ElectricMotorcycleForum.com

Zero cannot let them be an authorized dealer if they don't have anybody to do the work.

-Don-   Auburn, CA

First, the place I bought the bike at still has the same crew of employees. I don't know why they stopped being a dealer, but they were told by Zero that they couldn't be a service center because that privilege is reserved only for Zero dealers, and they wouldn't allow them to remain a service center unless they continued being a dealership. And Zero told me the same thing. From what I saw when I brought the bike there for a firmware upgrade, they had several people who were way more savvy than the anyone at the dealer I've been trailering it to.

Second: The dealer I've been trailering it to doesn't have anyone qualified to do the work. They literally said they aren't qualified, and can only do what Zero tells them to do over the phone. But they're still selling bikes.

Third, I worked at an authorized Jaguar service center. I wasn't a factory trained Jaguar mechanic, but the fact that we were certified to do work on Jaguars was enough to allow me to do work on Jaguars. If I ran into something Jaguar specific that required training, I either asked the Jaguar mechanics on site, or I called Jaguar directly for help. No one ever told me that they wouldn't take my call because I wasn't a factory trained Jaguar mechanic.

Zero is imposing this restriction on their own. They can choose to authorize a non-dealership to be a service center if they wish.

I recently replaced the OBC on my bike that burned up while it was charging. See the attached photos of the replacement charger and note the inlet cable is attached to the charger box. To replace that you would need to cut off the cord from an old charger. I don't think it can be purchased as a separate part.

How much did that part cost?  And how hard was it to change?

I'm thinking it might be cheap insurance to change the whole charger, since I don't know if the heat has damaged anything.

So now the question is, is the AC current reading rock steady?  If it's jumpy, it a poor  connection heating up.

-Don-  Auburn, CA

I haven't held the voltage reading for any length of time, but it seemed steady to me.

I have to turn over the computer to my wife, now. So it will be awhile before I respond again.

Thanks.

Quote from: oldnoah on October 28, 2020, 03:39:50 AM

Hot enough to melt and burn the plastic around the terminals. Both in the cable, and in the receptacle in the bike. This happened with the original Zero cable. I was careful with the several replacement cables I bought to make sure they were 14 gauge wire. And one of those cables was an expensive "Hospital grade" cable. At this point, a brand new cable will melt on the first charge. It's not the cable.

There are only two possibilities, as shown by your own numbers:

1. A poor connection right where the plug mates with the bike.

2. An intermittent short in your OBC that was NOT there when you measured the current.

The only other possibility is that you measured the current incorrectly.

Ohm's law is *NEVER* incorrect. Your numbers for current draw proves NO problem during the time you checked.

No other possibilities that I can think of.  IOW, you have a 15 amp rated cord with only  11.2 amps. Well within spec.  Where is the possible problem?

Something is not adding up. You have to find out what it is.

-Don-  Auburn, CA

Ohm's law is never wrong, but anywhere there is a high resistance in a circuit more heat will be generated. I can't tell whether heat is being generated in the receptacle, or if it's being transmitted down the wires from the charging unit TO the receptacle. But it's not being caused by the cable.
Obviously, if it's just the receptacle, the fix should be pretty easy. I just have to convince the Zero dealer to do it, or tear it apart myself and see what I can do about finding parts that fit. Zero is definitely not helpful. And I don't want to drive another 400 miles just to have them tell me there's still nothing wrong.

I bought my Zero S new in 2016. Between 2016 and 2018, I rode it about 26k miles. In 2018, I noticed that the charging cable was getting noticeably hotter. I tried cleaning the contacts in the cable, and in the bike, with electrical contact cleaner spray. Didn't help. Eventually the cable housing started to melt, so I bought a new cable (not zero, but I was sure to get a cable with 14 gauge wire). It seemed like it was running cooler for awhile, but eventually it got hot too. It melted and burned. In the fall of 2018, I noticed my battery was losing power, especially when it was below 20% state of charge, and I couldn't accelerate to faster than about 45 mph.
I called the place where I bought the bike, but they were no longer a Zero dealership. They offered to work on the bike, and said that they had wanted to remain a Zero service center when  they stopped being a dealership, but Zero refused. I called Zero, and told them that there are no dealerships within the range of my bike, but that the dealership where I bought the bike wanted to be a service center, and they said "that's not possible." I also told them that I'm an electromechanical technician, and I could troubleshoot the bike with their help, and they told me I had to take it to a dealership. They would not help me.
Now, I used to be an automotive mechanic, and the dealership I worked at was an authorized Jaguar service center. We weren't a Jaguar dealer, but we sent mechanics to Jaguar to receive "Jaguar Factory Training" and we had a sign out front from Jaguar, saying we were an official Jaguar Service Center. So Zero's arguments fell flat with me. Of course they can authorize a bike shop to be a service center, as long as there isn't another dealership within the same territory.
The nearest Zero Dealership to me is 110 miles away. I literally can't ride it do that dealership because it doesn't have the range.
Eventually, I trailered the bike to the nearest dealership. They diagnosed it with battery failure, and replaced the battery under warranty, but claimed that the charging problem wasn't a problem. Maybe the cable got hot because of the battery problem. I was more inclined to think that the battery failed because the charging system is getting too hot, but whatever. I trailered the bike home, and next time I charged the bike, the cable got hot again, and burned the cable. I rode the bike to discharge the battery to less than 20%, and trailered it back to the dealer (consider now, that each time I drive to the dealership, I have to drive 220 miles. So a pick up and drop off is 440 miles, and I've done this twice). They claim they they charged the bike with a new "OEM Zero charging cable" and it didn't heat up. So they sold me a new cable, and I trailered it home again.
After riding it down to about a 40% charge, I plugged it in. I have a home made cable adapter with individual conductors, so that I can measure the amps in each leg of the charging cable, and a clamp on style amp meter, so I checked the charging on each leg. The hot and neutral leg each measured ~11.2 amps. I also measured the ground leg because the bike trips the gfci (another clue ?) and got 0 amps, but I probably need a higher resolution amp gauge to see the charge that trips the gfci. I measured the voltage in my outlet, without the bike charging it measures 122.2 V, and with the bike charging, it measures 117.2 V.
So at this point, Zero is telling me to trailer the bike back again, but I’m not willing to drive 400 miles just to have them tell me that there’s nothing wrong. I see some activity on this forum with people digging into  their own bikes to fix or modify them, but Zero doesn’t seem to offer service manuals, or the ability to look through a part catalog. I haven’t ridden the bike much in 2 years, and its getting toward winter, so I expect to lose interest, but in the meantime, I’ve got this very expensive boat anchor that I don’t know what to do with.
Any suggestions?

Hi, I just bought a new Zero S in the beginning of April 2016, and I tried to adjust the handlebars back to a more neutral position. The bars themselves were easy enough to adjust, by loosening the four bolts in the center. But the throttle, brake handle, and switch clusters all rotated with the handlebars, so the brake handle was too high, and the mode and directional buttons were too low.

So I tried to loosen these, and rotate them forward, but the throttle is held in place with torx screws, and when I loosened it, it wouldn't turn. So I took the cover off, and found two things: First, the throttle spring came out, and I'm having a hard time getting it back together, and second, that the throttle spring cover is pinned to a hole in the handlebars, so they aren't adjustable at all. Really(!?)

Has anyone done this before? And if so, how do you get the throttle mechanism back together?

I just bought a Zero S, 13.0. I'm planning on using it just for commuting, as I've been commuting on a Yamaha Virago 250 for about 8 years, mostly to save gas and the planet.

I didn't buy any chargers or anything. I'm seeing some references in this forum to problems with the on board charger. I'd like to hear more about that. So far I'm happy enough with the ~4 hours it takes to recharge after I get to work/home. I haven't paid much attention to the actual time it takes, but the bike seems to be fully charged when I check it at lunch time.