Giant GLI180 4A EnergyPak 5 pin charger tear down

[offroad]

The case is plastic welded on all 4 sides, no clips to simply open. Use a hobby tool (Dremel) to split the case. Caution: Lots of fine black dust particles.

Internally, the circuit board is wrapped in aluminium sleeve which acts as heatsink. When you cut and the silver appears, you are through.

Input circuit has 5A fuse wrapped in heatshrink next to AC socket. If your LED's are dead, you might be lucky and just need to replace fuse. De-solder to replace.

CANBUS daughter board mounted vertically off PCB. 5 pin connector to integrated LED and 60% charge switch. CANBUS communication is via Giant connector pin 2 (brown or yellow) pin 3 (red or pink) pin 4 (green).







If your original Giant charger dies, you can use a 42v (4A/6A) compatible and harvest the old 5 pin cable from the old charger and use thick RED and Black wires. You do not need the CANBUS signalling circuit to charge battery.

 

[awattavichi]

Your teardowns are really helpful for those that don't want to have to buy replacement batteries or chargers! Thanks! Regarding charging, I have an Energypak 625, if the canbus doesnt need signal to charge the battery can I just apply 42V and 6A from my variable powersupply to pin 1 (-) and pin 5(+) and it will charge? Will the circuit in the battery stop the charge or do you suspect that one would have to watch the battery power level? I am trying to get some more power in my battery to update the bike firmware but I suspect my charger is dead. Charger powers on and passes the boot up but fails to charge the battery (no voltage on pin 5, I think the battery is still good as it started to charge with a charger from the shop). Lastly in your teardown, is there a fuse that is on the board that could have blown? Could you show a photo?

Thanks so much!

 

[offroad]

Sorry, bit late. The 4A charger only has an input fuse on the 120/240v high side. There is no fuse on the 42v output on the units I teared down. The 6A charger does.

Any 4A/6A charger will work but ensure it is a charger not a power supply as the charger will recognise the voltage / current differential and turn off or down into trickle mode.

The battery BMS will balance the load to all cell packs and will 'turn off' the voltage once full.

The CANBUS signalling between charger and battery provides telemetry data to the firmware, aka add +1 charge to the charge count.. Also calculates the 60% capacity for storage function. This is assuming the battery is stored in the frame, as the power switch is still active drawing micro amps from the battery, similar to TV standby for remote turn on.

If you plan to store your bike, simply remove the battery from the frame.

I don't recommend firmware updates unless absolutely necessary. Latest firmwares include 'anti tampering' code which will disable motor if anything suspicious detected, between speed and torque sensors. This can also create false positives and leave you 'stranded'. Government agencies might have something to say about this practice...

 

[Zola]

Hi ,
Great post on the charger … can you help:- I have a Giant DPS-83C A charger that has no output its spec is 41.8 v @ 2 amps .
Tested the continuity of the 5 wires of the Neutrik 5 way to PCB all good.
Voltages as follows photo 1 …

I cannot see any in line fuse on the PCB ?

Any thoughts. ?

Is the pin 3 and 4 for the CAN bus “ handshake? To tell the charger to output?

On the battery errors I get ok of the 5 flashes on test 1-4 … on test 5 I get 2 leds flashing 5&6 in the row , they stop … then led flashes once ???

Any steer would be greatly appreciated.

Many thanks

Derrick

 

[offroad]

Late to the party.... again. The fact you are only getting 34.5v on the secondary, not 41.8v could indicate component failure on the second stage output. Not familiar with the 5 pin XLR chargers, if in fact they are Canbus protocol. Is that mentioned on the daughter board anywhere ?

You don't need the Canbus communication to charge the battery, so any 41.8v unit will work.

 

[Zola]

Hey no problem, thanks for you reply , ref interrogating the circuit's … the silicone PCB that’s a real pita to get off… “ cream “ on hear wrote up a thread commenting on it .. it a Mission.. hey on wards and upwards

 

[austrian_painter]

thanks man, your post helped me a lot!! i registered just to say THANK YOU!!

my unit burned out, so i simply bought a 42v power supply with 4 ampere and connected the original giant loading cable to it.
simply the Plus and Minus, the other 3 data cable are useless.
works like a charm...

no need to buy a 250 euro new unit. a cheap chinese 42v-4a power supply does the job nicely.

thanks man!