Is my charger broken?

[Namastebuzz]

Hello

On our son's E-Rider Model 15 there's a charging problem.

It's a 48V system. When you plug the charger into the bike the light in the charger turns from green to red to indicate charging then goes back to green once charged.

Over the last year or so, sometimes when you plug it in the red light doesn't always come on and you had to unplug, switch off then plug back in and but it always charged eventually.

Now, however, it just stays green and won't charge. My charger says it outputs 54.6V and 2.0A. I put the multimeter on it and read 40V and 0.8A .

I checked the continuity of the wires leading to the battery and also plugged the charger directly into the battery but with the same result.

Are those charger readings abnormally low?

 

[Namastebuzz]

Just to note, the battery is reading 49.7V

 

[Nealh]

If you are only seeing a 40v output form the charger then yes it is faulty, it should output 54.6v even when not charging.
One can buy a charger cheaply £10 - £20 with the correct charge connector, if unsure of which you have post a pic of the connector.

 

[Namastebuzz]

Thanks Nealh
That's exactly what I wanted to know.
I assumed the charger was faulty but at least I know.
It has an IEC (kettle) plug on and most of the chargers I see don't but I'm sure I can modify whatever one I get.

Cheers

 

[Bikes4two]

Thanks Nealh
That's exactly what I wanted to know.
I assumed the charger was faulty but at least I know.
It has an IEC (kettle) plug on and most of the chargers I see don't but I'm sure I can modify whatever one I get.

Cheers

I think @Nealh was wondering about the type of plug that goes into the battery? However, it sounds as though you can deal with any plug differences yourself (chop off the original, solder and heat-shrinking I guess?)

 

[Namastebuzz]

.l I think @Nealh was wondering about the type of plug that goes into the battery?. .

Yeah it IS a kettle plug that goes into the battery. Weird I know. There are a few chargers with them but I've ordered a 4A charger with an XLR plug coz I can get it quickly.

 

[Nealh]

Billyboya currently has some threads running as he is also having problems with his erider 15, he had the IEC kettle connector on the charge and discharge side so we persuaded him to change the charge connector to a dc5.5 x2. We think he was trying to reverse charge the battery so for safety got him to change it.

 

[Namastebuzz]

Thanks for the info Nealth. I'll check it out.

New charger just arrived. I soldered an IEC connector in place of the XLR and plugged it in and - Hey Presto! - it's charging!

The charger was from Amazon but getting it here quickly was the deal breaker. The 15yr old requiring a lift to\from the station twice a day was making things considerably tricky when you're dealing with 2 of your own kids and three foster kids!

The charger looks pretty cheap and nasty but I'll check it later to see if the shed's burnt down.

 

[Nealh]

Put it on a timer so power is automatically cut, the cheapo ones usually work ok with out issues. Some of them are a bit quirky and if the battery voltage is about 80 - 90% they refuse to charge unless discharged a bit more.