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Lectric Factory Batteries for 1.0, 2.0 & 3.0 models
Secondary Batteries for use with Battery Balancers
The Elephant in the Room - Battery Fires
One of the questions that newbies ask is about the danger of battery fires because of news reports they have seen. I follow all the Lectric groups and there have not been any known instances of battery fires caused by the charging of Lectric bike batteries.
As reported by a major consumer advocate group, a potential contributor to these fires we have seen in the news are under $800 bikes sold on Amazon that may have circumvented the most basic safety regulations in what is known as the “Amazon loophole”.
Lithium-Ion batteries are flammable and will catch on fire if they overheat and potentially catch fire from a direct short circuit or from being in a fire caused by some other ignition source.
The common denominators seen in the battery fires that make the news are modified batteries, using non-factory chargers to fast-charge batteries or charging large number of batteries simultaneously in older buildings with questionable wiring. If you plug twenty 2-5 amp chargers into multiple power strips on a single 15 amp residential circuit and the breaker does not pop, bad things can happen to the home or apartment's wiring inside the walls.
It makes sense to turn off or disconnect your charger from the bike, once the green light is displayed. Some Lectric owners are using a countdown timer to cut power to the charger after a configurable number of hours. The timer we have listed here is fine with the following caveats:
1. If you cut power to your charger with a timer but leave the charger connected to your bike, we have seen reports that slight resistance in the Lectric charger’s design can drain your battery. We have tested that and are unable to duplicate the issue so far and it might take a lot longer than we could test for.
2. If you use a timer, you will have no visual confirmation by the charger's green light that the battery was ever fully charged. If the battery needed a 4 hour charge and you set your timer for 2 hours, the battery won't be fully charged for your next ride. Eventually, before your next ride you may want to plug the charger back in to see the green confirmation light or turn the bike on and check your volts reading to be sure it is the 53-54+ volts of a full charge.
Common battery balancer questions:
Which models can use a battery balancer?
How do battery balancers work?
Where would I mount the balancer unit?
Can't I just bring along a spare battery to swap?
Can I ride climb steeper hills or ride faster with 2 batteries?
What do I do if the battery balancer fails?
What if I want to run 4 batteries so I can ride 100+ miles?
You can use a battery balancer on any single battery Lectric model including the 1.0, 2.0, 3.0, Lite, XPeak and Trike. The XPremium and XPedition are dual battery bikes with a balancer already built in.
Battery balancers connect to the bike between your existing battery and the controller. The second battery you use, either an Amazon or other purchased battery or an extra Lectric factory battery using an ElectricAllWheel battery adapter, will also connect to the balancer via a cable with XT-60 connectors on it. The balancer device keeps automatically switching the load to the higher voltage battery. It does this seamlessly so there is no interruption in power going to the controller, dash and motor so no loss of odometer readings. The second battery must be the same 48 volts as your standard Lectric battery. It can be an different Ah (Amp Hour) capacity.
If you are stopping your bike and switching batteries out manually this takes a few minutes to turn Off the battery key, fold the frame, check the charger port dust cover is removed from its port, turn key to Unlock on the battery from the frame, remove the key, remove the discharged battery, slide in the fresh battery, reinsert the key, turn the key to Lock the battery in the frame, close the bike up and turn the key back On. At some point in this procedure there are usually some pinched or bloodied fingers and pleasant thoughts about how Lectric might have made the ON/OFF key easier to access.
If you mess up during the swap procedure, the battery can try to fall out on the ground and break the battery's plastic end cap or you can forget to remove the key or little charger dust plug and wonder why the battery won't slide out. You can get the bike back together with the fresh battery and forget to turn the key to the final click On position and wonder why the bike acts dead. Any odometer trip reading you had will be lost because the dash was turned off during the battery swap.
Contrast that with the battery balancer where you charge the two batteries and just ride with no battery swapping hassles. Your battery balancer may be small enough to mount in the same area as your controller or may be mounted behind the seat tube area of your Lectric bike's frame. Some Lectric owners have modified their Lectric lock bracket to hold their balancer behind the seat. Some controllers have a heat sink and others don't require direct air flow. With the battery balancer the rider will experience better performance because there is less voltage drop on hills or at speed. Overall, you have the same number of amp hours available to work with in a swapped out battery situation or using a balancer. Don't expect more hill climbing power or higher top speeds although you may feel some improved snappiness in throttle response. Your whole longer riding experience will be a lot simpler and your odometer will not lose its trip reading for your ride.
A battery balancer failure is unlikely but can be easily handled. If your balancer is externally mounted you can simply remove the XT-60 cable connectors and manually hook them together directly bypassing the balancer and you are back in business on a single battery. If you are installing the balancer internally you can get some extra cables and run the XT-60 connectors externally and that would allow you to do the same cable swap. When that one battery tires out you can switch the cables and you are going again on the other battery.
So you want to ride 120+ miles at 20MPH with a 4 battery balancer? Well, it is possible by using a special 35A QUAD battery balancer ($120) Electromotive Mods offers. Check out the link above to Electromotive Mods and select the 35A Quad from the drop down box. It even allows you to run power to dual motor controllers for all you crazy experimenters out there.
Note: There is minimal experience with trying to use a second battery balancer on Lectric XPremium or XPedition models as those bikes have a balancer already onboard. If we are able to validate safe options for those models we will come up with the information as it is available.
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