Ideas for low cost bike

[harryS]

The sad fact is that review sites don't really explore the most basic areas in the ebike market. You can buy a couple of 8ah LIPO batteries for $150, but no one can really recommend them for beginners. They are fairly dangerous. A step up is Chinese LiFePO batteries. I've seen lower capacity, roughly 10 amp hour (36v) for around $200. I ordered a 15 ah Lifepo, and it showed up this morning. At some point, I will do a review.

Can you mention the vendor? I'm looking at a couple of sites where I can get a 36V bottle battery for $200, and am thinking, Oh heck, I might take the risk.

I am doing a DIY conversion of one of my old pedal bikes. I knew the project might cost more than buying a $749 Trail Rider from farbike.com, but I had two nice bikes hanging from the garage ceiling and wanted to put one to use. I have a $199 ebay rear wheel. I also ordered new tires, tubes and a front wheel (old one wobbled) for $99. Added a $3 bell. I still need a battery.

 

[George S.]

A lot of the rear wheels from Ebay are 48 volt and high powered. If you can use a 36v battery, I can offer this much advice, but a 48 volt will be a little higher in price, if you have a 48 volt motor.

1) I bought an Ebay Lifepo4 that is branded as "Sun Thing". There appear to be a couple of vendors, if you look at the battery pictures. The 10 AH are not bricks, they are an aluminum case, so it might be a different kind of cell. The 'bricks', which are generally blue and wrapped in heat shrink, are pouch cells. The bricks need some protection, when you mount them on the bike.

2) Luna Cycle offers a 36volt 20 AH battery for $270. This is a huge pack at an outrageously low price, and it just showed up. It won't quite fit where I need to fit a pack, on either of my bikes, but I'm hoping this pricing will win out. No charger included. They also have a 48v pack around the same price. (http://lunacycle.com/)

3) There are a lot of Aliexpress vendors selling blue shrink wrap packs with a couple of different Samsung cells, Dolphin and Frog packs. This is a tough place to buy because there is almost no feedback. It's harder to use something like PayPal.

4) Blue My Sky is a vendor with some feedback kicking around, but the feedback is mixed. (https://bmsbattery.com/ebike-batter...-ebike-battery-pack-with-charger-battery.html)

In this list, #1 is somewhat secure because Ebay is Paypal, feedback ratings, and some customer protection. It is a long wait, with ocean freight. This is the only option I have any personal experience with. I am hoping #2, Luna, is a huge success and they re-write the rules on battery packs. They are so new, the option was not available when I ordered my Ebay pack. I think #3 is a work in progress. It's hard to know what you are getting, but the prices are very low. If you run a search for "electric bike battery 36v 10ah" you will get a lot of hits. I don't know about #4, but you might look at it.

All but #1 are the newer tech, cells not pouches, so the battery pack will be smaller and lighter. If anyone is flexible about the design, and willing to take some risk, it should be possible to build a very useful bike. I would not push the speed on these bikes, but they can be very nice bikes. I'll put up a review of my bike and the battery pretty soon.

If any of the reviewers want to help kit builders, they might get involved with these sources enough to figure out what the situation is. Right now, there are some real risks. It can only get better, and probably much better.

Good luck with the project. Let us know. Everyone should be super careful with batteries and connections.

 

[JoePah]

(Link Removed - No Longer Exists)

Is a good choice. The owner is Barent Hoffman is in Seattle and a real enthusiast. He tested actual capacity and performance He just ordered around 300 battery kits for Sondors owners who wanted another battery with more capacity.. The entire kit is $330 for battery bracket and charger.

Don't know what size motor you bought or what your controller is. This battery is 36v13ah made from LG18650 lithium cells, from China.

He should be ordering another batch in October. You could ask him.

 

[George S.]

(Link Removed - No Longer Exists)

Is a good choice. The owner is Barent Hoffman is in Seattle and a real enthusiast. He tested actual capacity and performance He just ordered around 300 battery kits for Sondors owners who wanted another battery with more capacity.. The entire kit is $330 for battery bracket and charger.

Don't know what size motor you bought or what your controller is. This battery is 36v13ah made from LG18650 lithium cells, from China.

He should be ordering another batch in October. You could ask him.

I noticed he was out of stock on that over the weekend. I'm glad he left it open to the general public. Didn't know if it was a one time Sondors deal. This is definitely something to consider, and it's clear we may get some really great choices for much better prices.

 

[harryS]

I bought a 36volt geared wheel from ebay because I was leery of pedalling a big direct drive hub. I only had the ebay seller's word that it would work on 48V, so I acquired a 48 volt battery from Lunacycle. Looking at the controller, it's listed at 36 volts. It still might work, but I bet the low voltage cutoff is wrong. I suspect that the lunacycle battery has its own low voltage cutoff circuit, but I'll have to put the kit together and test it. If it doesn't work out, then I'll buy a 36 volt battery off ebay,

By the way, the 48volt battery is a dolphin case and is advertised as using the newer high current Samsung 30Q cells. I had a longer range project in mind where I 'd like to get a mid mount bafang motor next year. I get into a new hobby and get too goofy, wasting money on it. Still cheaper than sports cars.

 

[MLB]

. Still cheaper than sports cars.

Yes it is!!

 

[JoePah]

@harryS That geared hub motor is probably good to 60v. However you need a controller that will provide output to 66v or so. The controller might work with a 48v battery depending if its a quality controller like a Lyen. but probably not.. You could always sell it and get a different controller.

 

[harryS]

I hear you about the controllers, JoePah. I would have to make sure it works with the motor. So $40 here and $80 there, maybe nothing works, and pretty soon I got enough parts and spent enough $$$ to have bought the battery in the first place. Ha ha.