350 watt hub motor tests

I have tried to use this 350 hub motor numerous times but never liked it at all. I have decided to try it again this time to see if I can get better range on the batteries. Maybe a hybrid pack will work for a better range with this setup. If so it might be a good bike to take to the lake and like that. I still like my rhino better to run to the store ect.

I have it so I might as well test it. For instance, I know I got four miles on the 12ah sla pk and 10ah nimh pk combined on a rhino bike. So I am going to put the two together tomorrow after I build a half butted trailer to carry them.

No matter what happens with this test, I am a winner. I found a schwinn 24" from the seventies. Big steel tubes and best of all it's a real girly step through. It's the color of american style mustard, the color of something you might find in a baby diaper, but it is the ideal frame for me I think. The hub is on a 26 inch wheel it's got a little extra height in front, but still very easy to get on... If worse comes to worse it will be easy to mount my spare rhino on it. Just in case I ever find someone to ride with me.

I did have to take the chrome fenders off of it. Too bad they were kinda retro classy.

How about a push trailer lol Bob tail of course. Trailing behind a rhino drive.

I know you are right from the last round of experiments, I really have no use for 20 mile batteries. I was and am more interested in weight reduction. If a battery pack will do ten miles and weight about a forth of an sla pack, I would be good with it. that's pretty much why I was looking into nimh. They seem to be easy to work with and the weight is about usable if I can ever build them for a reasonable purchase price.

I need a little trailer for stability so I don't mind pulling a battery pack along, but I would like for it to be smaller and lighter than the trailers I have to build for the Sla packs that get me about 5 miles now in this terrain.

I started out saying I wanted a bike that would do ten miles an hour and go ten miles. It should also be less maintenance than the gas bile. Easier to store (wife complained about the smell) not noisy for the neighbors sake.

I have the ten miles an hour no problem now. I just need to get to the ten mile range and the easy to store parts. I need to make a couple of modifications on this new bike even if the hubber bubber works well enough.

I began thinking I would leave it pedal assist and just ride it for the exercise, but knowing me it will wind up with the rhino on the rear wheel and the bub on the front wheel and share a battery pack. Probably use the rhino to climb hills and the hub to cruise. The two motor thing kind of interests me now.

That last part is what I'm finding out withe nimh pack. it's not putting out enough to cover the 900 watts the bike runs at. That's why I'm going to try working with the 350watt hub for a while. But yes I'm still going to run it with a hybrid pack. For one reason the hybrid packs on the rhino gave a little more kick to the performance. If it does that with the 350 it would be a better ride. I have the trailer built, now I just have to get the thing ready to go. Tomorrow I plan to do some testing.

Well the hub motor has just been retired like me, permanently.... Darn thing won't run worth a tinkers dam and it is hard to pedal, if it dies. I think I'm going to stay with the rhino drives.

One thing about those batteries, we are all talking about. I know for a fact that the lowly sla battery will put all the amps it has on demand. That's why I blew a 40amp circuit breaker when running a rhino without a controller. Those batteries were a ,mere 17ah not twenty or forty. They could have been 12ah and still would have done it because I have blown thirty amp fuses with them.

First of all if I needed to commute 20 miles a day to work, and if I wanted to use a bike, or I were in a state the really insisted that I go green. The first thing I would buy would be a high quality, high performance motor system, not a DIY thing, Then I would indeed buy about 125% of the battery requirements I thought I needed. Yes I would buy Lithos because then I could easily justify the expenditure for both. The performance and convenience would far outweight the dollars. When you look at the cost of an auto or motorcycle the cost of a good ebike is a bargan.

My first priority would be a drive system that was almost a 100% dependable. It would not be something I built in the back of my house. *(Not that it can't be done, I just lack the skill and patience to do it.)...Then my second priority would be batteries that were both dependable and predictable. Sla is not predictable though they are dependable within their power band. (Short run, high draw). It is hard to detemine without a amp/watt meter what the condition of the battery is at any given time. That might also be true of the lithos. The meter thing is kind of like a gas gage on a china bike a heck of a good idea, I have run out of gas on that thing three or four time in the 6 months that I rode it.

I have kinda come to a decision today about the bike. It is not a necessity for me at the moment. I no longer drive a car but my wife does, so when we go anywhere she drives her car. My bike is for pleasure and is a hobby. I could never stand the pain of riding it ten miles. That six miles to the lake almost kills me lol. Old is not fun.

The battery test was not a total waste of my time and money. I think there might be a good use for those nimh batteries on a better drive system where twenty amps is all you need to climb the hills where you live. With the true D cells at 10ah each (if they indeed are) you would only need two strings to make a twenty ah battery. Two strings would be pretty easy to monitor. If you charge each 12v pack individually just look for on that would come close to the other then check each string. Find the one that won't charge up and then check the cells. not a big deal.

The problem with me and the nimh is that I would need a 36v 30ah battery. That is 90 individual batteries. A lot in other words. The buy in could be $300 easy. I might as well invest double and get the Lithos. Even three hundred is more than I want to spend to go five miles now and then. I have the 18 (LOL) ah nimh so I will try to find a use for them. I might add to them if I can do it inexpensively now and then.

I also might look into rebuilding sla batteries. If I could find a source for them. That would be a cheap way to go for batteries. I don't mind pulling a trailer full of batteries along behind me. It makes the bike more stable to be honest.