Finally a flaw with the Bosch Active

[Danidl]

After two trouble free years and 2500km of cycling, I have had a problem with the Raligh Motus. .. cycling downhill on bumpy road, the stays holding the rear carrier came adrift. The carrier, containing the battery pack , jerked back and dislodged some of the interior cables in the housing... A slow ten kilometres back home then... The only way of knowing there is a problem of battery disconnect, is the obvious its harder to cycle and an absence of as speedometer display.

The problem is that wires are disconnected within the battery mounting assembly., Not the battery itself but the carrier and plug into which it slots. The carrier is one of those double decker units
Whatever about style, the removal of the battery pack assembly , is a real chore... It was never intended to be removed ,from the carrier end, as there is no clearance, with the cable . It must be the case that the assembly is attached with the carrier off the bike , and later the cable is fed down to the motor and attached there.
Anyway,and using all my tools from Allan keys to mobile phone torq sized screwdrivers, I succeeded in isolating the offending segments.. yes 3 wires of the 5 had jerked off their metal pins. Examination showed that they were if soldered, it was very little material used .. by very little substitute.. microscopic.... Soldering to the pins extremely difficult, but feasible..
Rebuilding and replacing , about three times longer, all due to silly decisions about clearance.
What i am sure if is that no bicycle shop would have repaired it this way, .. they would have thrown away the housing, instead, opened the motor,
Moral.. check up on the carrier screws and fittings periodically...

 

[Gringo]

Not so much a flaw with the Bosch active motor then, more a lack of routine maintenance.
To have two stays come adrift at the same time probably means they have been working loose for some time. The sort of thing that can happen on any bike especially after 2500km

 

[Fat Rat]

Maybe just put a dab of loctite on the threads to stop it happening again

 

[Danidl]

Not so much a flaw with the Bosch active motor then, more a lack of routine maintenance.
To have two stays come adrift at the same time probably means they have been working loose for some time. The sort of thing that can happen on any bike especially after 2500km

I agree with the maintenance thing, my bad, and the reliability up to then lured me into complacency. But my point is that the fixing ie soldering of the leads to the pins of the connctor was incredibly weak. .. the grommet holding the cable , which is supposed to provide the mechanical anchorage,just popped out of place. My main point is that no consideration was .given to disassembly and repair.
Incidentally there was loctite on the stays. The stays were the ones attaching to the seat post, and the amount of movement was very little , a little more generous length of cable , would have sorted it.

 

[chris_n]

I agree with the maintenance thing, my bad, and the reliability up to then lured me into complacency. But my point is that the fixing ie soldering of the leads to the pins of the connctor was incredibly weak. .. the grommet holding the cable , which is supposed to provide the mechanical anchorage,just popped out of place. My main point is that no consideration was .given to disassembly and repair.
Incidentally there was loctite on the stays. The stays were the ones attaching to the seat post, and the amount of movement was very little , a little more generous length of cable , would have sorted it.

Just shows they were all subject to forces that are well outside of their design criteria. If the bolts hadn't been loose there would have been no problem. I rather suspect the wires would fall off my engine if it fell out of the car.

 

[Danidl]

Just shows they were all subject to forces that are well outside of their design criteria. If the bolts hadn't been loose there would have been no problem. I rather suspect the wires would fall off my engine if it fell out of the car.

.. but I suspect not outside the retention force for the grommet... . . The amount of metal , soldered, or welded used to attach the heavy wires carrying the 10 to 20 amp from the plug down to the motor was tiny.

Talking about wires in cars, once I forgot to reattach the thick braid from the frame to the starting motor .. the earth return. On attempting to start the engine, the throttle cable went red hot!!!.

 

[Trevormonty]

You can buy new plug/cable assemblies online.

 

[chris_n]

..
Talking about wires in cars, once I forgot to reattach the thick braid from the frame to the starting motor .. the earth return. On attempting to start the engine, the throttle cable went red hot!!!.

I have come across that before, a neighbour had a problem with his daughters car. Wouldn't turn over, bought new battery etc, still no joy I asked him one day what the problem was. He told me the tale, got jump lead out of the boot battery negative straight to the engine block and started first go!