God Mod- Buyer Beware.

[Chriull]

2 hours ago, conecones said:

Other than price and size(diameter), what would be advantages of using multiple smaller capacitors (such as this 2200uF) vs one larger capacitor (such as this 6800uF)?

Seems the ripple current per capacitance is a little bit better for the 2200μF caps.

Could likely be that the buffer capacitors are overburdened by ripple current with some wheels in some situations.

But connecting more of these caps together will create more parasitic inductances which work against the intended benefits.

And as you mentioned 

2 hours ago, conecones said:

I would trust a single large capacitor with solid screwed terminals more than a cluster of smaller capacitors with soldered terminals and wiring throughout held together by glue.

But as realized with inmotion wheels using many smaller caps along the copper bus which divides the supports to "each" mosfets is a great solution.

 

[Chriull]

5 hours ago, sbb said:

.

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B08L3FRKYF/ref=sspa_dk_detail_0

240 kbit storage depth is very little. But there are for sure some other usable products for this purpose.

 

[GoGeorgeGo]

6 hours ago, conecones said:

Other than price and size(diameter), what would be advantages of using multiple smaller capacitors (such as this 2200uF) vs one larger capacitor (such as this 6800uF)?

Since this is a high risk mod dealing with unprotected/unfused high voltage wiring to the battery, wouldn't it make more sense to reduce number of parts as much as possible? I would trust a single large capacitor with solid screwed terminals more than a cluster of smaller capacitors with soldered terminals and wiring throughout held together by glue.

price, the small caps are 7-10$ . that cap is 75$

[Paul A]

11 hours ago, sbb said:

definition of "expert"

 

Qualifications are not necessary.

A pair of spectacles and white lab coat will do.

 

 

Declan as he appears on own videos.

No spectacles.

[Paul A]

Adding a True Super Capacitors to your Electric Unicycle. EUC Upgrade.

EUC UPGRADES

12Likes

45Views

Mar 12023

Will it work with a true super capacitor added to your EUC wheel.

 

 

[techyiam]

5 hours ago, Paul A said:

Adding a True Super Capacitors to your Electric Unicycle. EUC Upgrade.

  ...

Will it work with a true super capacitor added to your EUC wheel.

This is the question I am hoping Kevin will answer with positive results. 

I still have Kevin's onboard capacitor mod on my Abrams. The only difference is that he added 2 cap's, and I added 4. So far, I have experienced of no negatives, and only positives. And the positives is too good for me to ignore, so I don't plan to remove the mod.

With regards to the onboard capacitor mod he did for his own Abrams, he tested his mod first on his Abrams for months before he shared his design on YouTube.

With Kevin's Super Capacitors mod, he is doing the same thing. He will be testing his mod idea on the various wheels that he has access to. If he finds some useful benefits, then he may share his mod design with us.

He is the one putting in all the effort, money and taking all the risks. If it doesn't work out, we lose nothing. Additionally, he shares his mod design at no cost. Kudos to Kevin for his efforts.

I speculate that the Abrams that he tested his Super Capacitor mod with in the above video is his own Abrams. And his own Abrams has his onboard capacitor mod installed already. I am speculating that he will be testing his Super capacitor mod in conjunction with his onboard capacitor mod. If Kevin reports useful benefits from his super capacitor mod on his Abrams, I will be excited to see whether it will be worth the extra expense to install the super capacitor mod on my own Abrams.

Note also in his initial God-Mod video, that he was to test the God-Mod on various wheels. But then it went quiet. And it appears he has lost interest in the God-Mod now, and has moved on to his own Super Capacitor Mod.

Me thinks he didn't get enough benefits from the God-Mod, and so he didn't want to make a follow up video, since he is the type of person who doesn't say anything if he doesn't have something good to say.

[mrelwood]

41 minutes ago, techyiam said:

So far, I have experienced of no negatives, and only positives.

In my understanding the only actual change a capacitor mod brings is that the ride modes get harder. What if you’re already satisfied with the ride modes, does a cap mod bring any other changes?

[Uras]

17 minutes ago, mrelwood said:

In my understanding the only actual change a capacitor mod brings is that the ride modes get harder. What if you’re already satisfied with the ride modes, does a cap mod bring any other changes?

I have a limited understanding of electrical things. I understood that a capacitor just stores electricity (battery power), but it can discharge at greater amount than the actual battery pack. It's a short term thing. I also wonder, if the wheel is working hard and drains the capacitor while it is still working hard, then the capacitor is no longer useful at that point (continuous high speed etc). It seems it would buy you time / give that instant boost of power when the wheel is working in traffic or on a technical trail for example. The capacitor would charge up again while the wheel isn't working flat out; while braking etc. It would probably help me on some of the technical climbs I do, almost stopping before climbing over a baby head size rock or small log. All that high torqueing from nearly stopped. Would the capacitor charge up in those moments leading up to a full stop prior to a manouvre requiring explosive power (lifting over the rock / log)? Maybe this is the type of situation where it would work best - stop and go hard situations. I'm only theorizing here based on my limited knowledge. I could understand some positives with no negatives at this point.

Edited March 1, 2023 by Uras

[mrelwood]

11 minutes ago, Uras said:

I understood that a capacitor just stores electricity (battery power), but it can discharge at greater amount than the actual battery pack

At greater speed actually. Yes, that’s how capacitors work. But you can discharge the capacitors in a few milliseconds, so the practical usability of the added “power” isn’t quite clear. A change in pedal modes is a big deal though, and if someone has found the medium mode to their liking, installing a capacitor mod would seem like a bad idea.

[Uras]

37 minutes ago, mrelwood said:

But you can discharge the capacitors in a few milliseconds

Yeah, the dude in the most recently posted video used capacitors that stored a fair bit more juice I think. Perhaps he bought a few seconds, or a second of explosive use? I suppose that is what we don't know right now or yet; what is the ideal amount of capacitor for a given wheel before diminishing returns kick in. Or it might be more versatile than that simply based on cost; the one capacitor bank will give varying returns depending on wheel (motor wattage, battery wattage etc). I suppose that as the capacitor bank gets larger that it will take longer to charge up too - although that would seem to be better than a smaller bank that charges much quicker and then discharges in an instant (what we have now?). Perhaps the only limiting factor to capacitor amount is physical size and cost?

I can guess at what you're saying about pedal mode - that extra capacitance will possibly make the current mode more abrupt while it was in effect? I could imagine getting used to that intuitively after a little while - but that is only in my imagination at this point . I could also imagine that it might not have an effect, for example can it exceed the standard explosiveness of the wheels original capacitors, or does it supply the same explosiveness but just last longer? Our wheels standard capacitors must have the same (or similar) short term effect on pedal mode now. They run out after a given time then we're just on whatever the batteries are capable of. Do we notice this in the pedals? Personally, I don't, but then I don't notice any difference between the pedal modes anyway 

Edited March 1, 2023 by Uras

[Uras]

Reading through the comments of the last posted video (above), George Berven mentioned this: "The greatest potential of this evolution is not cut-off protection from over-torque, voltage sag or battery over-current (which are benefits) but rather it's "range extension" or a reduction in battery sizing possible through an increased regenerative efficiency. (Tesla has done the math on this."

He goes on to elaborate on this some more. It still seems that (given his points) that this would be more beneficial in stop go type situations (or slow down speed up)

 

[mrelwood]

3 hours ago, Uras said:

Yeah, the dude in the most recently posted video used capacitors that stored a fair bit more juice I think. Perhaps he bought a few seconds, or a second of explosive use?

He got about a minute of power on time with a few watts of consumption. Let’s say (1/60)x2W = 0.033Wh. That’s not much. When the consumption is 2000 times higher at 4000W, it would likewise last 0.03 seconds. Like I think it was@GoGeorgeGo who mentioned, that the cost and size would be better used for adding actual batteries in parallel.

3 hours ago, Uras said:

I suppose that as the capacitor bank gets larger that it will take longer to charge up too

It will, yes. Which can create situations where the regular capacitor bank would provide power, but the “super capacitor” does not.

3 hours ago, Uras said:

I can guess at what you're saying about pedal mode - that extra capacitance will possibly make the current mode more abrupt while it was in effect?

@GoGeorgeGo described in his video that the 7000 something uF capacitor bank he used made the soft mode behave like a medium mode, and tightened the medium mode as well. But that the hard mode didn’t have clear differences.

 What concerns me is that the original capacitance value could have been carefully selected for the PWM switching to operate in a certain way, but a much larger bank would not operate in a way that’s desired regarding the charge-discharge timing. Which downsides would we be facing if this was the case?

3 hours ago, Uras said:

I don't notice any difference between the pedal modes anyway 

How is that possible?? For the 14D I can see his it can be harder to tell, but the 16X should be pretty clear. You know that you do need to be stopped in order to change the mode on a KS?

Edited March 1, 2023 by mrelwood

[chanman]

7 hours ago, Uras said:

Perhaps he bought a few seconds, or a second of explosive use

Definitely not. I did math earlier in the thread and even with a big supercap bank (which as other people have mentioned has issues, like needing a BMS) you're maybe getting a few hundred joules of extra storage before the voltage drops below the battery level. That's for example a few KW for 0.1 seconds.

[techyiam]

8 hours ago, mrelwood said:

In my understanding the only actual change a capacitor mod brings is that the ride modes get harder. What if you’re already satisfied with the ride modes, does a cap mod bring any other changes?

I can't speak for anybody else, or for another wheel. I can only speak for myself on my Abrams. I am not a big nor heavy guy. And I am still using stock power pads with non-slip carpet tape taped over it. Also, remember that this is an "onboard capacitor mod", not a "parallel connected to battery capacitor mod".

After the mod, the pedal modes works very similar to before. It dips very similarly to before without mod. And the ride is as cushy as before in Soft mode, less so in Medium mode, and harsh in Strong mode.

After the mod, the motor sounded more refined. It makes considerably less noise, and is even smoother. If anyone who have not ridden on a 22" wheel before, the first time you get to ride it on a road, you would noticed the supreme smoothness. Well, after the mod, it is even more so.

For me, the biggest performance gain comes from much improved pedal sensitivity, or response. Maybe if I was a big heavy guy with super duper power pads, it would matter less.

Below is an update I posted in the Abrams thread soon after the mod with 4 additional capacitors. I would say now the effort to brake on my Abrams is no more than on my V12 with Inmotion branded power pads and spike pedals. However, the braking modulation, progression, and power is better on my Abrams. To accelerate like my V12, I need to put my weight on the front pads on my Abrams. But the effort isn't much more.

 

On 12/19/2022 at 6:44 PM, techyiam said:

Another quick update on my Abrams. 

I have just become a bigger Guinea pig. I added two more capacitors to my controller. This is equivalent to adding four capacitors to a stock Abrams. Since Kevin only added two, and I haven't come across anyone else adding four, I am now in uncharted territory.

To my disappointment, pedal sensitivity did not improve further. I think I am now getting into territory of diminishing returns. The motor maybe a tad smoother and quieter when accelerating from rest, hard to tell though. However, I haven't encountered any issues. I think I will keep this configuration for now.

Another thing that I did was to play with the stock pads placement. I decided to place them lower. This notion came from my experience with the Inmotion branded pads on my V12. As it turns out, it got worse.

The way I figured was that on a 22" wheel, it would require more rider input than on a 16" for the same acceleration. Pedal sensitivity can help, but only up to a certain point. After that, the rider needs to either lean more, use more leverage, or both.

On the V12, with the braking pads, I don't really need to lean too much backwards to get decent braking performance. On the other hand, on the Abrams, sometimes I need to lean backwards more, and I lose balance. So for the Abrams, either I use more leverage, or use a padding system that locks my feet in, allowing me to lean way over but not lose balance and fall off. I guess there is a third option theoretically, and that to carry weights on me, or eat all my meals at fast food joints. 🙂

The Abrams is a tall wheel; it significantly taller than the V12. If I can grip the top with my knees and lean forward, I can get the Abrams to accelerate.

When I first got my Abrams, I wanted to experiment riding it padless. Hoping on, right away I realized that my body weight alone on the pedals was not going to generate enough torque to cause the wheel to accelerate or brake, at least, not in a significant way. This included leaning as much as I could, moving my abdomen forward, and standing on the balls of my feet. As a next step, I decided to try non-slip carpet grip tape at the top of each side where my knees make contact with the sides of the wheel. This helped greatly. But that means my legs would have to be squeezing the wheel. Nevertheless, I test rode the Abrams around the neighborhood, and beyond during off hours when there was no traffic.

Next, I added the stock pads. Initially, they didn't really help that much because my legs would just slide past them.

What made a big difference was to cover the stock pads with non-slip carpet tape. I also added the non-slip tape above the pads where my knees would make contact with the controller housing.

This setup works best if you ride with straight legs. This implies that your inner knees or lower legs have toughen up, and no longer hurts when you squeeze the wheel with your legs. If you bend your knees, then your legs have a tendency to slide past the pads.

That's where I am at now.

In the future, I may consider putting on a different padding system, and have my feet locked in.

 

[mrelwood]

 

4 minutes ago, techyiam said:

After the mod, the pedal modes works very similar to before. It dips very similarly to before without mod.

 

4 minutes ago, techyiam said:

For me, the biggest performance gain comes from much improved pedal sensitivity, or response.

Aren’t the above quotes contradicting each other though? After all, the ride mode settings are called pedal sensitivity on some wheels.

 And since the only thing that even can change the ride feel is how the pedals tilt during acceleration and braking.

 Hence I want to ask you, what do you specifically mean when you say pedal sensitivity?

 

[techyiam]

11 minutes ago, mrelwood said:

Hence I want to ask you, what do you specifically mean when you say pedal sensitivity?

Fair question. 

I know that you have been associating pedal sensitivity to pedal dipping.

But through my struggle with my V12 lack of braking power, after much trials and tribulations, I came across the experience that pedal sensitivity means just that. It is like an amplifier where the gain has been increased. The pedal doesn't dip any further, but the wheel would accelerate or brake better for the same rider input.

I did something that was not documented nor have I read on social media. The procedure is outlined below.

I don't know how many profiles are there. But it you keep repeating the procedure, there will be one profile where the pedal sensitivity is significantly stronger, and the wheel doesn't wobble. When I say increase in pedal sensitivity, I mean for the same rider input, and dipping angle, the wheel would accelerate harder.

My V12 doesn't wobble on acceleration nor under hard braking. If I do a recalibration, I lose all the gains and back to a normal V12.

 

On 8/2/2022 at 1:22 AM, techyiam said:

Has anyone experimented with the following :        (WARNING: This simple procedure can make your V12 perform worse and be less stable.)

With the wheel off, press and hold down the power button.  Keep holding down the power button. Eventually (in less than 30 seconds or so), it will beep once and the shell will start to rotate on it's own (the euc stays stationary relative to the ground) . The rotation can be clockwise or anti clockwise, it doesn't matter. Continue to hold down the power button. It will beep two more times. After the 3rd beep, the euc will stay at its rotated orientation, and start to move relative to the ground. Release the power button. If the shell rotated backwards, it will now travel backwards, or vice versa. The euc will travel between 15 to 20 feet on it's own. Then the motor will no longer supply torque to the wheel for motion, but the euc still self-balances, and will returns to it's normal non-rotated orientation. 

[mrelwood]

1 hour ago, techyiam said:

I know that you have been associating pedal sensitivity to pedal dipping.

Pedal dipping often refers to tilting forward while turning. Pedal sensitivity refers to the ride mode setting. High sensitivity = hard mode, and so on.

But you are somehow confused about what’s actually happening:

1 hour ago, techyiam said:

The pedal doesn't dip any further, but the wheel would accelerate or brake better for the same rider input.

That right there is not physically possible. The wheel either balances or it doesn’t. It can’t accelerate more for the same amount of lean, because that would make it tilt backwards.

 The wheel has just a single function: to stay upright. And it has only a single means of doing that: to spin the tire. It can’t separate the two. It either balances by accelerating as much as is required, or it doesn’t balance.

1 hour ago, techyiam said:

and the wheel doesn't wobble.

Are you saying that the firmware can somehow prevent wobbles? Or is it perhaps just a setting that you feel more comfortable in?

1 hour ago, techyiam said:

When I say increase in pedal sensitivity, I mean for the same rider input, and dipping angle, the wheel would accelerate harder.

That is not physically possible. It would be called a tilt-back, and I’m sure that’s not what you mean.

[Uras]

9 hours ago, mrelwood said:

How is that possible?? For the 14D I can see his it can be harder to tell, but the 16X should be pretty clear. You know that you do need to be stopped in order to change the mode on a KS?

thanks mrelwood - I have troubleshot this with you and others in the past. I actually questioned whether these models used modes at all. Maybe it is something they got rid of in recent update? The wheels work and at this point we don't know what we're missing, which might be nothing. EG wrongway thought that ks hard mode is equivalent to med mode on other brands; that was from a couple of years ago. Either way changing modes, while stationary, powering on / off, checking again in the app etc has no discernable effect for us. I have left them on hard just in case - I could use harder at times, especially when climbing from a near stall or stall.

I am thankful for your contributions here and on youtube - you continue to enlighten me (and others I hope) . I have mentally dismissed my interest in capacitors and will move on.

Edited March 2, 2023 by Uras

[Uras]

3 hours ago, techyiam said:

I did something that was not documented nor have I read on social media. The procedure is outlined below.

I don't know how many profiles are there. But it you keep repeating the procedure, there will be one profile where the pedal sensitivity is significantly stronger, and the wheel doesn't wobble. When I say increase in pedal sensitivity, I mean for the same rider input, and dipping angle, the wheel would accelerate harder.

have you posted this in a v12 forum techyiam? It's a great find - it's the sort of thing I'd use.

[techyiam]

1 hour ago, Uras said:

have you posted this in a v12 forum techyiam? It's a great find - it's the sort of thing I'd use.

Yes. In my above post, that quotation is my post from the V12 thread.

A heads-up though.

There are probably between 15 to 30 profiles. And there is only one profile that is so special. 

Before you switched to the next profile, make sure you are well verse with your baseline.

Ride it and get to know how your wheel rides. The pedal sensitivity will improve markly, along with the lack of wobbles. The V12 has a tendency to wobble under hard braking, especially above 50 km/h. So get familiar with your settings. Go through the procedure and change to the next profile. Test for acceleration, and hard braking above 50 km/h. You will find your V12 no longer wobbles or a lot less. Braking should also be significantly stronger. When you find a significant improvement, stop the process. If you missed it, you will have to go through the trial and error search for the special profile all over again.

Do you own a V12?

Edited March 2, 2023 by techyiam

[techyiam]

12 hours ago, mrelwood said:

That is not physically possible. It would be called a tilt-back, and I’m sure that’s not what you mean

Before we continue, let's make sure that we are on the same page.

You are saying it is not possible because the wheel self balances itself by accelerating or decelerating so that the reactional torque of the motor negates the rider's imbalance generated torque. That is why you say if the wheel accelerates more than what is required to negates the rider's generated torque, the rider would be tilted backards.

Can we agree on this first? 

[techyiam]

12 hours ago, mrelwood said:

Are you saying that the firmware can somehow prevent wobbles? Or is it perhaps just a setting that you feel more comfortable in?

Yup. That is exactly what I observed. 

Both the pedal sensitivity and wobbles reduction thru firmware was also observed by another rider. 

I am not here to convinced anyone. It is more about sharing my data point.

It has nothing to do with feeling more comfortable. The wobbles either are greatly reduced, or plainly go away. It is a night and day difference.

If it wasn't for this undocumented phenomenon, my Abrams would have blown away the V12.

Edited March 2, 2023 by techyiam

[Robse]

Wheels do not start wobbles by themselves - there must be an initial wrong movement that via an energy input (rider's vibration in the legs) can result in a progressively progressing oscillation (sideways). You typically see more wobbles with riders who are tired in the legs, or cold (and shivering a bit from the cold) which makes me think about why you have big caps  in old-fashioned analog power amplifiers: To prevent distortion = unwanted oscillations in the signal you send to the speakers. Perhaps the increased capacity causes the power supply to the motor to be more "smooth", and that you thus achieve a quieter smoother engine run, and thus experience fewer vibrations that can lead to wobbles?

[mrelwood]

31 minutes ago, techyiam said:

Before we continue, let's make sure that we are on the same page.

If I understood your description correctly, then yes, we agree.

 

19 minutes ago, techyiam said:

Both the pedal sensitivity and wobbles reduction thru firmware was also observed by another rider.

Do you mean that the pedal sensitivity was also lowered? Because that would explain some things. But earlier you said that there was no change to the pedal behavior.

 

19 minutes ago, techyiam said:

It has nothing to do with feeling more comfortable. The wobbles either are greatly reduced, or plainly go away. It is a night and day difference.

You are aware that wobbles are an oscillation between movements to left and right, correct? And you also know that the only thing an EUC can do is to spin the tire. So there are no mechanisms in place that would affect a side to side wobble. How do you spin a tire in a way that wobbles less sideways than another way of spinning a tire?

 

 Also, in your description about how to change these “profiles”, you described that first the wheel tilts the shell but stays in place in relation to the ground, and latter keeps the shell tilted but moves along the ground. Please explain to me how the hell can it do that when the only thing the wheel can do is spin the tire?

 I’ll make this faster: It can’t. It can only spin the tire, nothing else. It can’t separate between accelerating the shell and accelerating the tire. Whether the movement between the shell and the tire tilts the wheel or moves along the ground depends on whether you hold on to the shell or not.

[techyiam]

2 hours ago, mrelwood said:

If I understood your description correctly, then yes, we agree.

OK. Now I am going to describe to you what I observed on my Abrams. 

As it turns out, while on my Abrams powered on, and self-balancing, I can make changes to the settings, and the changes take effect in real time.

Here is what I did:

(1) I am standing on my Abrams' pedals, powered on and self-balanced in a doorway.

(2) I held on to both sides of the doorway so I am also balanced side-to-side.

(3) I lift up my heels in a consistent way. My body stays basically straight. The wheel and I accelerates forward.

(4) I now change pedal mode while I am still self-balancing on the wheel. My feet placement on the pedals does not change since I don't have to step off.

(5) I repeated the procedure for all three pedal modes: Strong, Med, and Soft.

(6) Here are my observations. I accelerated quickest in Soft Mode, moderately so in Medium Mode, and least quick in Strong mode.

(7) I didn't really noticed much pedal dipping while accelerating regardless of pedal mode. Even if the pedals have dipped, it couldn't have been more than 1 degree sloping forward.

(8) If I place my CoG near the front of the pedals, and immediately to the rear of the pedals, and continue rocking back and forth, the pedal angular displacement is greatest in Soft mode, and the least in Strong mode.

(9) Here is the kicker. While I was in Strong mode, and Medium Mode, I changed the pedal angle from zero degree to 5 degrees sloping forward, and repeated the tests. The changes to pedal angles were made while I was still on the Abrams. I did not stepped off. The feet placement on the pedals remained the same.

(10)  Observations: No change in acceleration. Acceleration was still the greatest in Soft mode with zero degrees pedal angle, still quicker than in Strong or Medium mode with 5 degrees forward sloping pedal angle.

I repeated the test numerous times.

The above should be reproducible. 

Assuming you have made the same observations, can you explain how this is possible? 

Edited March 2, 2023 by techyiam