captainhightop
Active member
Story time!
After replacing my gear cable outer/inner to see if I can make the linkglide 10x setup a bit smoother, I put everything back together and motor only switched on intermittentently showing an Error 05 (throttle error) on both HMIs I have. I flushed the connectors with isopropanol and it got worse if anything and then after a few more cycles it would no longer even turn on.
Time for a stripdown.
So first a quick check of the controller.
Some mild water damage on the controller board in the area shown (and a bit on the back), but board was still powering up (green light flashing), none of the magic smoke appeared to have escaped the caps.
Gave it a scrub with iso and a toothbrush and it looked pretty much good as new. Board appears to be conformally coated to some extent, but I guess it's not perfect.
Plugged everything back in (still nothing) - green led still flashing though.
Measured the voltage from the motor after it had been plugged in to the battery for a while and it looked like a very low voltage leaking out of the big capacitor (less than 1V and falling). So, something is up and I'm a software guy so electronics at this level is basically: does it look burned and are any fuses blown. I can't see any fuses, although the guy who's teardown video I followed says there is one (SMD I assume).
At this point I kinda gave up, but I thought: if it's screwed I'll just order another motor as I was going to get a spare anyway. (not that many sources for controller boards).
So a couple of small beers later...
I thought: well if it's screwed I've got nothing to lose and decided to strip the whole motor down for practice.
Yuck
Here's what I found:
Now I'm no expert, but I think we've got a water ingress problem
The grease on this side of the drive is just a rusty mess. Looks like it's got the same problem as BBSHD, the bearing around the crank letting water in.
The inner gears have fared a bit better, but still some rusty gunk there.
Unfortunately I didn't take pics of the next bit, as it was getting late, and I needed to concentrate.
As I was removing the small connector marshalling board, I noticed that the coating they put on (looked like clear silicone sealant) was wet and coming off the board, the board looked like it might have been conformally coated, but appeared to be in quite a bad way. I could see raw copper in places and a fair bit of corrosion on the back of the large internal JST style connector that takes signals to the main controller board.
So I removed all the silicone junk (it mostly fell off), and gave it a scrub with iso like I did with the controller board.
Now plugged all the electronics back together mostly outside of the motor making sure to protect anything from shorting.
Pressed the ON button on the HMI and amazingly it turned on first time.
That was kinda surprising, but it looks I don't have to use my old BBSHD clunker to get to work on Monday (or WFH).
Not finished yet though.
Final steps:
- Clean out gunky rusty grease
- Regrease with same stuff I used on BBSHD (aero type grease that's good for all gear materials)
- Use liquid electrical tape to try and seal the board against further water/shorting issues (the silicone was also to stop the ends of the pins puncturing the main power lines I think)
- Re-assemble
It all works (at least walk mode and a quick pedal across the kitchen).
I'm going to take it out for a test ride later today so fingers crossed the cleanout did the job.
Conclusion
Now, last week was particularly wet, but I've had wet rides lots of times before without issue (once I removed the battery on/off internally and externally), so what was special about this week that caused the issue.
I have some theories:
- Co-incidence, it was going to happen at some point, just reached that point
- Inverting the bike to do the gears caused the water to soak the marshalling board and when I powered it on to test it it starting shorting with all the moisture under the silicone.
Positives:
- Controller seems pretty sturdy (assuming the test ride goes okay).
- Easy to strip down (not as cramped as BBSHD controller)
Negatives:
- No spare parts easily available (and even so I'd have ordered a controller not the marshalling board, which wouldn't have fixed the issue)
- Error code didn't help (05 is throttle error I think and I don't use a throttle)
- Very little grease and it's easily contaminated
- Water ingress
- No breather valve
- Easy to tear gaskets when disassembling
Future:
Look into controller replacements, options seem to be:
- Grin Baserunner (could fit in the frame somewhere)
- Innotrace controller - INNOTRACE | Controller X1 mit Einbau, Kalibrierung und Teststandsfahrt
- Github open ebike controller - OpenSource DIY, simple, motor controller · Issue #34 · OpenSourceEBike/Bafang_M500_M600 (probably a longshot)
- Don't turn bike upside down after wet ride / washing!
I kinda like the innotrace as it removes the canbus requirement (I think), but not sure if it will just suffer the same issues.
Update Ride Test:
Just got back from a successful 40min ride, not very taxing, level 1-2. No glitches, hopefully that's sorted for now
.
That's about the length of my work commute one way, so tomorrow will be the real test (that and the terrible English weather).
Update 2 - Work Commute:
A total of 24 miles completed without issue, and decent weather for riding too!
After replacing my gear cable outer/inner to see if I can make the linkglide 10x setup a bit smoother, I put everything back together and motor only switched on intermittentently showing an Error 05 (throttle error) on both HMIs I have. I flushed the connectors with isopropanol and it got worse if anything and then after a few more cycles it would no longer even turn on.
Time for a stripdown.
So first a quick check of the controller.
Some mild water damage on the controller board in the area shown (and a bit on the back), but board was still powering up (green light flashing), none of the magic smoke appeared to have escaped the caps.
Gave it a scrub with iso and a toothbrush and it looked pretty much good as new. Board appears to be conformally coated to some extent, but I guess it's not perfect.
Plugged everything back in (still nothing) - green led still flashing though.
Measured the voltage from the motor after it had been plugged in to the battery for a while and it looked like a very low voltage leaking out of the big capacitor (less than 1V and falling). So, something is up and I'm a software guy so electronics at this level is basically: does it look burned and are any fuses blown. I can't see any fuses, although the guy who's teardown video I followed says there is one (SMD I assume).
At this point I kinda gave up, but I thought: if it's screwed I'll just order another motor as I was going to get a spare anyway. (not that many sources for controller boards).
So a couple of small beers later...
I thought: well if it's screwed I've got nothing to lose and decided to strip the whole motor down for practice.
Yuck
Here's what I found:
Now I'm no expert, but I think we've got a water ingress problem
The grease on this side of the drive is just a rusty mess. Looks like it's got the same problem as BBSHD, the bearing around the crank letting water in.
The inner gears have fared a bit better, but still some rusty gunk there.
Unfortunately I didn't take pics of the next bit, as it was getting late, and I needed to concentrate.
As I was removing the small connector marshalling board, I noticed that the coating they put on (looked like clear silicone sealant) was wet and coming off the board, the board looked like it might have been conformally coated, but appeared to be in quite a bad way. I could see raw copper in places and a fair bit of corrosion on the back of the large internal JST style connector that takes signals to the main controller board.
So I removed all the silicone junk (it mostly fell off), and gave it a scrub with iso like I did with the controller board.
Now plugged all the electronics back together mostly outside of the motor making sure to protect anything from shorting.
Pressed the ON button on the HMI and amazingly it turned on first time.
That was kinda surprising, but it looks I don't have to use my old BBSHD clunker to get to work on Monday (or WFH).
Not finished yet though.
Final steps:
- Clean out gunky rusty grease
- Regrease with same stuff I used on BBSHD (aero type grease that's good for all gear materials)
- Use liquid electrical tape to try and seal the board against further water/shorting issues (the silicone was also to stop the ends of the pins puncturing the main power lines I think)
- Re-assemble
It all works (at least walk mode and a quick pedal across the kitchen).
I'm going to take it out for a test ride later today so fingers crossed the cleanout did the job.
Conclusion
Now, last week was particularly wet, but I've had wet rides lots of times before without issue (once I removed the battery on/off internally and externally), so what was special about this week that caused the issue.
I have some theories:
- Co-incidence, it was going to happen at some point, just reached that point
- Inverting the bike to do the gears caused the water to soak the marshalling board and when I powered it on to test it it starting shorting with all the moisture under the silicone.
Positives:
- Controller seems pretty sturdy (assuming the test ride goes okay).
- Easy to strip down (not as cramped as BBSHD controller)
Negatives:
- No spare parts easily available (and even so I'd have ordered a controller not the marshalling board, which wouldn't have fixed the issue)
- Error code didn't help (05 is throttle error I think and I don't use a throttle)
- Very little grease and it's easily contaminated
- Water ingress
- No breather valve
- Easy to tear gaskets when disassembling
Future:
Look into controller replacements, options seem to be:
- Grin Baserunner (could fit in the frame somewhere)
- Innotrace controller - INNOTRACE | Controller X1 mit Einbau, Kalibrierung und Teststandsfahrt
- Github open ebike controller - OpenSource DIY, simple, motor controller · Issue #34 · OpenSourceEBike/Bafang_M500_M600 (probably a longshot)
- Don't turn bike upside down after wet ride / washing!
I kinda like the innotrace as it removes the canbus requirement (I think), but not sure if it will just suffer the same issues.
Update Ride Test:
Just got back from a successful 40min ride, not very taxing, level 1-2. No glitches, hopefully that's sorted for now
.That's about the length of my work commute one way, so tomorrow will be the real test (that and the terrible English weather).
Update 2 - Work Commute:
A total of 24 miles completed without issue, and decent weather for riding too!
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