King Meter KM-529 assist levels

[Dadam]

Hi I've got the above display on my Woosh Bikes conversion (XF08C hub motor)
Overall I love the kit but I find the display a bit annoying.

It has five levels of assist but it seems that the levels have different cutoff speeds, with only level 5 cutting off at the 15.5 (25km/h) legal max. All five levels seems to deliver the same torque (or close to it) and they only differ in cutting off at different speeds. Instead I'd have expected each to put out different level of torque, but all cutting off at more or less the same speed (15.5)

The only configurability offered by the King Meter unit is to change the wheel size and the overall cutoff.

I'm not looking to set it beyond the legal limit but I do want the levels to have a different level of assistance up to the cutoff, not the same level of assistance up to different speeds.

Anyone know if this can be adjusted, e.g by some kind of hidden config screen?

The KM-529 is also in my opinion unnecessarily large; takes up a lot of bar space. If there's no way to reconfigure it, any recommendations for replacements that offer adjustment to the assist levels? Do other units have the same connector pinouts?

 

[saneagle]

The only way to get what you want is to replace the controller and display with ones from KT. They cost around £80 for the pair. Chalk and cheese compared with what you have, so well worth the £80.

Woosh has mentioned that he can reprogram the controller somehow. Maybe he can clarify that, and if possible, you can test it and let us know how well it works.

 

[Nealh]

Your Lishui is currently set up for speed control and the affect/ poor control you are experiencing is typical of crappy speed control and often is used on many china hub bikes, those of us in the know use the much better KT current control which China call torque simulation control in each PAS level.

As mentioned Tony @Woosh did mention in another post that they can set up/programme the Lishui for speed or torque control, best to speak to Woosh and see if it is possible.
Personally I'm surprised Woosh don't have torque control programmed as default if it is possible for them to do so.

 

[Dadam]

Thanks I'll email Woosh. I'm a bit surprised as it seems a bit useless just to have speed levels.

It's not as if it needs some sophisticated logic; at the end of the day it just needs a different proportion of the max voltage supplying to the motor.

 

[Nealh]

Speed levels are unneccessary as a control method because most will just simply use level 5 for max speed rather then having to thumb up and down.
With torque control one simpy selects the power one wants and pedals at a speed they are happy at , each PAS level one can pedal to the cut off quite easily or bung in more effort to go over the cut off.
The torque control is so much more relaxing and the end user has more control over the power level usage.

 

[Dadam]

Speed levels are unneccessary as a control method because most will just simply use level 5 for max speed rather then having to thumb up and down.
With torque control one simpy selects the power one wants and pedals at a speed they are happy at , each PAS level one can pedal to the cut off quite easily or bung in more effort to go over the cut off.
The torque control is so much more relaxing and the end user has more control over the power level usage.

Yes exactly. It's the way my Orbea works so just assumed that was the standard way.

On the Woosh conversion yep I just ride in max, but I do have to drop it back to 2 or 3 on a shared overpass on my commute as otherwise I'm going too fast for mixing with pedestrians (often parents taking kids to school)

 

[Woosh]

Anyone know if this can be adjusted, e.g by some kind of hidden config screen?

I don't have a configurator for Lishui controllers but I have different firmware files / profiles.
The Lishui controller with factory programming behaves like in this video:

The motor will not cut out before you reach the speed limit as set in the LCD settings in all assist levels, from 1, 2 etc to 5.
If you need to use your pedalling effort to control the speed, stop at level 4 and avoid level 5. At level 5, the motor will do like 90%+ of the work, you are effectively ghost pedalling and it's difficult to control the speed with ghost pedalling.

Please have a word with Andy about this.