Yeah that’s about right. The V1 famously only went about five miles hence the “last mile vehicle” branding. A123 cells have great safety and wear profile but not great energy density.
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Im pretty sure this is normal. Iirc, standard range boosteds charge in an hr dead to full, so 10-15 for the upper 25% tracks.
Nice work on the revival! Good to see stuff live on and not in the dump.
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In this case it’s probably not advisable to use the leftover A123 cells for a new board build. I’ll open a new topic when that time comes after I’ve given it some thought…
Thank you! I do intend on keeping it working as long as possible. It really is a blast to ride. I snowboard and I get pretty similar vibes when riding the boosted board.
A bit more range would have been nice… I was thinking I could take the board and my wife the bike but 5 miles roundtrip might not be enough. Just thinking out loud for now 
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Houston! We have a problem!
I was about to make another update post on how well it’s working after a 5 mile run this evening. I chose a nice flat trail and the plan was to test the full range. I rode a couple miles one way, a couple miles back and then just around the parking lot until the remote showed the last light blinking. It didn’t die on me, I stopped and I powered it off. It was still going strong at that point.
Packed, came home, plugged the charger in and… nothing. No light at all, no blinking, nothing. The charger LED was on, the charger is good. At this point I wasn’t too worried, I just thought something had rattled loose or a wire got disconnected. I took the pack off, opened it up again and started checking things. Surprisingly everything was still solid, everything connected.
Please bear with me while I go through everything I checked:
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- all cells still have charge. I measured all of them, one by one, at the BMS contact points (wires not broken). All of them are at 3.29v
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- main ends of the 12s cell series are solid, the BMS contact points read the full voltage going in.
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- the charger plug reads the usual 40 something volts. Same at the BMS contact points of the charger leads, no wires broken, the BMS board gets power at the charger connections.
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- the BMS status LEDs are not dead, I tried powering it on assuming just the LEDs are off but the remote doesn’t show it powering on.
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- the connections the the ESC are fine although this does not matter. Even if those wires had not been connected, it should blink red when the charger is connected - now nothing happens, no light at all comes on the BMS.
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- I didn’t run it hard. For the whole 5 mile run I pushed off before starting every time, got on the power gradually, flat trail and I was always in Mode 2 (middle setting).
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- after the run I couldn’t feel any heat in the ESC or battery pack area.
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- I can’t see any obvious damaged/burned parts on the BMS.
So why the hell is this thing not powering on? Surely the BMS couldn’t have just died like this. Remember, it worked fine, I powered it off before leaving and I plugged it in as soon as I got home 15 mins later. Also, the cells can’t be the culprit, it shouldn’t even matter if we have cells connected at all… if anything wrong with the cells but the BMS would be fine, it would blink red when the charger is plugged in.
Please, any suggestion is welcome. What else could I try? I was so happy I had this working 
Sad. Still nothing.
Went back and checked all connections again. All cells are at 3.29v, the charger outputs 43v. There are 3 leads going from the charger connection to the BMS board: black, red and blue. Black+Red show 43v and Black+Blue show a little lower, around 42. Assuming this is normal. Voltage is going in the BMS. This is where my skills end, I don’t really know how to diagnose circuit board components if they’re not visibly burnt. I stared at the BMS for a good few mins, nothing.
One crazy scenario does come to mind. With the longer ride, from the vibrations, maybe some tiny piece of metal/solder came loose in the pack case and when I flipped the board over and put it in the car, it fell back down on the BMS and shorted something. I never noticed any such piece when I opened it up though.
I really don’t know what else I could try. I’ll take off the BMS from the cells, maybe try cleaning it with IPA and a plastic brush… thinking out loud…
We should also start planning for alternatives. To be honest I don’t want to deal with Boosted hardware anymore. I could probably find a v1 BMS on ebay but I really don’t want to go that route. I’d gladly spend a bit more and change out the electronics.
Having said that, I will need some guidance from you guys. Considering 12s is fast enough for me and that I’d like to keep the original motors for now, what ESC, remote and BMS should I be looking for? For starters I’d use the same 12s1p cells. I can always make a bigger enclosure and go with 12s2p later.
I don’t mind spending a bit more on better parts so let’s see if we can get a shopping list going.
- I’d like the remote to work as close to the original Boosted one as possible (smooth and gradual control).
- The ESC should be as future proof as possible if I ever need to replace the motors. I don’t plan on needing more than 2000W, even that’s pushing it.
- The BMS, I don’t know what specs it would need. As long as I can connect 12s of these LiFePO4 cells to it, it should be fine. It would be cool if there’s a way for me to use the original charger with it.
I’d grab yourself a makerX DV4 – they’re tiny and can handle all the amps you’d need.
Oof, sold out right now. I think they’re rolling out a new version so hopefully that’s in stock soon.
I’ve also got a spare makerX DV6 that I’m selling for $175 shipped, but it’s a bit bigger than the DV4. Might be hard to fit in the enclosure.
@frame is also selling a cheap Unity 
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Cool, I see the DV6 measurements, let me see if it would fit.
I’d also need to understand what remote I can use with it and how it would connect.
Oh and what about the motor sensors. With boosted I see 2 leads with 5 wires from each motor. Would I be able to find out the pinout and connect those to the new ESC?
Please treat me a as a complete noob when talking about DIY board parts. I know my way around ESCs, batteries and brushless motors but not from the esk8 world.
What does “cheap Unity” mean?
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Any VESC compatible remote will do, the most popular and reliable option being the Hoyt Puck
I’m not sure what connector Boosted motors come with, but you can likely just swap them to the right size JST connector and call it good. Maybe someone else can chime in for this part.
The Focbox Unity is a relatively reliable VESC that’s been around for quite some time. The dude I tagged is selling one for cheap. It’s comparable to a makerX DV4.
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Hell, while you’re at it, check these out:
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Considering how safe the cells are Id skip the bms and balance externally with simple discharge balancers.
Very interesting. I’ll keep these in mind, if nothing else, for the idea of new enclosure shapes. I’m fine designing my own and I have a large format 3D printer. These would work fine printed in ABS.
Never heard about discharge balancers. I’ll read up. The idea of using a complete BMS would be for me to keep using the same charger and not worry about the battery in day-to-day use.
BTW, this thread is a big inspiration: 3D Printed Boosted Board Killer
I could print the same enclosures easily.
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In a final effort I took the BMS off and connected only the charger leads back. Still nothing. We should have had at least the red light come on.
I don’t understand how it just died like this. It was working so well…
Surely it can’t be the charger… it measures 43v just as it says on the label.
I guess we’re going to move forward with the new hardware plan.
It’s somewhat more clear now what VESC I need but I’d still like to look for a BMS option which would play nice with these cells and need to decide on a remote.
Started look into BMS options. For now these two stand out:
Or this, a more simple one only used for charging. This might be enough to keep using the charger I have… right? In this case would it be safe to use (discharge) the pack without an active BMS on it?
Any other options?
@hummieee when you said “simple discharge balancer”, what did you mean? Could you point me to an example please?
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If you want a canbus enabled bms that talks to the vesc, the FlexiBMS and Ennoid BMS are some more options. Very small but a bit more expensive.
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That’s one problem! I don’t know exactly what I should want in this build. Do I need the BMS to be that smart and talk to the vesc or should a good vesc with a set low voltage cutoff be enough?
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Definitely not needed, but many of us prefer it. Way easier to open an app and check your battery’s health than measuring voltages manually.
For your space-limited situation, I’d just get a daly, something small but solid.
+1
I think any BMS where you can open an app to check cell voltages is fine. The CANBUS enabled BMSs are smaller, and there is constantly development around the communication with the VESC. Eventually, in addition to a low voltage cut-off, it will be able to reduce power if one group in an unbalanced pack gets too low to protect the pack.
All these BMSs should be used in a charge-only configuration, with the VESC connected directly to the battery… but the charge port running through the BMS.
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Roger! This makes it quite clear.
I’ll go back to looking at VESCs now, see if maybe the one mentioned for sale above would fit.
Can I get some advice on choosing a remote? Just random googling shows quite a lot of options… is there anything close to (in shape and quality) to the boosted one?
Closest remote I can think of is a Flipsky VX1 pro.
Basic, relatively reliable… 2.4Ghz Remote VX1 Pro for DIY electric skateboard – FLIPSKY
It’s more expensive but the remote I mentioned previously, the Hoyt Puck, is the most reliable and popular option we’ve got. Some people print different cases for them in case you don’t like the original puck shape.
That puck shape is indeed a bit weird but having it reliable is more important.
I randomly ended up on focbox website but while their vescs are out of stock, I did notice their remote looks exactly the same as the flipsky one you mentioned. Btw, what’s the difference between the two options "for vesc4 and for vesc6? Would this work with any other vesc out there?