World’s fastest Schwinn cruiser

[indian22]

Thanks for remembering Tony. I like photos & appreciate the effort of all who document during a build. Explanations are clarified with good photos & we learn from these.

I like it when I've spotted an area of a build that might provide a design improvement if modified or perhaps eliminated, but I live with the thought while I ride and experience the bike for awhile. Making hasty changes can lead to disappointment down the road and I've done that so many times. You mentioned your bike was "Getting too complicated" & you wisely kept it simple, for now, but you've already started a plan to design and automate the foam plug fabrication.

Road rat suicide by biker sounds an urban legend but is quite common place in the rural areas with large animals, wildlife and domestic livestock, and can be life threatening to drivers and occupants of large vehicles as well. Getting it on video would have been epic.

Rick C.

 

[Tony01]

A new much larger battery and the hub heat sinks are in order. I don’t dare ride it in this 100 degree heat. These few nights have been sweet. I really like riding very slow. Just needs more range and an onboard level 2 charger. I don’t know where I’m gonna put the charger and j1772 plug without glassing a new top portion. I really like this bike and I plan to make it better.

the look is beginning to grow on me. I sort of like how plain, or “stock” it kinda looks. At least from a distance. This bike is nowhere near the man magnet my 212 Yamaha was. This bike I can really chill and get into my thoughts without getting bothered. I actually forgot what a burden the constant attention was like. Sometimes you just wanna go for a ride and mind your own business.

Had my third cop experience today. Cops are a lot more indifferent towards the ebike just like everybody else. He pretty much told me I’m invisible and likely to get hit. I agree. If I see a dumb driver behind I kill the taillight and haul away. A trend I’ve noticed is that when there is little traffic if I see lights behind me that are catching up rather quickly it is a good chance it’s a cop. So I slow down to the speed limit or about 5-10mph under depending, so the cop does not see me Hauling As$ at close range.

I am finding myself frequently turning off the headlight for pedestrians at night. I know how bright that light is. I can’t even look at it in the daytime. I see them shying away. My light has three wires, the third being an amber led ring on the outside. Thinking of where to put a switch for that. Or just put the taillight on its own switch. Going invisible has its benefits

 

[PeteMcP]

caption to above pic....

Maintaining his bad a$$ image had taken a lifetime, so Tony wasn't sure what the neighbours would think about him finally building a bike from the RIGHT side of the tracks.

Seriously though Tony, glad to see your still thinking about and carrying out improvements to this build rather than losing interest and moving on to the next project. Bike is a rider for sure.

 

[indian22]

This bike looks the part, not to worry. The details of function you'll discover during the riding & change things as a result. Keep it and you on the road long enough and any modifications required will be noticed & sorted Tony. This is a fine piece of work, definitely an advanced level project that involved a lot of thought and work.

Rick C.

 

[Tony01]

Couple more night pics. The idiots who might as well be the rioters and looters covered my favorite bridge with their slogans. Took it all down. You know the regular stuff., black this, police that, “silence is violence”. Silence is NOT violence. Rioters shutting down a local freeway the other day, stopping traffic and breaking commuters’ windows with crowbars, getting them out of their cars and beating them up, that is violence. Strange stuff going on.

 

[PeteMcP]

Sheesh Tony. What with the Corona virus lock-down and now the BLM demo's/riots, things went from one extreme to the other in short order in the States. Stay safe.
This is another one of those occasions where I'm glad I live in a country where access to firearms isn't ever necessary or even an option.

 

[Tony01]

gonna make that video soon

 

[indian22]

How much suspension travel front and rear Tony?

Looking most excellent!

Rick C.

 

[Tony01]

How much suspension travel front and rear Tony?

Looking most excellent!

Rick C.

Rick it is 3.4 inches front, and around 4-5 inches rear. Can’t really know the actual rear travel without putting a camera on the back.

I put new brake shoes on the 51 year old front hub. I guess the old ones could have been original from 1969...

Bought a new battery. 74v60ah or 4.4kwh. A huge step in range from my 1.9kwh pack.

 

[indian22]

That's good travel & great wear on the brake Tony.

Will you be cell balancing or going with a B.M.S.? Using a new controller or will the old one manage? I'd say a serious jump in range. This Schwinn is a serious urban ride and I'd think it a real a stop light bandit!

Respect.

Rick C.

 

[Tony01]

I’ll be using my two rc chargers to balance them once every couple months or so. Take about 8 hours for half the pack cuz they only do 6s each. I think a big pack like this will take a lot longer to go out of balance.

Trouble that led to this. On my existing pack I have two series in different places that won’t take a charge above 3.9 and they are dragging the rest of the pack down. I almost smoked some cells again a few weeks ago. Down to 60 volts two blocks from an outlet dipping down to 54v with even 1/4 throttle. Yup.

My throttle map is messed up right now and the regen is unusable. I had to disconnect it. I got new firmware that messed it up, locked me out, and is probably set to 20s. I don’t want to risk faulting into overvoltage permanently by charging to 88v and then having no way to quickly discharge it back under the overvoltage threshold. so I am only charging up to 84 like a 74v pack. Without regen, 4 more volts, or healthy batteries my range is really bad right now, easily 2/3 or less of what it was before I damaged it. Maybe 10 miles hauling.

This firmware is designed for a custom built display I bought a month ago that my vendor has been working on. Touchscreen, pin login, full access without having to use my $900 phone in my left hand while testing the bike with the right. Cost $100... Gonna be here Monday... probably gonna have to machine a clamp shim for it, if it’s designed for a 7/8” bar. The middle section of my moto-x bar is around 15mm...

then I’ll use my old phone that I’ve been using for the speedometer app, to record video for my fans...

 

[Tony01]

Replaced the fork oil with 20w. Was 10w. Huge difference in performance.

attempted to remove the spring preload rings. Stopped short of removing the legs. Decided to leave it for another time. Big job.

 

[Tony01]

Well I got my batteries in, and they are much smaller than I expected. I haven’t looked at them any closer than this.

have some controller issues too. The display came and worked for a couple days but then I pulled over while on a ride to change some brake settings and the it changed some other setting, make the Bike not running. Had to get a tow. Getting fed up with my vendor, who only delivers lies and disappointment. He does seem to treat me better than the people that have paid him and are waiting 6 months or not even getting their stuff. Put my name on a waiting list for a high power controller from another vendor. Meantime I’m trying to get it worked out. Today set up an old android phone to let him try and set it up remotely. Failed. He is sending me another, says he will ship tomorrow but with him that usually means “go away I’m busy”. So I might have it in a week or two. There aren’t really very many options for quality controllers, but if I can get something similar, less power even, and not have to deal with my vendor, that would be great...

 

[indian22]

Bad vendor experiences are so detrimental to the popularity of biking in general regardless of the power source and it's not just the import distributor types that are guilty of poor service/quality either. This is tough on experienced builders and riders think of the new enthusiasts that are completely soured on the hobby before they can even get a good start on their first bike. For the rest of us it's a terrible annoyance and waste of time. I use Paypal to guarantee I won't lose my payment as well.

Trial and error, a lot of error, has been my experience with selecting vendors Tony. Then supporting those that prove trust worthy. That quite often means paying a bit more and perhaps waiting a while for delivery, but when selection is limited, vendor to product wise, leads to taking to occasionally taking chance which is always more of a risk.

Good luck with it all.

Rick C.

 

[Tony01]

Sometimes you just have to do everything yourself. The display plug on his new harness seems to be the same plug for the Bafang USB programming cable, so I’ve got the cable on order. Hopefully someone can send me the PC software so I can program the controller directly. I’ll be sending his display back and possibly the controller too.

Put myself on the waiting list for a Nucular 24f controller. Specs look a little better, up to 500 phase amps (more torque), total price also around $600. But hopefully I can get my existing setup running before I have to go elsewhere. We will find out next week.

Nucular electronics — the platform for design light electric vehicles (LEV)

A unified control system for electric vehicles, such as electric bike, motorbike, scooter, golf car. All components are synchronized with each other in order to effectively and smoothly control electric vehicles.

nucular.tech

 

[indian22]

Thanks for the link good specs in a small package.

Rick C.

 

[Tony01]

Getting it running again, new controller from new vendor, and I’ve begun building my new battery.

I’m punching a single hole in the short tabs of the cells, and cutting a few of my bus bars for the old cells in half. Just need a short 1.5” bus bar with one hole. This build will go fast...

 

[indian22]

What's the ball park specs on the controller Tony?

 

[Tony01]

What's the ball park specs on the controller Tony?

Oh same controller as before just different vendor. 23300w 430a phase. But I’m thinking of going to the asi8000 now cuz I want to push higher phase, like 550 or so. We shall see.

 

[Tony01]

The first 10s1p brick is done. All the cells are right at 3.48/3.49. Not even bothering with balance leads right now. Pack this size will take a while to go out.