AS Battery Replacement

[Chris51]

I seem to recall that AS Bikes had a recommendation on their website for a company that refurbed batteries, and think that they were from Coventry. Met someone who had a battery done and they also increased the number of cells and thereby the battery rating

I see that the AS website now recommends a company in Northampton

Had mine rebuilt at a place in London(different tech used ) cost £280 for 15ah.

 

[Scout]

Ive just had battery failure in one of our bikes at the weekend , the bikes are old milan2 's and use lead acid battery packs , we toyed with buying new bikes or new battery's, but with of googling I decided to refurb the old battery myself, I took it to bits (easy) took out the old cells, looked them up and found these on eBay, I need 3 and their wired in series . These are exactly the same as the originals

I stress tested the old cells two hold up to 13v and one has dropped to 11.5v without load, so I guess thats the weak one, i'll keep the other two as spares for the (currently ) good bike


https://rover.ebay.com/rover/1/710-...0001&campid=5338547443&icep_item=173011397291

so at least if we decide to get new bikes we sell our old ones with confidence.

 

[TinaLes]

Well done Scout saved yourself some dosh & got the batteries working again.
Like most we have the lithium style battery packs, ours is Bosch 16 amp/hour 36 volt big jobbies.
I have thought about having to rebuild ours sometime in the future, but it does not look easy, even opening the battery itself could be difficult without destroying the casing. I hope there are not special tools needed.
If & when the time comes, I will look at buying the single cell circular Chinese/Panasonic replacements.
I think each cell is rated at 3.1V, so I am expecting to find 12 batteries inside, but they will all have to be separated to find the weak one or two, and I am not sure how they are formatted/held together either I guess time will tell.
LES

 

[Scout]

Well done Scout saved yourself some dosh & got the batteries working again.
Like most we have the lithium style battery packs, ours is Bosch 16 amp/hour 36 volt big jobbies.
I have thought about having to rebuild ours sometime in the future, but it does not look easy, even opening the battery itself could be difficult without destroying the casing. I hope there are not special tools needed.
If & when the time comes, I will look at buying the single cell circular Chinese/Panasonic replacements.
I think each cell is rated at 3.1V, so I am expecting to find 12 batteries inside, but they will all have to be separated to find the weak one or two, and I am not sure how they are formatted/held together either I guess time will tell.
LES

well time will tell as their only on order and Ive yet to fit them, I was very surprised at the poor quality of fitment the cells were loose and just held by small foam padding and a bit polystyrene. I can and will do a better job securing them, but again they are old technology and in reality our needs for bikes are limited.

could you not get a set of laptop/phone opening tools to help their only a few quid on eBay, and come with prods and flat tools for opening cases

 

[Emmit]

They look similar I will check them out

Could I point out that the Ebay ones are a whole £5.01 cheaper. That's not enough, even for me, a Tyke with a Scottish mother to chance that alterations would have to be made.

Combine this with the excellent service that AS provide, you'd be nuts to try to save a sous or two.

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[TinaLes]

well time will tell as their only on order and Ive yet to fit them, I was very surprised at the poor quality of fitment the cells were loose and just held by small foam padding and a bit polystyrene. I can and will do a better job securing them, but again they are old technology and in reality our needs for bikes are limited.

could you not get a set of laptop/phone opening tools to help their only a few quid on eBay, and come with prods and flat tools for opening cases

Thanks, I have a computer opening set somewhere, you know why dont you?, yes its to replace the battery in my laptop
I have used hundreds of Yausa Sealed Lead acid batteries, more 7amp hour ones than others. set of two in every Fire Alarm System, I installed over the years. Bigger Systems bigger batteries for longer stand by duration, they were good, never leaked, but of course they were charged full time.
LES

 

[Scout]

well time will tell as their only on order and Ive yet to fit them, I was very surprised at the poor quality of fitment the cells were loose and just held by small foam padding and a bit polystyrene. I can and will do a better job securing them, but again they are old technology and in reality our needs for bikes are limited.

could you not get a set of laptop/phone opening tools to help their only a few quid on eBay, and come with prods and flat tools for opening cases

update: today at 12:35 the batteries came , less than 24 hours after ordering

on arrival I measured the cells, 12.82v on each one, that must be the float charge for storage.


NOTE: the good cells in the duff battery were 13v the duff cell is 11.5v I wondered if the good cells got over charged because of the duff one?

by 12:55 they were fitted (better than the originals ) and measured again in the box 38.4v

I put both battery's on charge (barring in mind I had charged the one which wasn't faulty fully 6 hours yesterday) after 1 hour I tested both the old one showed 40.02v and the one with new battery's fitted 40.06v.

how much , if at all this will increase with a longer charge time I'm not sure, and I will test at a later date, but both chargers were showing green for full, so that might not happen

on installing on the the bike for testing, it would not work,
then i realised in my haste I hadn't turn the key,

on a quick test ride, the bike seems to have more torque on pull away (the bikes have twist and go, which is why I wanted to repair, not replace) , a side by side longer test is due when it cools down and we will see how much if any improvement the is between the two bikes .

so the refurb is done for £45.09 and the new parts came from petrol scooter express parts

www.petrolscooter.co.uk 02476455893 they do loads of different parts for all kinds of battery powered equipment.

 

[TinaLes]

Hi Scout
I take it you have 3 of these Yausa 12V lead acid batteries, connected in series to give you 36 volts?
I have two concerns for you, one is that maybe all three should be changed for new, as if one of the other two original starts failing it will drag the new one down with them. Its the same on the MH, always best to add a second battery inside a few months from new, or fit 2 new ones.
Second issue is what you bike charger type, is it a 3 stage smart charge i.e bulk, absorption, then float?
It would be great if that was the case, as the batteries would last longer with a good charger.
I must admit I dont know what our Bosch charging regime is at the moment, but when I am charging next from say 50% flat, I will check the charge voltage with a multi meter at certain times.
They Say, Check the battery voltage level after leaving the batteries off charge for at least an hour to get a more accurate stable stored voltage.
Good luck.
LES

 

[Scout]

Im thinking I never explained it properly , we have two bikes, the battery pack failed on one, so I took the faulty battery pack to bits, it contains 3X 12v Yausa battery's (cells) wire together in series, I changed ALL THREE, as you say to only change the bad cell would not be good practice and they would soon fail again. We have A SECOND BIKE using the same battery pack, Ive kept the two good cells for spares as they are the same age and condition as the ones in the second bike, so fitting one or more should not really be a problem, but as is only £45 for 3 new cells its hardly worth it.

The charger does not state if its a 3 stage charger, I doubt very much that it will be, but I do have a C Tec 3 stage charger so it would be no problem during the winter to take the cells out and do a recondition charge on them one at a time.

As Ive said before theses are very old bikes, probably 15 years old or maybe older, but well made and we would have to spend a lot to get better, we are still in two minds whether to treat ourselves to new ones, if so we can at least sell these on with good intent.

 

[TinaLes]

Ah sorry thought it was one battery bank.
glad all is well now.
LES

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[Scout]

posts crossed in internet land

 

[Nixdorfer]

Update: Finally bought a new battery off Ebay for our AS Bike, would of had ours re-celled but it didn't come with a battery when when we bought off another Funster

We need the cannon type but found the one I bought didn't quite fit, only mm's in it but meant I had to do away with the original guide bracket and modify things. Also the connection pins didn't line up on ours as the AS bike seems to have a non-standard spacing. Not sure if they are all like that or just the older model bikes.

Meant having to use the connector that came with new battery, better in some ways as it uses 4 pins rather than 2 so gives a better connection. But also means cutting a square hole in the baseplate where the battery sits and some modifiying to fit as the wires come out the bottom on the new one. Bit of faffing about but got there.

Old style plug, just 2 pins wire

New style in place with new baseplate - sikaflex underneath to seal it
(looks skew but its the side plate sloping)

Original guide in situ just to show how it was, notice the height difference on the locking pin holes

New guide and modified bracket

New battery in, note the new batteries are taller than the original ones

Batteries seem to be going for about £150-165 mark at the moment. AS Bikes quoted me about £280 last time I rang them.

Not sure if buying a genuine one would save the hassle of modifying, the guy at AS Bikes just mentioned the connector may need adjusting. So if looking to avoid some modfying and faffing about then maybe buy genuine or be careful extra on dimensions on the one you get. I thought they were fairly universal but seems not. Also note the polarity was the wrong way round, but as changing the connector anyway didn't matter. But if using the original one be careful.

Having just bought and fitted the battery last week sods law we are now selling the AS bike as finally got a Roodog mountain bike instead