"Velcro Board" | MBS Core 94 | Idea ATS mounts | Single SK3 149KV | 12s LiPo | ESCape

all cables on top - no problem with charging :wink:

Serious. Power.

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XT150 connectors soldered on! First time soldering. The first connector took me like 2 hours. I just wasn’t able to attach the cable to the connector quickly enough. Then, once I finally managed to make a solid connection, I realized I forgot to put the plastic housing on the cable first. :sob:

Nevertheless, by the sixth connector, I can do it all in a blink of eye! I mean, a slow blink… like 10 minutes or so. :slight_smile:

I’m still not sure whether I should put XT150 on the last two cables. I have purchased some AS150 as well. I’m thinking about using those instead and connect to VESC directly. Is that a bad idea?

For charging, I have two iMAX B6 chargers and I plan to break the 4x 3S to 2x 2x 3S for charging. I could then either use the alligator connectors to connect to the charger (they came with the charger) or make charging cables with one AS150 male, one XT150 female for one battery pair and one AS150 female and one XT150 male for the other pair. Given my excellent soldering skills, that shouldn’t take more than full afternoon. :slight_smile:

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So I got this great idea to attach the velcro to the board with glue only because “I won’t drill into my nice and shiny board”. As a test, I glued some velcro to a piece of plywood first. It held on fine. How different can it be with a board, right?

It only took a single test to find out. Now my shiny board looks like this:

… which is clearly much better than having a few tiny holes in it.

:sob:

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That sucks :weary:!

Use a black edding and try to forget it Your velcro seems very weak and is not even self-adhesive. No way that could work with this tiny stripes even with perfect velcro. Also the paint on your deck is a problem. Furthermore I think your enclosure will come apart after some rides because of the structure ( wood screws only).

If you don’t care about how it looks I have some suggestions. Take some black gaffer tape and wrap it around your box that will hold it together and it won’t come apart, maybe it wiggles a bit one day but no battery or vesc is leaving the box (that happened with my very first box :laughing:).

Because you want to take the box off for kiting I think the easiest and safer way would be to use 2 straps and some high density foam (or camping mat) between deck and box. There are also velcro straps available, the one in the pic would be too small but just to get an idea what I’m talking about.

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The velcro strips on the board are only to prevent moving the box from side to side. In addition to that I’m using two straps that go around the box and the board (probably similar to what you’re suggesting). That seems to keep it in place really well. Will post some pics later.

The box is glued together. The screws are only to reinforce the joins. It seems pretty sturdy. Plus, I’m not going to abuse my board the way you do. :wink: Still, wrapping some tape around just in case sounds a good idea. It’s not that I don’t care about how the box looks but I think it can hardly get much worse. The tape might actually improve the looks. :grinning:

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Ah alright. Maybe you can use an antislip mat between box and deck (additional or instead of foam). Also good that you glued the box, too.

:joy: When my electronics left the box it happened because a friend tried it the first and last time. I couldn’t know that he goes full throttle instead of braking and crush into a concrete wall :laughing: For such cases it’s good to have a sturdy box.

Yeah. It also pays off when falling off a cliff or getting run over by a truck. :laughing:

None of that is what I would consider the primary use case for myself. :grin:

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As promised, here’s some pictures of my super sophisticated velcro mounting system. :laughing:

Here’s how the box looks on the board. It’s sooo bulky and awkwardly shaped. This is my v1. Will need to at least trim the height or (more likely) redo it completely.

I have two velcro straps on the board and on the bottom of the box.

Two long straps are attached to one side of the box by screws and go under the board and attach to the other side of the box with the velcro adhesive part.

After unmounting the box, I can re-attach the straps to the sides so that they are not in the way. The bottom pieces and the straps that go around are the same velcro… ehm… sex? I mean, they are either both male or both female. Not sure which is which as far as velcro is concerned. The point is, they don’t stick to each other, which is a cool feature. That’s not a coincidence! :laughing:

Here’s also some gasket that I have added as @rich has suggested. It’s just some window gasket I found home. Probably won’t keep the color for very long. :slight_smile: BTW, this is with the batteries sitting on the bottom. I think I have space for like 5 more VESCs than I need. :slight_smile: I actually may need to call this “v1 early alpha”. :laughing:

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BTW, the attachment may look weak. It’s just 4 thin pieces of velcro. But it actually feels pretty strong. I tried lifting the board, shaking it side to side, even flip it around. The box wouldn’t move at all. Of course, how well it will do on an actual ride may be a different story (especially when hitting concrete walls :laughing:) . Will just need to test it to find out.

Motor mount arrived from @idea! The single motor looks so lonely in that double motor mount. I may need to fix that at some point. :grin:

Now all I need is an ESC.

All I need is ESC. All I need is ESC. All I need is ESC-ape… :notes: :slight_smile:

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Getting there dude! Mines still waiting on ESCapes as well. And motors actually, but expecting them soon. Still feel like I got loads to do till it’s running though! You think you’ll be all set for when the ESCs arrive?

Yeah, starting to look good. I think I should be at least be able to do a test ride when the ESCape arrives.

I’m figuring out the phase wires now. I would like to be able easily detach the battery/ESC box from the wires. First, it will make taking things apart easier. Second, I can then leave the MTB in the storage and only take the box to my apartment if I need to charge batteries. I found these MT60 connectors that look perfect for that purpose.

On the motor side, I’m not sure whether I should put female 4mm banana connectors or solder it on. I don’t really need to be able to detach the wires at that side. I haven’t been able to find any relevant info on the forum. Any advice, guys? @Der6FingerJo @rich @AndyBigD

Connectors seem a better option to me. I won’t need to cut into the wires coming out of the motor. Might be relevant if I ever want to sell off the motor.

I would strongly prefer individual bullets over those mt60 connectors. I used them once on a Longboard build and they were mostly a pain in the ass. way too small, awkward to put together and pull apart and generally not very trustworthy imo. At least with somewhat bigger motor wires.

Hm, OK, in that case I could only use connectors near the motor and if I need to take the box with me, I would take it with some 30 cm of wires, which probably isn’t that bad.

My only concern is that I’m going to disconnect/connect frequently and with individual connectors I will need to do 3 connectors instead of 1. Plus, there’s a risk of swapping them up. That’s why I have considered something like MT60.

I say go for it, I’ll be using MT60s on mine. They’re just 3x 4mm bullets in one plug so why not? Perfect for what we’re trying to do with simple removability of parts. I plan to cut and solder extensions on my motors that bring the cables to the box, then make my own ports/sockets on the box to connect MT60 & 2x MT30 (sensor cable) for each motor. My motorised hanger will then just have one long braided cable bundle with 2 sockets to plug directly into the side of the box.

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Everything is possible but soldering bigger wires on smaller connectors is no fun.

XT60 and MT60 (=3,5mm bullets) are best to solder up to 14AWG

4mm bullets up to 12AWG

XT90 (=4,5mm bullets) best up to 12AWG (10AWG is also OK)

5,5mm bullets (140A) up to 10AWG

All of us are waiting for MT90 which would be best for esk8, Hobbyking can you hear me?

I found a company making custom MT90 connectors, I would order a connector for 3 phase and 6 sensor wires in one connector, how cool is that? :heart_eyes:

But before you start drooling like me :drooling_face: or ask me for the link, there is a problem. You would need at least 2000$ to order 1000 pieces, that’s the minimum order quantity :rofl:

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They actually say “Suitable for: 12AWG wire (Max)” here.

That’s not to argue that soldering it may not be fun… especially if my soldering skills are involved. :laughing:

ESCape lego edition! :laughing: Carefully built to size. :slight_smile:

Testing if everything fits in the box. It does! And this is still with 23 mm of lego duplo bricks underneath the batteries! :grin: That much I can safely cut off of the box height.

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Designing a new battery / ESCape compartment to replace that wooden skyscraper I have built. :laughing:

This one is the other extreme – low profile, but taking up the full width between the straps. Not sure how well that will play with the board flexing. My idea is to put a lot of foam at the bottom to allow for some travel as the board flexes.

I’m also not sure whether the lid can actually be 3D printed. I have sent it to a friend who has a 3D printer for considering.

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