esaj Posted August 22, 2015 Share Posted August 22, 2015 This past week, I've had a few occasions where the wheel won't start balancing after powering up. Ie. the message plays ("Welcome to use Firewheel, Sport mode"), the battery display lights up and shows 99% (well, it's always been on full battery, as I usually just ride a full trip without turning off and back on the unit in between), and everything else seems ok, but the motor does not engage. It's completely "limp", I can tilt it what ever way, and the motor won't start turning, it behaves like it's off. Shutting down and restarting it usually works just ok again, although on occasion I've had to do it twice. I think it happened to me once maybe more than month ago, but then I was doing a fast restart, and thought that the chip got stuck in some weird state because I cycled it so fast, but never again after that until this last week or so. Has this happened to anyone else?After the wheel starts up "correctly", I've had no problems (of course there's always the nagging feeling that something's wrong and the wheel could shut off / break down from under me at any point, but that hasn't stopped me from riding at full speeds )...The first culprit I'm going to check are the mainboard capacitors, as I've seen similar behavior in desktop computers when the capacitors start to be at the end of their road... I haven't opened up the wheel yet, but will finally next week, as the battery project's finally gets going after dragging on about 1.5 months, mostly thanks to international shipping companies (BMSs 30+ days in transit), customs (held back the package for a week) & postal service (lost the packet for a single critical day, so it didn't arrive for the weekend like it should have, and my battery guy had a work-related trip for the next week, and couldn't work on them). I'm so going to "enjoy" working on the wheel all night for several nights a in row, as my vacation just ends at the beginning of next week, and don't want it to drag any longer, as the summer is about to end. With the weather having been what it was, I could have easily done it a few times over just during all those rainy days But better late than never. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gimlet Posted August 22, 2015 Share Posted August 22, 2015 Last thing you want just before you start playing with the battery as you won't be sure if any future problems are down to the existing problem or the modifications. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
esaj Posted August 22, 2015 Author Share Posted August 22, 2015 Last thing you want just before you start playing with the battery as you won't be sure if any future problems are down to the existing problem or the modifications.I call it "my usual luck", and then my colleagues wonder why I'm so pessimistic about things most of the time I doubt it has anything to do with the battery, but might go ahead and order a new Firewheel without batteries over the winter, and rebuild it with the custom packs (so new motor, shell, mainboard, secondary PCB). I've personally ridden it now for about 1400km, plus vee probably rode it a lot over the almost 5 months he had it (we counted around 250-300 full battery cycles, if those have been around 20km per trip, that's around 5-6000km on top of my rides).Worn capacitors are fairly easy to distinguish, as the top starts to bulge: The next stage is where it starts leaking electrolyte, or like happened to me once, blows out from the top (sounds like a gunshot). That's why there are those "cuts" in the tops, so it can vent through there instead of blowing in all directions. If it is one or more of the capacitors, I can take working and very little used capacitors from the old mainboard that has the burnt chip. At least they've left enough of the legs showing to easily cut them & replace capacitors, if those were shorter, I'd have to remove the solderings from the mainboard. The best option would probably be to replace them with Japanese solid-capacitors, as those have a far longer lifetime, but don't have any right now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
esaj Posted August 23, 2015 Author Share Posted August 23, 2015 After tearing down the wheel, no visible bulging in capacitors... was sort of hoping it would have been that, as it'd have been easy to fix, plus I'd have had the replacements ready from the other mainboard. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Speedy Posted August 25, 2015 Share Posted August 25, 2015 I have a tip for you. Check the hall sensors.I had to replace all 3 hall sensors in my motor with a short period of running in between. Apparently it was either a bad batch of hall sensors, or they were killed by poor contact that I later found in the connecting plug to the mainboard. This plug is actually poor quality, and when you have disconnected it a few times, the pins loose tension, and poor contact will occur.Disconnect the motor from the mainboard and turn it on, then connect a voltmeter to the black hall sensor wire and each signal wire (blue-yellow-green). Turn the wheel slowly; You should measure the hall sensors shifting between 0 and 3-4V. If any hall sensor gives any other voltage, or is stuck at one value constantly, it is broken.What was really weird when I had poor contact in the connecting plug, was that it worked normally until the wheel was put under load. Then it suddenly would shut down the power to the motor. I could turn it on/off many times immediately afterwards, and the motor had no power, just like you described.Apparently when the connector was cold again, it re-gained contact. You would think the hall sensors didn´t carry any current of significance, but apparently they do.I solved my problem with the plug by releasing the female tabs on the control board side of the plug. Looking inside the tabs they have a small lip that looses tension when unplugged enough times. Tighten this up, maybe it solves your problem I soldered the crimped wires to the tabs on each side of the plug, just to be sure. Since then my wheel has not had any problems! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dmethvin Posted August 25, 2015 Share Posted August 25, 2015 On my wheel, the plugs on the control board were stuck on with a dab of hot glue. I don't know if that was done in response to this problem or just because they are being paranoid, but when I replaced the board I did the same. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
esaj Posted August 25, 2015 Author Share Posted August 25, 2015 @Discoking & @dmethvin: thanks for the tips, will have to check these. The motor has never shut down while riding, but it can't hurt to check the sensors & make the connections better. Now that the batteries & vee73's GW14 have arrived, and I could get on with the projects, I didn't have the time to go pick them up today, as I've been stuck doing our office move all day (got home around 11pm), and looks like it's going to be the same tomorrow... Why does the timing of everything always suck? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Speedy Posted August 26, 2015 Share Posted August 26, 2015 On my wheel, the plugs on the control board were stuck on with a dab of hot glue. I don't know if that was done in response to this problem or just because they are being paranoid, but when I replaced the board I did the same. That plug might probably be a poor one as well, but the one I am referring to is the 6 pin white plastic plug in this picture, it´s ass quality Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.