Voilamart hub motor not driving

[mikeflute]

Hello
I am new to ebikes and this forum, I have just built my own ebike with a Voilamart kit from eBay the bike has been fantastic done about a hundred miles, but came to ride it today and I can hear the front hub motor spinning and responding to the throttle but not driving the wheel . I have sent a message to the supplier and am waiting for a response, has anyone else had the same problem? I had presumed that Voilamart was an ok brand.
Mike

 

[vfr400]

Lift the wheel off the ground to see if the motor turns it forward or backwards. If forwards, your clutch is stuck and probably needs to be replaced. If backwards, there's an electrical solution that depends on which controller you have.

 

[mikeflute]

when I lift the wheel of the ground I can hear the motor spinning and responding to the throttle but not turning the wheel at all in any direction even with a little bit of help.

 

[vfr400]

That's weird. There's always some friction that turns the wheel, whether it's the woodruff key, clutch or gears that are faulty. Is the motor making the normal whirring sound?

The only way that could happen is that something like a screw came loose inside, jammed the gears and broke the woodruff key, but I've never heard of anything like that happening. How did it start? Was there a bang or did it happen overnight after your neighbour crept into your garage, dismantled the motor, removed the clutch and put it all back together as an April Fool's joke?

Show us which motor you have.

 

[mikeflute]

The motor is making all the normal sounds when responding to the throttle. it was working absolutely fine then the next day nothing. so very strange. I will ask my neighbour about the April fools joke.

this is a link to the eBay site
Voilamart 250W 26" Front Wheel Electric Bicycle Conversion Kit Bike Wheel https://ebay.us/VFHxqe

 

[mikeflute]

it was the 250 watt front

 

[vfr400]

Well, if you're convinced that there's no friction turning the wheel slightly forward or backwards, you'll have to open the motor to see what's going on. Take everything off the axle on the other side to the wire, undo the six screws and tap the axle from the other side to bring the guts of the motor out in one piece. Don't worry. Nothing will spring out or fall off unless it's already broken.

You might want to try one more time testing it with the wheel in the air after removing the brake to make sure it has every chance to turn. If it goes forward, something is broken, but if it goes backwards, it's an easy fix from the outside.

 

[mikeflute]

Helo vfr
Thanks for all the info, I am no stranger to working on engines and and general mechanics and would like to have a look inside, but I can't really start fetching it to bits at the moment, I will have to wait for the supplier to get in touch with me as I only got it of eBay about 2 week ago. I am really disappointed about it packing up as I was enjoying getting back into cycling. I will probably do another conversion for the wife while I am waiting for mine to be sorted out, if it has to go back to China I could be in for a long wait.
Mike

 

[mikeflute]

I sent voilamart a video of the problem and they said it was the control box, they sent me a new one and it is now up and running again. had to wait 2 weeks for the replacement to come from China.

 

[vfr400]

I sent voilamart a video of the problem and they said it was the control box, they sent me a new one and it is now up and running again. had to wait 2 weeks for the replacement to come from China.

There's nothing in the controller that can cause that problem. Only if you had been fiddling with the settings and set it to run in the other direction, but then you'd see the wheel turning slowly backwards when you lifted it off the ground.

 

[mikeflute]

I don't know how to fiddle with the settings, all I know is that it was working fine before, and a new controller fixed it

 

[harrys]

Last year, I deliberately miswired my 22A KT controller to spin a geared motor backwards. It was interesting to hear it whine with nothing happening outside.

According to the popular bootleg schematic of the KT's, their microcontroller does have a learn lead, but it's tied off. If so, presumably they teach it at the factory to run a properly wired motor.

Perhaps the Voilamart controller had the same situation, and the controller lost its bearings.

 

[mikeflute]

Before I fitted the new controller I tried to reset the memory using the memory wires, (2 wires the same colour) with no change I didn't expect it to work. Then I swapped the phase wires leaving the blue ones together and the yellow and green swapped over, the motor ran in the correct direction but riding it the motor was very noisy, so I stopped in case it did some damage. Any way its now going well and I am really enjoying cycling again.