EM3ev Factory Tour

[Ravi Kempaiah]

Although the entire E-bike industry relies heavily on Asian products and factories, there is a certain sense of skepticism. 99% of all E-bikes are made in Taiwan and China and there are some trustable vendors. EM3ev is one of them.

I have known Paul for sometime. He is a man of integrity and great work ethic.
His specialty is batteries . I have seen battery recalls, burnt stores, burnt houses, ridiculous claims of range and shady business practices. No wonder most people are skeptical of anything to do with batteries.

Paul is a guy I would trust. He is not after quick money and goes above and beyond to maintain high-quality customer service.

Here is a factory tour of his new facility.

 

[JRA]

Got a chance to meet Paul at Interbike in 2013 at the DaVinci Mobility booth. Very happy to see that his business is doing so well. A very clean and classy operation.

That camera guy was pretty enthusiastic for sure!

 

[George S.]

I recently bought a Chinese multimeter with a 100 amp shunt. Basically you hook up 3 or 4 wires (or a relay) and then you have a color display showing amp flow, voltage, watt hours, battery capacity in %, all that stuff. Oh, yeah, and the display is wireless, so you can put it anywhere within 20 feet or so. It’s $30 on Amazon, maybe 60% of that direct. The US does not do any of this. If they do, it’s a specialty product with a huge margin. It’s nice technology. It’s decent production quality. I get everything from China. I get CC-CV boards that are fully programmable as battery chargers for Lith packs, and I can use any end voltage I want. Again, like $20.

If the projections hold true, and it is hard to hide a giant battery factory, 70% of world lithium cell production will be in China. They did this with solar, moving in to be the producer of scale. Musk doesn’t share a GD thing with anyone. It’s all for Musk. Maybe ebike companies will have better access to batteries when China is a quality producer. In any event, prices will drop to where they are for EV companies, around $150 per kWh.

I don’t think Paul marketed the MAC motor very well. It’s clear he got in disputes with Hicks, at Luna, early on. He was supposed to have other arrangements in the US. I love my MAC but I just don’t care about it anymore. Anyone could make a similar motor. Bafang has almost cornered the geared 500w market in the US, at least for minor assembly retail ebikes, not DIY. When Paul wanted a performance cell for his packs, he went with the Samsung 30q. It’s not a cell that seems to hold up. Even the data sheet says 250 hard cycles to 60% capacity. He's using other cells now. Why should I trust any capacity versus cycles number, from anyone?

I don’t know if Paul can stay relevant. I like DIY bikes and I like experimenting with packs. I’m hoping Vruzend works out and I hope some real high capacity cells show up. But, what the heck, my next conversion is probably going to be a van, if anything. People living in vans, urban boondockers, riding ebikes. There’s the future!

 

[Ravi Kempaiah]

I recently bought a Chinese multimeter with a 100 amp shunt. Basically you hook up 3 or 4 wires (or a relay) and then you have a color display showing amp flow, voltage, watt hours, battery capacity in %, all that stuff. Oh, yeah, and the display is wireless, so you can put it anywhere within 20 feet or so. It’s $30 on Amazon, maybe 60% of that direct. The US does not do any of this. If they do, it’s a specialty product with a huge margin. It’s nice technology. It’s decent production quality. I get everything from China.

Good for you, George!
Hope you have a great weekend. Share some photos of your ride.
Don't worry about Musk, Samsung or Paul. They will do well.

 

[flymeaway]

Here is a factory tour of his new facility.

Thanks for posting this Ravi. Having built CNC equipment for my own factory I really appreciated the CNC spot welder Paul built. Battery fabrication has come a long way in a few years!

Court J.