Faraday Porteur S E-Bike Resurrection - "ZombiE-Bike"

 

So it works. I think? None of that EV torque and zoom from the Tesla or even the Nissan Leaf, or before that as from the Tronbike Ninja 1000 Conversion. Just a little pull, constantly, that needs goading to get going. Sort of defines "assist", but its a honestly a little lame.

The Resurrection Process

The Starting Point, $300 from Craigslist - I recognized this as a pricey sexy ebike of the 2010's

I hoped it was a fail in the Arduino controller, but this was sealed and proprietary...

Digging Out the Original Battery from the Downtube...

Removal of the Torque Sensing Niner Accentric Bottom Bracket was Required...

More Square Tapered Bottom Bracket Shots...

The Battery  - Big Long Rod of 18650s - Turns Out it Was Dead...

and if it was not dead, I killed it with curiosity (thats the BMS torn in half)...

Stripping the Aluminum Reveals 18650s In A Complicated Pattern I did not want to try fixing and repacking into that downtube...

SO I bought a Stylish, External Battery, and You Can Too: 

The End Point - External Battery Hotwired Into Internal Wiring. Frame Drilled and Tapped to Hold the Cage...

Strava Output:

For the 7.5 mile ride, averaged 8 mph around town. No sweating in jeans and a sweatshirt, but its freezing out today (California 45 degree sort of "freezing"). Trading back and forth with Zeb, his Meta Hardtail 29er provided a better ride with just barely more effort. Maybe the whole electric thing is to make up for heavy cheap bikes?

If you have Strava, you can explore further below:

Santa Creme Update: Pike Ultimate 150mm, Magura 203mm front with hacked mounts, Magura 180mm rear + One Up threadless!

Title pretty much says it, fork's first run today. Big surprise - no lockout! Also, the recommended 100 psi for my weight is way too high, cut it down to 25. Also found the rebound was way too turtle, cranked it to 10 clicks to middle position and it worked much better.

The fork comes with 180mm spacing by default, so for the 203 rotor I was stuck as of Friday for a ride today. Mikes Bikes mechanic suggested I try a 160-180 adapter and add spacers on one side. It worked, just barely, but there is weight reduction/simplicity over the funky offset as in the 160-203 adapter - I did run the Fox for a week with the 203's. I have an adapter on order from Amazon but might not use it.

ALSO rather than messing with a Starnut, I also ordered a OneUp tool and threadless installer - worked great. Goal is to run smaller fanny pack/no pack. Carlos has a tube strap for me. Good too since I tore the waist strap off the backpack, making it slammy when taking jumps. Bike ridden at Tamarancho. No lockout on the fork is concerning me a little, but its got 3 controls plus sag pressure I am learning to use.

Now what to do with the spare 150mm Fox? going to check my notes but it measures over 150mm travel like the new fork - I assumed it was 140mm but thats the other Fox. The non-boost forks both need work, maybe sell the working 150 and focus on the 140s/find a shop?

Confirming Direction of The RM29C19 Light Bicycle Carbon Rim

The RM29C19 Rim Indeed has a +-5 degree angle for each spoke, and I think I have the direction right. 

See the "direction" arrow below near the first spoke of the wheel near the valve hole.

And here is the broken end of the spoke:

2 Spokes in 2 Days - breaking Sapim spokes at the threads?

 Needed a place for photos on this one so I thoughts I would post here.

Prepping the bike to ride last night late, I found a spoke hole staring back at me and noticed something rattling around in the rim.

Removed the tire, then rotor, then the cassette, cleaned up with Stans, and the let out the metal - not only the nipple but the chunk of the threads.

Found the spare spokes, used as new nipple, marked the spoke with tape, trued (though it was not out much) and tensioned the new spoke, duct taped the rim, then tire, some air, cassette and rotor back on.

Got it all back together, pumped it to 50lbs, went to bed woke up and rode WMD with the gang.

I scrubbed some air out along the way, everything working fine. We decided on the final leg and I did hear some rattling, I assumed it was my noisy hub or derailleur (each with their own issues and recent maintenance). 

Back home, bike on the stand and I spin the wheel, here noise inside the rim and find another hole staring back at me. It was not the taped spoke, so its a new thing. Took some pictures, and here we are.

Data on what I ordered July 19, 2020:

I reached out to WheelBuilder tech support to see if there is anything I should do before tearing off the tire and duct tape again.

So Much To Catch Up On

 I was hoping to move these efforts to video but as it turns out, video takes huge amount of time/slows down progress. Its not like my BLOGGING has been prolific.

So many projects, mostly small, even a huge debugging effort on mystery noise coming from Santa Creme - the answer, as always, the bottom bracket!

Cranks falling off Old Blue, Z falling off the Meta, tubeless battles and a new pastime of destroying and rebuilding derailleurs - 11speed road and 12speed clutched XT.

New tire, the Maxxis Aggressor, has been a revelation, unreal/uncanny traction - I made it up Big Trees Climb (aka My Bitch - really GN's perspective) twice in a row after 9 years of trying.

I'm working on a plan to automate the VLOG, maybe build a robot to document/make it easier to start, stop position and cast appropriate light.