Which motor/kit to get? Bafang CST or Xiongda? 36V or 48V?

[daenny]

Hi,

I am new to the community and looking for a e-bike kit to transform my Gazelle Geneve bike to an electric bike (http://urban.vergelijkfiets.nl/upload/fietsfoto/126/Big-Geneve-heren.jpg)
I would like to go reasonably fast (30-40 kph) and it is somewhat hilly (Liverpool area), but I would definitively give pedaling support. The range should be 30-50km, but of course the more the better . I am only 65kg, the bike is at the moment at about 16kg.
The bike has a carbon front fork (including the dropouts), so from what I read, a front motor is not a good idea, is that correct?
The bike has a Shimano Hollotech Deore Crank, so I would need a special PAS sensor, as far as I understood. It has a also 9 speed cassette with Shimano Deore shifter in the back.

After some search I narrowed it down to some options:
Bafang CST (oxydrive HT kit, or ciclotekstore.eu BPM kit) with 36V. Or from BMS battery with 48V (https://bmsbattery.com/ebike-battery/680-48v116ah-bottle-09-panasonic-battery-pack-battery.html#/color-black).

I read a lot of good things about the oxydrive kit, but I missed the promotion sale. The ciclotekstore kit comes close (http://www.ciclotekstore.eu/b2c/producto/9822075/2/bpm-lcd5-e-bike-motor-kit-36v-13-2-ah-usb-gp-battery-) and has the option for the hollotech PAS sensor. But if I would want to upgrade to 48V at some stage, I would need a new battery and a new controller for both of these kits.
So I thought of the BMS battery set above with the 36V500W CST motor. Would that be a good fit? What are your experiences with delivery times and duties on a ~850USD bill? An option would be to by the motor from ciclotek and only the batteryset from BMS battery. I like that I could use the same cassette on the CST motors.

Or I was looking at the smaller Xiongda Dual Gear motor kit. There I was looking at the 48V rear version, from pandabikes, but they do not stock the 700c rim version at the moment. I guess I could buy the bare motor kit (http://www.pandabikes-shop.co.uk/shop/4586709616/xiongda-hub-motor-kit/9703384) and let a bike shop fit it to a rim, correct? The disadvantage would be that it only fits freewheels. I read that it is rather wide, so probably a 9 speed freewheel would not fit, is that right? Can I use a 7 speed freewheel easily with the existing 9 speed deore shifters?
However the advantage of that set is that it is smaller/lighter and therefore more stealthy/looking more legal. They do not sell batteries with that kit, so where would you get the batteries then? BMSbattery, ebay, somewhere else?

What are your experiences with these kits/sellers? Do you have any other recommendations for me?

Thanks a lot!

 

[RobF]

A crank drive kit would be simpler, for all the reasons you've outlined.

However, the motor isn't your biggest problem, battery capacity is.

It does depend on hills, head winds, how much grunt you put in, and if there's an 'r' in the month.

But you will struggle to do 20mph+ for 30+ miles from a single bottle battery.

 

[jonathan75]

Nice bike.

I personally would get the batteries from a UK supplier like Eclipse or Woosh because if something goes wrong (and batteries apparently sometimes do) then they can actually help.

Yes you could ask a bike shop to fit a Xiongda, that's what I did with my CST, was £39 including spokes, note it's possible to buy rims on gumtree for £5. Your bike being heavy is a reason to consider the lighter motor.

If looking at the CST, note it's the same as a BPM (other than it's a cassette against the latter's freewheel), albeit that all of the former are marked 250w, and only a few of the latter are, they're generally just supplied to manufacturers. I've seen this a few weeks ago http://www.elettrovelocipedialberti.com/prodotto/cerchio-ruota-28-bike-motore-bafang-bpm-250-watt-36-volt/ and it's a rare example of a 250w.

The other parts (PAS, controller, controller box, LCD/LED display, brakes with 'cutoffs' or hidden wire brake sensors if you've got a combined brake/gearchanger unit, speed sensor, hand or thumb throttle, and maybe a front light (although some think their shorting can wreck the controller) can be got for ok prices at BMSbattery, greenbikekit, elifebike, and aliexpress. BMS are selling an interesting 20a sine wave controller in the shape of the 09 type bottle battery mount (of the type Eclipse sell), as a kit with other gubbins, worth a look. I've heard of people having problems with BMS and Elifebike although I resolved mine after haggling at great length (they sent the wrong kit...). Never buy a motor wheel from China as the wheelbuilds are sub-amateur.

 

[daenny]

Hi thanks for the quick replies already.
So an idea would be the 09 20A controller set (https://bmsbattery.com/controller/698-sine-wave-controller-for-09-case-controller.html#/color-black/voltage-48v) with a CST motor (also from bms) and the battery from eclipse. Is there a difference between the 350W and 500W cst from bmsbattery? Or I could get the spoked wheel from ciclotekstore and only the controllerset from bms.
The other option would be the xiongda set also with a battery from somewhere else.
Hmm I just checked, all the batteries in "bottle type" at eclipse are out of stock atm .
I did not look at crank drive sets in too much detail, yet. I guess a BBS01 would be ok? I would need to replace my bottom bracket and would loose the 3 front chainwheels, right?

 

[RobF]

You would lose the three rings on the front.

The ring on the BBS will be roughly the size of your middle ring.

You need to establish if using the middle ring gives you a big enough range of gears.

Low shouldn't be a problem, the motor will have enough grunt to assist you enough to get up all but the very steepest hills.

High might be a problem because you will need to pedal at the speed you want to go at.

 

[daenny]

Hmm, that might be a problem, on a little bit of downhill I really would like to have the biggest ring, since otherwise I would not be able to keep up with the pedaling I think.
Does anyone have experience with the xiongda kit or other free wheel kits? Would I be able to use the 9 speed deore shifter with a 7speed free wheel without much trouble?

 

[Nealh]

I have 36v Bpm and Oxy cst and BBS. Bpm 21mph , Oxy 24mph but eats the battery life and BBS up to 27mph. Easier to have legal 250w motor with 36v as 48v tends to be 350w +. Gravity takes over downhill as the bike and rider all up weight is some what heavier than normal bike.
As you are only 65kg then maybe a Bpm or Cst is over kill and a smaller lighter hub will equally give you a good set up, so don't discount Xiongda, Q100h or Q128h.
D8veh is the Xiongda master and will give you the low down on the kit, on any bike if you want a bit more speed then 48v will get you another 3/4 mph on top of 36v systems.
The BMS 09 kit looks good and is a nice plug and play set up, I think the only down side is you need to carry out a controller mod to accept a speed sensor again D8veh has explained and shown how to do this in one of his threads.

 

[daenny]

Indeed, the CST might be a bit overkill, but it would be fun, I guess .

I found a discussion on endless-spheres:
http://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=3&t=58490&hilit=deore+freewheel&start=900
So it should be possible to use the 9speed shifter with a 7speed freewheel with some fiddling on the cables.

So I am currently leaning towards the Xiongda motor with 48V or 36V. (http://www.pandabikes-shop.co.uk/shop/4586709616/xiongda-hub-motor-kit/9703384)
Due to the size and weight. Does anyone have experience with the kits from pandabikes, or do you get your kits from China directly? And then 48V or 36V?

The only thing is that I read that the dropout is quite large on that kit? My rear dropout is 135mm I think.

 

[pn_day]

I got the CST from bms battery. Running with a 20 Ah, 36V battery, the S12S controller and LCD3 display.

Works very well. Is a bit heavy. I usually run the controller in speed control mode at mode 4 which gives assist up to about 20 mph which is my usual comfortable peddling speed. Mode 5 gives about 23 mph but hammers the battery.

If I had to do it all again I would probably just buy something like the Woosh Big Bear and save months of tweaking and improving! Then again the build and spec was half the fun.

Xiongda 2 speed motor also seems to be a good option - smaller motor, but low gear gives lots of torque to drag you up the hills.

Personally I wouldn't fancy a crank drive with a thin chain like a 9 speed - they are fragile enough without adding additional motor torque. However, others on here are very pleased with their crank drive setup - depends what you want.

 

[Nealh]

My BBS is now near 1k and no issues with 9sp chain or drive.
The 48v Xiongda gives approx. 30% more torque and power then the 36v so its a no brainer for you first kit, D8veh stretched his rear drop outs from135mm to 146mm to accept the hub and reported no major issues and he used a nice mtb frame as well.

 

[Deleted member 4366]

If you only weigh 65kg, a Xiongda would never change into low gear. Now that I'm a bit fitter, I very rarely use low gear, and I'm 90kg. The Xiongda is best for overweight unfit people or exceptionally steep hills.

It seems a shame to spoil your bike by putting on a freewheel gearset, though I'm happy with a 7-speed one on my bike with my Deore XT 9-speed changer.

If you were to go with a freewheel motor, it would be the Q100H. At 20A, it packs a fair punch. The 260rpm one will give about 20 mph at 36v and 30% more at 48v. Obviously, you get 30% more power at 48v.

Looking at the cassette motors, the 500w Bafang is total overkill. There's no need to add that much weight to your bike. It won't make your bike go faster than a Q100H at 48v, but you'll get more help on the hills. Again, a 500w CST motor is better suited to heavy unfit people or extreme hills (30% or more).

A Q100C would also be an option, but the 328 rpm is a bit too fast for its power at 36v and even worse at 48v. The 36v 201 rpm one at 48v would become a 260 rpm one, so about 20 mph again (32 km/h)

Woosh do a MXUS CST kit, which does about 36km/h at 36v (assuming that its the same as mine). That would be a cheap simple installation, especially if they sell it with the 15 ah 09 bottle battery, otherwise you could get the battery from Eclipse or the Panasonic one from BMSBattery.

With all these hub-motors, you need to offset the rim a bit because the spoke flanges aren't equal distance from the drop-outs. The Oxydrive one is already off-set. I don't know about the Woosh one, but the BMSB one isn't, and the spokes will need tensioning anyway.

Fitting a PAS to a hollowtech BB is no problem. You just drill out the magnet disc to 25mm and swap the sensor to the other side of its bracket. Some kits now have the clip-on sensor, which is even easier.

A crank-drive kit would be another option. As you've figured out, you lose your nice cranks and chainwheels. You get the advantage of speed and torque (not at the same time) and a neat installation, but the disadvantage of having to be in the right gear all the time, so lots of gear changing, which makes the ride a less relaxing than with a hub-motor.

There's no exact answer to what you need. All the above options plus a lot more will give you what you want.

If I had to choose and I weighed 65kg, it would be a 36v 260 rpm Q100H with the Panasonic 09 bottle battery that includes the 20A sinewave controller. There's a little more DIY than some of the other options, but nothing difficult.

Let us know what you decide. Before ordering, you should let us to check your shopping list to avoid boo boos.

 

[Nealh]

Woosh Mxus is 201rpm with 15a controller when I enquired about it Andrew said it was weedy but it work better at 20a and 48v, but that would incur extra costs.

 

[daenny]

d8veh, thanks a lot for the extensive explanations . That is definitively helpful and some food for thought.
Also thanks to Nealh for the extra information.
This e-bike project of mine is nothing which has to be done on short notice, so I am planning to do it sometime this summer. I do not mind a bit of DIY, soldering, etc. I would also not shy away from LiPos, since a good friend of mine is using them a lot in his quadcopter projects.
But looking at the options, I would indeed go for smaller/lighter motor. Something wind for 250-260rpm at 36V and then running it at 48V with the 20A sine controller in the bottle battery sounds like a good deal to me, which would also be an easy and clean installation. So that would leave me with your proposed Q100H and a 7 speed freewheel. Do you know of any cassette motor which would also be suitable?
I found at ciclotekstore (http://www.ciclotekstore.eu/b2c/producto/2201215/2/platinium-motor) the 33km/h 28" version. That would be roughly in the specs, do you have any idea which motor that could be? Were did you get your MXUS CST from?

 

[selrahc1992]

Hi,

I am new to the community and looking for a e-bike kit to transform my Gazelle Geneve bike to an electric bike (http://urban.vergelijkfiets.nl/upload/fietsfoto/126/Big-Geneve-heren.jpg)
I would like to go reasonably fast (30-40 kph) and it is somewhat hilly (Liverpool area), but I would definitively give pedaling support. The range should be 30-50km, but of course the more the better . I am only 65kg, the bike is at the moment at about 16kg.
The bike has a carbon front fork (including the dropouts), so from what I read, a front motor is not a good idea, is that correct?
The bike has a Shimano Hollotech Deore Crank, so I would need a special PAS sensor, as far as I understood. It has a also 9 speed cassette with Shimano Deore shifter in the back.

After some search I narrowed it down to some options:
Bafang CST (oxydrive HT kit, or ciclotekstore.eu BPM kit) with 36V. Or from BMS battery with 48V (https://bmsbattery.com/ebike-battery/680-48v116ah-bottle-09-panasonic-battery-pack-battery.html#/color-black).

I read a lot of good things about the oxydrive kit, but I missed the promotion sale. The ciclotekstore kit comes close (http://www.ciclotekstore.eu/b2c/producto/9822075/2/bpm-lcd5-e-bike-motor-kit-36v-13-2-ah-usb-gp-battery-) and has the option for the hollotech PAS sensor. But if I would want to upgrade to 48V at some stage, I would need a new battery and a new controller for both of these kits.
So I thought of the BMS battery set above with the 36V500W CST motor. Would that be a good fit? What are your experiences with delivery times and duties on a ~850USD bill? An option would be to by the motor from ciclotek and only the batteryset from BMS battery. I like that I could use the same cassette on the CST motors.

Or I was looking at the smaller Xiongda Dual Gear motor kit. There I was looking at the 48V rear version, from pandabikes, but they do not stock the 700c rim version at the moment. I guess I could buy the bare motor kit (http://www.pandabikes-shop.co.uk/shop/4586709616/xiongda-hub-motor-kit/9703384) and let a bike shop fit it to a rim, correct? The disadvantage would be that it only fits freewheels. I read that it is rather wide, so probably a 9 speed freewheel would not fit, is that right? Can I use a 7 speed freewheel easily with the existing 9 speed deore shifters?
However the advantage of that set is that it is smaller/lighter and therefore more stealthy/looking more legal. They do not sell batteries with that kit, so where would you get the batteries then? BMSbattery, ebay, somewhere else?

What are your experiences with these kits/sellers? Do you have any other recommendations for me?

Thanks a lot!

I have the oxydrive kit. Frankly,I love it - I've tried various crank drives (kalkhoff impulse 2,TCM woosh) - the thing about crank drives are that one has to continuously consider them,or be aware of them,when changing gear etc. With a hub drive the motor does its own thing,in stop start town traffic there's no need to be careful. Generally I just set the level of support on how much exercise or hurry I need and forget about it. I get 26 miles without using an indicated half of a 13 amp 36 v battery,but its on a skinny wheeled racer that weighed 9.5 kg sans kit and I enjoy putting in some effort,I weigh more or less what you weigh. To me a hub drive is better for a workout and stress free - it also has plenty grunt for hills and enough to easy do 22mph on hilly terrain

 

[Nealh]

I get 25-30 miles out of my Oxy that is off road mtb on 15ah battery.
Ciclotek are rebranded Mxus supplied kits and hubs, their 15,25 and 33kmh
are probably 201,260 and 328rpm motors or something close. Very similar to the units sold by ELFKW in Austria which are also Mxus supplied I believe.

 

[Deleted member 4366]

I got my MXUS motor from, errrr MXUS. Actually I got it from a Chinese handler, which is a shame because MXUS told me there's two versions: the one with thin wire and weak magnets for the Chinese market and the one with thick wire and strong magnets for the EU. I guess mine is the same as the Woosh one except that mine is 260 rpm. I think we both got Chinese ones. I bet the woosh one is also 260 rpm. It's OK for light people. I ran mine at 48v and 19 amps. It couldn't match other motors for torque at that power, so it didn't run very efficiently with my weight and our very hilly terrain, though it might be OK with a lighter rider.

There's one other important option that I can think of. There's also the smaller Oxydrive kit that uses the smaller Bafang cassette motor. I think that it would be a perfect solution. You need to check with Andrew (Oxydrive) what speed the motor is. With either Oxydrive kit, I think there's a bit of toom for haggling the price because he reduces them from time to time on special offers. Best to get him on the phone and plead your case.

I just checked his website. Would you believe it. That kit has been reduced to £450. That's a steal. Only it ended on 31st May. It might not be too late if you cry on the phone. Call him tomorrow. Don't wait or it'll cost you.
http://www.oxydrive.co.uk/offers/index.html

 

[Deleted member 4366]

I didn't realise your bike has 700c wheels. You have to add about 2 mph to all the speeds I mentioned above. Ask Andrew what's the RPM of that motor. 250 rpm or more would get you to 35 km/h.

 

[daenny]

I just had contact with Andrew and he was offering me the small CST kit with a newer SWX02 CST motor for the offer price. I have not found much about the SWX02, but from what I read it should be plenty for me. So that sounds like a great deal to me.

 

[Nealh]

Link here to a seller, they like 350cst but smaller !!!
http://www.woaczh.com/show_list.php?id=3
Use the search area as mechaniker got hold of one to compare to a XOFO, contact mechaniker to get the low down on it.

 

[Deleted member 4366]

I just had contact with Andrew and he was offering me the small CST kit with a newer SWX02 CST motor for the offer price. I have not found much about the SWX02, but from what I read it should be plenty for me. So that sounds like a great deal to me.

I just checked with Andrew about that. All the 11Ah CST kits now come with the SWX02 CST motor and a new LCD. At £450, that makes it the best value kit bar none. That motor will do 32km/h in a 26" wheel and about 35km/h in a 700C. It's a bigger motor than a normal Bafang SWX, but smaller than the BPM or big CST, It should provide plenty of torque.