Shortboard with suspension story, rebuilding with belt drive after 1 year on hubs.

[vap]

You can get 3d print designs here - About vapgames - Thingiverse

I’ve been going on hubs + brother hobby trucks for a year, way over 1000km on this board. This thing is so much fun, I really can’t imagine i’ve lived without electric shorboard all the prior years
Only 7.5kg weigh, 20-22km range + swappable battery extension.

I’ve been living in Türkiye for the last 2 years, it’s extremely hard to get parts here, due to stupid customs regulations - all parts have to be under $150 (complete boards are not sold and can’t be shipped here), there’s 5 packages limit per month, you can’t order more than 3 items in one package, there’s 30-50% tax, and none of skateboarding companies ship to Türkiye.
Haha turkish customs, you thought that’s gonna stop me, you don’t know me…

8.5" popsicle, redrilled for RKP (not a fan of RKP)

FSESC 6.7 (smuggled from Russia)
Brother Hobby Suspension trucks (smuggled from Sweden)
Generic CNDMotors (China Drive Motors) 8360 hubs. I’m thoroughly impressed how durable these are, i’ve been riding on rough roads, frequently overheating them, doing jumps and drops on them, went through 3 sets of sleeves, and these motors are still as good as new.

I’ve found that Teamgee sleeves are compatible, and until some time ago they had aliexpress store that could ship replacement sleeves, not available anymore though. My only problem with these is overheating. The more I got comfortable riding, the quicker I could overheat them. At the peak of summer I could only get 5-10 minutes of fun riding before the board turning into a thermal throttling slug.

VTC5A 12s2p

I’m also doing FPV, I designed it so I can quick swap with 6s quad packs. Charging is external on balance charger, no onboard BMS.

DIY enclosure made from a polypropylene case.

First assembled photo. I’ve started with 83mm wheels, but quickly switched to 90mm.

The hinges and lock failed after couple months, so I’ve used brass furniture hinges, 3d printed locks and extra belts for redundancy (yes, the enclose opened while i was riding a couple times, now it’s all secure).

[vap]

Flipsky VX1, after a year battery failed. Swapped with similar sized 900, now it lasts forever.
Also PSA for all VX1 users - secure the potentiometer wires, they are touching the throttle wheel, and over time will get broken.

Recently I’ve tried upgrading to VX1 PRO (cause I’ve cracked my old vx1 and broken the pot). And I had a runaway on the first ride, the board just suddenly went full throttle, I’ve jumped off and the board went into the bushes. So I went back to VX1 (fixed it with parts from the pro).

And another PSA for loop key users:

Pulling on the wires + vibrations will break wires at some point and you’ll lose brakes. Happened to me. Now I always add an extra shunt:

[vap]

2 months ago I was riding at night and hit a pothole at around 25km/h, the result was ripped rear truck:

Tucked and rolled the crash with a couple of bruises.

Also discovered that front pivot was cracked and was held by reinforcement pin:

Unfortunately the BH trucks are not available anymore, they cancelled my order.

I managed to rebuild rear truck with with front baseplate, and temporarily used 8.25 avenue suspension truck in the front. (I had spare, cause I use them on my normal skateboard)

Narrow truck in the front feels really unstable, don’t recommend.

After that i’ve gotten some generic DKP 12" trucks from ali, and meepo mad wheel clones from amazon.

And this combo is actually pretty sick, lots of grip on the front, drifting in the back.

Avenue baseplates fit any TKP hanger:

[vap]

Here’s some progress on the belt drive:
Designed 40t pulleys and cooling fans:

25mm riser with connector passthrough:

I’m gonna try using these generic cheapo 6354 180kv motors.

My biggest problem was overheating, these are completely open and I hope they will be easier to air cool. Any longer motor wouldn’t fit with avenue baseplate

Light hardening, absolutely necessary since the windings are very loose. Let’s try kafuter K-5204K thermal conductive glue + some silicone conformal coating in between windings

100% need the motor guard, I know there are plenty of trucks with integrated motor bash guard, but couldn’t find any that can be shipped to me. Designed my own with a bunch of aluminium profiles.

There are 3d printed 2.5mm spacers between the mounts and the hanger,

Slop stop:

[Pecos]

Enjoying the process progression! Sucks it’s so hard to ship to Türkiye, though I have no skin in the game it seems from far outside like it would be a benefit to everyone if türkiye was in the eu open markets. Keep the updates coming

[ApproachCautiously]

Is this just a sort of make shift attempt at a heat sink?

@vap

Pulling on the wires + vibrations will break wires at some point and you’ll lose brakes. Happened to me. Now I always add an extra shunt:

Epoxy can also fix this issue if you ever want to mess around with different or smaller shapes for your loopkey. I’m probably the only one to care about stuff like that though

[vap]

Yea, at some point I slapped these aluminium strips in an attempt to improve thermals. I don’t think it did anything.

[vap]

Look at the wire colors. Plus is yellow, minus is blue. Never trust any parts from random aliexpress supplier.

Wire placement took a lot of head scratching. The wires that come out of the motor are simply enamel windings in heatshrink, should not bend them.

Glued the sensors, and heatshrink

Wire arrangement. Maybe came out a bit too long, but that allows to minimize stress on connectors and windings attachments.

I tried spinning the motors. Not sure if I’m happy with the torque, maybe I expected too much. But I’m already thinking about going to 45t pulleys over 40t. WANT TORQ! But need to actually try it first.

Currently 275mm belts are perfect for 40t. For 45t I’d need like 290mm.
BTW Onsra Challenger is using smaller motors - 5048 with 45t pulleys.

[rusins]

This thread is awesome. I love seeing people do DIY on a budget

The bash guard to protect the motors looks great! I’m surprised you managed to build it before test-driving the thing (usually protection is an afterthought); I was expecting the motors to be scratched already

[vap]

Thanks! Haha, I’m used to always do running start, so I figured I’m gonna start scraping motors immediately.

@rusins

on a budget

i guess it’s a budget build, only i’m paying premium for the bottom of the barrel parts.
Anyway, hard to get parts, but it’s so awesome to ride here in Antalya - ride all year, mostly flat, mostly good roads, low traffic, giant labyrinth of small streets with million of turns, beautiful views.

[vap]

Just finished it. 3 AM ride.

It has slightly higher low end torque than hubs, not as much as I’d want to, definitely want more.
But the torque is way more consistent and smoother than hubs, hubs kinda have nothing on the low end, and then kick in on the higher end. Also brakes are way better now, I can actually stop.

Of course the avenue TKP for me feels way better than any RKP. Personally don’t like RKP at all, RKP feels linear, while TKP feels like it has exponential progression.

And woah how much smoother the ride is, feels like I can plow through everything.

Wire arrangement, i wanted to retain the 9 pin connectors, they are hidden in the riser.

The riser has an m4 going through it in the place where bump stop is, so the bump stop doesn’t collapse through the 3d print. Mounts can touch the deck, but I don’t lean that far.

Overhauled the insides as well, new FSESC case with more clearance for USB ports, TPU connector mounts:

[Sk8tedad]

Damit, I wish I could give you some of the stuff in the horde. I love seeing your determination and creativity. I also would LOVE to take you for a ride on one of my boards. Also I’m thinking you’d love the road’s surface here,I’m quite spoiled.

[vap]

@Sk8tedad

Also I’m thinking you’d love the road’s surface here,I’m quite spoiled.

Where do you live ?

[Sk8tedad]

San Francisco, east bay,near Oakland hills,if you find yourself here look me up. We will ride!g=

[vap]

Thanks for the offer!
I’ve been to San Francisco a few times for GDC, I’m a game developer. Awesome city, visiting it again is one of my life goals.

[vap]

belt drive testing

Bumped the motor current from 18 to 22A. More fun, still not enough torque. No overheating, motors get barely warm, though the air temperature is around +17C.

Been tuning this thing and fighting all sorts of noise issues.

First of all the metal guard scraping sounds awful and attracts too much attention every time I do a running start, these tpu scrapeStoppers kinda fix the issue:

Another problem is the belts making rubber-squeaking sounds with PETG pulleys. I’ve ordered 2 sets of belts from 2 different suppliers (remember the 3 item per package limit), Powge belts are very squeaky, Dolro belts are quieter.

I’ve tried reprinting pulleys with PLA, but for some reason PLA pulleys come out warped and I can’t
even put them on the axle cause the bearings are misaligned. I’m thinking about getting ASA filament.

Sooo, I ended up adding silicone lube to one belt, the squeaks are gone, no skipping so far. (also did you know condom packets contain silicone lube that is perfectly compatible with latex and rubbers )

MadWheel clones are the beasts, I’m used to bracing myself before every bump or bad patch on hub motors, but these just eat up all road imperfections. Though meepo brand ones are kinda unbalanced, and don’t sit tight on the bearings, i had to print a tiny spacer (0.3mm), to prevent them from sliding left and right.

I’ll upload all my designs to thingiverse once I have time.

[tipsy]

@vap

Powge belts are very squeaky

That’s my experience with them as well

[Sk8tedad]

If you find yourself here absolutely look me up. I can’t tell you how much fun I’d have letting you ride the collection, right now I a testing ( I try to kill them,it what I’m good at) an inrunner motor board. I’m uncharacteristically slow,I’m struggling to get it set up. I was supposed to work on launching it, I kinda forgot because I was so focused on get it set up .

I’ll add a link to the video I shot instead of testing

[vap]

@Sk8tedad

an inrunner motor board

Haha awesome, at first I thought it’s some kind of protective enclosure for an outrunner. What is the model of these motors?

[vap]

https://www.amazon.com/Meepo-Cyclone-105S-Wheels-Set/dp/B0C1FN9LDS
BTW, these are absolute bargain right now.