I have a friend with TB DD and an extra Metr unit that we can throw in next ride but I can tell you right now that weak low speed braking affects all direct drives. You will be able to minimise it by running a 4x4 setup but I am yet to try a set of motors that isn’t affected by this. I have Carvon SDV4 as well as hummies and access to TB. So far the only set with nice strong breaks at low speeds are hummies (yes I know they are not DD - insert DD argument). My friend with the TB DD has to foot brake on steep hill stops where as on the hummies I more or less come to a complete stop on significantly lower brake settings (too much for him will lead to wheel lock up at higher speeds). As for the Carvon drives they are in 4x4 config but am waiting on the deck to see the results there, I’m pretty sure they are 115KV so its not much point trying to compare them in 2WD.
You have to remember here that a lot of people want torque. It gets you out of messes, gives you better brakes and in general is more fun. There is not point having a top speed of 80kmh if it takes you 10 minutes to get there if you catch my drift. In saying that these drives do offer a lot for their price and that is something that is good to remember. If someone was on a budget and could only afford $xxx and did not want belts then these may be an option. In their current form though DKP is kindof useless. They don’t really accelerate by the looks of it and even if they could do 50kmh they would be a death trap until the RKP version is available.
Quality really is in the eyes of the beholder. For me it needs to be fast, have good torque, stable, durable and most importantly reliable. The speed and power come from high grade magnets which I’m almost sure that these drives do not run, stability is not there as they are designed for DKP and as for durability and reliability only time will tell. I’m not trying to neg them here but for that price you need to make sacrifices. Its not impossible for someone to make some amazing drives and sell them for no margin or below cost but this is China we are talking about.
Yah my Carvons don’t seem to brake much at low speed(and I weigh nothing) and batt amps are -15 and motor are -70. It’s definitely a common occurrence among dd’s.
Torque, reliability, good brakes I fully agree with that!
Quality, how to define that? By price?
I have tried Maytech Hubs 80$ each, Meepo Hubs 60$ each and Hubs who are four to six times the price but not made by Hummie.
The most expensive ones out of this failed within 200km of riding, not only one set, two sets! Out of those hubs I tried, the Meepo ones where the most reliable without issues, Maytech hubs get really hot too. You can ask @rey8801, he used the Meepo hubs on 12S setup and seemed to have had fun with them.
As for braking, my gear drive setup gives me the most linear and pleasantly strong braking, between the hubs Enertions silver motors are the strongest.
I think you can use the elofty drives not only in DKP you can mount them on TKP base plates. @BillGordon is using them like this if I recall correctly. Sounds like it could be fun for me and is something else to what we already have.
In my case, I use my boards to commute and not for group rides, there are not many opportunities on my commute where I can get over 40km/h. In my use case I rather prefer to have a efficient drive train which gets the most out of my battery.
I am really looking forward to all the new DD from @rey8801 from Torqueboards and elofty, until now there was just one option which was unoptainable.
But I have to admit that I fell in love with my gear drive and the only hubs I would like to own are Hummies!
@Friskies, I read your whole post, but you didn’t mention what you consider your high quality direct drive. If you want to compare to hummie you have to put 83mm wheels on them.
Also you speculate that since price is cheap they can’t be good quality as opposed to pointing out that what makes them poor quality? What sort of reasoning is that? If you want to overspend on everything in life, believing that it will be the best, that’s your prerogative. But, that’s not a scientific test of quality.
Between my friend and I we have about 4 meepo hub sets. They were good for the price but the moment you get on the hummies you realize that they are just worlds apart, I consistently have members in group rides astounded at how easily I keep up and even outperform some of their setups. All motors will get hot (you can make any motors hot enough by just running continuous high amps through them) so it becomes how much heat they handle heat before irreparable damage. The weakest part heat wise in most motors are the magnets. If you get the best quality magnets you will get higher power and higher heat thresholds. I know there is a lot more that goes into motors than that in regards to maintaining magnetic fields et. Speak to @Hummie about it - he is honestly a genius and will tell you how much parts actually cost lol.
I keep my mouth shut these days as it doesn’t look good even questioning other sellers’ stuff. Thanks for the endorsement of the motors @Friskies, and I agree with u and the v4 im pretty happy with but I’m far from a genius and just a one-trick pony. I’m a hobbyist who wanted a good hub when none were available
I bet these motors will more than satisfy a lot of people. My only criticism is this widespread goal of sticking giant wheels like pnumies on. But then some people may live somewhere flat n not be a power monster and all good for them. So many different types of riders. If it doesn’t break it’s good
How to not break? Good magnet glue that can take high temp, vacuumed in winding resin, and phase leads that don’t end up shorting to the motor case
I mean its only really motors we are talking about here the only difference outside of cooling ability between hubs and DD is the type of cores that they take. I think I’ve highlighted pretty well what makes a good motor as that is what I am criticizing to begin with.
Just saw this on YouTube this must be the ELofty thought it was interesting Fabi was reviewing it. He didn’t seem to know it was DD as he kept calling it a hub motor. I would recommend starting the video at the 2:50 mark
Hahaha. Well that’s only me. Once I streetfaced, and dislocated my pinky, on 1" thick street plates(covering holes on streets), I sweared off thane and smaller wheels.
Sure, sure, I agree with you 100% that in the end they are all motors. But to have a fair comparison, you must put 83mm wheels. Because wheel size linearly affects torque and quadratic in heat. Only then is your comparison valid. Otherwise it’s just your speculation.
Nice find! Yes, that’s eLofty. The guy in the video says exactly what I feel riding with these motors. Just love the free roll, hardly any noise, enough acceleration and the efficiency. This is coming from a guy who has a 2x6374 10S setup geared to have a top speed of 50km/hr.
Hi, yep I am have extensively used meepo hubs. For the price they are worth it. At 12s you get 43kmh, nice torque since the mpw Kv. Pretty high efficiency. If you are lucky with truck then is a nice hubmotor. Of course nothing of special in terms of power. That’s why I looked for other hub motors at the time
Yea, this is why I have the goal of making a pneumatic hub motor based on the hummie v4 design. I will be finding out soon how moes race wheels (120mm) affect heat in the hummie hubs but I expect problems.
With any of these direct drives, I think pnuematics will make them overheat fast. You lose leverage with these big diameter wheels and small diameter stators.
Umm, really? Say you have identical motors and have 2 setups.
2wd with 83mm wheels, with Kv
4wd with 166mm wheels, with Kv
Simple math tells me that both of these setups can produce equal force, but the i^2R losses will be doubled in the second case. However, since they are distributed over 4 motors(and not 2) so motors in both the setups will heat up equally when each setup produces the same force.
So they wouldn’t heat up more. Am I wrong somewhere?
Now if we consider the case below(same size but different Kv), I have an intuition that both setups will be equivalent in terms of heat production and force production. But math has to worked out to say for sure.
