set the max speed higher than the alarm speed. 

- Pedal sensitivity 5%.
    It is recommended to leave this variable close to 100%, otherwise the pedals have a large travel before they cause a wheel reaction.

-Split Ride Mode activated. Braking <Speeding.
The mode is activated with a higher braking force than acceleration force.
 It is recommended to set the braking force higher than the acceleration force or even better to deactivate the mode. In this case braking and acceleration have the same force.

This wrong configuration probably caused the behavior and the crash described. When exceeding the maximum speed set on the wheel, the tilt back (straightening of the pedals towards the rear) was triggered without prior alarm. This corresponds to the description "the wheel has gone backwards". The tilt back is activated to avoid a cut-off when the rider exceeds the maximum speed set.

Please find attached the transcript of the repair estimate for the mudguard and the load cover. Please let us know by return mail if you wish to have these repairs carried out.

Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator (free version)

 

[techyiam]

If what the dealer diagnoses is accurate, then the firmware is still buggy, IMO.

On my V12 (not HT), I have tried many combinations of split modes. Since 1.16.9, everything work normally. 

[Denny Paul]

@Vichtak

Sorry, they gave you that lame response. It's infuriating. How can a product offer a bunch of different settings, then blame you for changing the settings causing the crash. 

If it's unsafe or causes erratic wheel behavior, Inmotion shouldn't allow the setting to be changed to that degree, especially without an override/warning message. 

Edited November 16, 2022 by Denny Paul

[Nostris]

Their reply is interesting and makes sense to be honest. The problem here, imo, is that the instruction / operator manual is simply too vague and simply does not explain sufficiently well how the wheel works, responds and how to properly set it up. There should at least be an in-depth explanation of adjusting the various para…and what effect the have! The V12 has a very large envelope of adjustment, and many options, unlike most previous wheels which you turned on and rode after deciding if you wanted hard or soft mode! 

[kriskova]

Hi @Vichtak!

I'm really feeling your pain cause I'm thinking about buying a V12 HT for weeks now I can imagine how much disappointment would it be for me to have these issues. These problems are the only ones that make me wait. Do we know what was the issue yet? Do you ride the V12 since then?

[versus]

Exactly the same happened to me today. On slight downhill - I felt wheel being pulled under me. I fell on my butt and was wondering what went wrong

I had no weird settings max speed set at 44 km/h and alarms at 37 and 44. No split mode. Pedal sensitivity at 70%. Wasn't going particulary fast at that moment. As soon as my butt hit the ground I remembered this post.

 

I.

Could you please advise what should I do next? What other logs are relevant?

Edited December 25, 2022 by versus

[mrelwood]

16 hours ago, versus said:

Exactly the same happened to me today.

Are you familiar with how a tilt-back feels like? What was the battery level when it happened?

[versus]

Yes, i am familiar how the tilt-back feels. I had it setup for relatively low speeds (low as 45 Km/h, but nowhere near the speed I was travelling at when the incident occured) and have experienced it. Battery was at around 70 percent.

At the time of the crash I was riding on mild downhill where pedals are already tilted-back a bit. I was completely in control of the wheel slightly carving. When all of a sudden wheel just slipped under me accelerating violently and i have found myself on the butt while the wheel proceeded and have stopped on its side (pads played a role), I immediately remembered this post as was reading it prior to my accident and have thought that some wierd settings (however unplausible) might have caused it and that with my "normal" settings i am safe. Unfortunately this was not the case. The spike in the graph speaks for itself. I was nowhere near the acceleration posture depicted. Was riding with more pressure on the back with very moderate speed (around 25 km/h)

Edited December 26, 2022 by versus

[Chriull]

17 hours ago, versus said:

Could you please advise what should I do next?

You could contact inmotion, they can read out some internal data storage which saves such events remotely. Maybe they can analyze some details? 

17 hours ago, versus said:

What other logs are relevant?

If you enabled data logging in EUCWorld you'll have a csv like

on your phone in some of EUC Worlds folder.

Otherwise one can download sutomaticly uploaded tours from the website? With reduced resolution?

As seen with @mlau's logs it did not lead to some definite result - just some ideas/possibilities.

Your linked chart looks strange. As there is  a negative speed spike followed by a full acceleration to lift cut off speed with low amperage this looks like a record of the wheel tumbling after the accident.

[versus]

52 minutes ago, Chriull said:

You could contact inmotion, they can read out some internal data storage which saves such events remotely. Maybe they can analyze some details? 

If you enabled data logging in EUCWorld you'll have a csv like

on your phone in some of EUC Worlds folder.

Otherwise one can download sutomaticly uploaded tours from the website? With reduced resolution?

As seen with @mlau's logs it did not lead to some definite result - just some ideas/possibilities.

Your linked chart looks strange. As there is  a negative speed spike followed by a full acceleration to lift cut off speed with low amperage this looks like a record of the wheel tumbling after the accident.

Yes. The wheel tumbled after the accident. Maybe the fall was caused by this negative speed spike but it definitely accelerated after that. I felt  as if it slipped under me.  The original poster's log looks very similar. Also Adam's (Wrong way) accident is also similar to mine. I didn't hit anything or scraped pedals or similar. Just riding regulary.  Would there be a log in iEUC world if lno logging was selected?

[Chriull]

16 minutes ago, versus said:

Yes. The wheel tumbled after the accident.

Imho the graph show this tumbling?

16 minutes ago, versus said:

Maybe the fall was caused by this negative speed spike

A negative speed spike means the tire spun backwards inbetween. That'll mean the wheel brakes, tilts the pedal forward and send one flying forward.

16 minutes ago, versus said:

 but it definitely accelerated after that.

The acceleration here shows just 10A - that's about the burden of a freespinning wheel? But it's hard to see anything from this graph as the details are very reduced...

16 minutes ago, versus said:

I felt  as if it slipped under me.

That slipping is maybe the key? If the tire lost traction and you were

1 hour ago, versus said:

Was riding with more pressure on the back 

the "free spinning tire, as it had no traction" could have changed direction. Once it had traction again it had to spin up as crazy and overleaned?

... or just some firmware/hardware failure artefact ... ?

Like these reported sudden tiltback activations you mentioned:

16 minutes ago, versus said:

The original poster's log looks very similar. Also Adam's (Wrong way) accident is also similar to mine. I didn't hit anything or scraped pedals or similar. Just riding regulary.  Would there be a log in iEUC world if lno logging was selected?

There is the icon in the top right looking like a sheet of paper with csv written in it. If this is not active logging is disabled and no log is saved. Look at your phone's files if there is some csv from EUC World.

But there is additional tour recording uploaded to https://euc.world/ if you log in with your account you can look if there is something of your ride to download or every upload/logging/recorded is disabled.

Imho contacting inmotion (at ?service@inmotion.com ?) would lead to the best analysis as they get much more detailed data. If they react, still can read your data and do analyze it.

For example an answer from them like here 

 

is not very helpful. On other occasions they did great full detail problem analysis.

Maybe @Cecily Inmotion reads this here and gets in contact with you?

btw: Your reseller as importer/distributer is reliable for any malfunction/fault of the product. Just if you bought fro.outside the EU you are the importer yourself...

[Vichtak]

On 12/23/2022 at 11:53 AM, kriskova said:

Hi @Vichtak!

I'm really feeling your pain cause I'm thinking about buying a V12 HT for weeks now I can imagine how much disappointment would it be for me to have these issues. These problems are the only ones that make me wait. Do we know what was the issue yet? Do you ride the V12 since then?

hi dear kriskova,

After a long time arguing with the InMotion support that it was not just a tilt back they finally changed the Driver board "so that the customer has peace of mind and confidence in his vehicle" but did not identified any issue and persist to explain we have to adjust parameters to make the wheel more stable.

i have no more confidence to ride my V12 even after this board replacement because issue root cause is not identified. i'm selling it.

 Inmotion support tested it and they ride about 7 km without issue (not a proof of safety for me)

Edited December 28, 2022 by Vichtak
typo

[Vichtak]

Hi, here is the end of the story.

i send a long mail to the shop who forwarded it to the support (see below), i explained them again that issue i faced was not just a tilt back or instability. i asked for the exact "safe" parameters that would avoid to have such issue but had not answer about this. My next post will be the anwer of inmotion.

 

Quote

Hi dear InMotion team,

Before closing this case, I have some questions regarding the investigation report received.

Bold text is quotation of the 3 root causes listed in the investigation report. Normal text is my feedback and questions.

 

Max Speed (17km/h) < Speed alarm (55km/h): "It is recommended to always leave an audible alarm before tilt back to avoid being surprised and therefore to set the max speed higher than the alarm speed. "

I agree that such a setting does not allow you to be alerted before the tilt back and I feel that InMotion is suggesting that the tilt back that ejected me was a speed tilt back that would have surprised me as the alarm was not set correctly.

However, the problem occurred at 20km/h, it’s not possible with a Max speed configured at 17Km/h (The max Speed param was configured at 39Km/h)  . Note that after the bug I temporarily changed the max speed (maybe to 17Km/h) thinking to go slowly back on the wheel but finally decided to walk back to not take any risk, I reset the setting I had at the time of the crash before bringing the wheel to the shop.

Moreover, what I experienced was not a speed tilt back (which I know from having experienced it) but a sudden tilt of the wheel of minimum 45° backwards. It’s like a tilt back but violent, happening in a fraction of a second, and with an incredible strong angle. At the same time the wheel accelerated all by itself in a straight line in this 45° inclined position. I would call this and ejection tilt back, and I doubt it’s a feature.

These two things make me think that InMotion didn't have access to the logs of the date and time of the problem because they would have seen that I was driving at 20Km/h (as shown on the EUC world curves below) and that the wheel accelerated very quickly (also visible on the curves).

For all needs, I remind you that the problem occurred between 16:05 CEST and 16:07 CEST on 9 October and I can provide the logs that I had recorded via the InMotion application at around 16:09 CEST. To do so I will just need someone tells me where to find them on my Android phone. I remind you that CEST is French summer time and that France currently uses CET.

Please confirm if logs between 16:05 CEST and 16:07 CEST on 9 October were retrieved and analyzed?

Pedal sensitivity: "It is recommended to leave this variable close to 100%"

If this dangerous wheel behavior is related to this parameter, then what exactly is the range of values that can be safely used?

 

Split Ride Mode enabled. Braking <Speeding: "It is recommended to set braking stronger than acceleration or better still to disable the mode"

I understand here that activating this mode can cause this dangerous behavior. Is this correct?

 

I have also some additional but important questions for which the community is looking for:

I remind that this product is not a toy for us but a mode of transport. The whole community will be interested in this information in order to drive safely, so in general we would like to know:

- What are the exact value ranges that can be used without risk?

- Does InMotion have plans to fix the software/firmware to prevent the user from entering settings that cause this behavior.

- Or better still, will InMotion fix the software/firmware so that these settings can be used safely?

 

[Vichtak]

Here is the answer i got from InMotion,

i'm of course not satisfied by this answer because the root cause is not identified and we got no answers to my questions. 

From my point of view : The support have no expertise or have a very low communication skills. Hopefully this issue has not be reported by many user and this wheel should be considered has safe and i have to be considered has not lucky.

Now i'm selling the wheel.

 

 

Edited December 28, 2022 by Vichtak

[techyiam]

Just curious, which wheel are you going to get that will be more reliable?

Additionally, with any new wheel, you would need to be extra cautious until the wheel is proven reliable.