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[sirdanielwhitney]

Hello all,
Perhaps you could point me in the right direction.

I was driving my fully charged 2011 DS pretty hard over some rough terrain (mud, bumps, and rapid acceleration), and the motor started making a scraping noise, intermittently cutting out, before dying with a cloud of plastic-smelling fumes and smoke coming out somewhere- Perhaps the motor, controller, or inside the battery box- I couldn’t tell for sure. Motor didn’t feel overly hot to the touch.

Turning the key I hear the contractor click with normal startup. Pressing the motor kill switch and I do NOT hear the smaller ‘click’ which engages the motor, and there is no response twisting the throttle. No error lights.
Controller blinks green and then stays green.

Where does the smaller ‘click’ which engages the motor come from? the MBB, perhaps?

I opened the battery box and took out the MBB, opened it, and removed the circuit board to notice a silver dollar sized melted plastic spot in the center of the MBB housing under the circuitry. Not visible from the outside of the housing. So, I suspect the MBB is fried, but I could also imagine this melted spot could possibly be from when the plastic case was manufactured.

I then tried to test the motor, but when connecting 56V direct to the motor terminals, nothing. Does this mean motor is seized?

I am looking for suggestions for testing the MBB, testing the motor, and where to find replacements.

Thank you for any help you can suggest!

[Crissa]

Sounds like the motor died and overloaded the motor controller.

It does not sound good, no.  Circuit boards can survive a surprising amount of melt, tho.

-Crissa

[Shadow]

This might be within range of a VESC open-source based controller, if you just want to get the thing working again. Trying to get 2011 era parts for Zero is not easy.

[sirdanielwhitney]

Thank you Crissa,
The controller blinks green once and then stays green when turning the key ON and Flipping the motor switch on the handlebars- so I started looking elsewhere

This might be within range of a VESC open-source based controller, if you just want to get the thing working again. Trying to get 2011 era parts for Zero is not easy.

And thank you, Shadow. These look awesome, but there’s a 400 A ANL Fuse on this system, and the biggest I saw with VESC was 75V/ 300A

[sirdanielwhitney]

Here’s a pic of the MBB- no way that’s from the factory, right? There seems to be no visible damage on the circuitry, though.

Is the MBB the location from where the smaller ‘click’ which engages the motor comes from?

[Crissa]

What's on the other side of the plastic?

-Crissa

[Shadow]

...

This might be within range of a VESC open-source based controller, if you just want to get the thing working again. Trying to get 2011 era parts for Zero is not easy.

And thank you, Shadow. These look awesome, but there’s a 400 A ANL Fuse on this system, and the biggest I saw with VESC was 75V/ 300A

I don't remember seeing a conversion to VESC with a Zero frame. On the 2011 it kind of makes sense though, same power rating for the motor 22kW, but I'm not suggesting it's already been done or would be cheap/easy. Fuses protect from fire, so you would want to size the fuse based on controller and wiring (not the other way around).

Lunacycles is showcasing an 100Vmax VESC-based controller design for their "ludicrous" mid-drive eBike product: https://lunacycle.com/blog/luna-bbshd-ludicrous-v2-released/

Going up from there is the Axiom 400V 100kW VESC based controller. The early announcement of Axiom: https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=89056
...and more recently the official website: http://www.powerdesigns.ca/

It is not a quick fix for your bike but if you need, there are options.

* edit *  Also the BESC (BESC at GitHub, the BESC Blog, and VESC forum thread of BESC) ;  and the 24F (24F Pre-order page at PowerVeloCity, and 24F thread at EndlessSphere)

None of the above should be considered an endorsement for any particular product.

[sirdanielwhitney]

What's on the other side of the plastic?

-Crissa

The other side has no visible signs of heat (see attached picture). The opposite side of that melted zone is flush against the aluminum on the battery box so I imagine it was a nice heat sink.