once upon time, an urge to build started.
It was not called…
[the time trap]
…it was called the AT. mostly referred to as “my AT” in LoB as DYI3
back to storytime. I built a build (I never wrote that ) which I might get deeper into later.
but the deck went to dreamland, and my main build with him. time to rebuild!
some lipo batteries were laying around, so I might rebuild it quite differently!
but first, let’s clean the filthy mess packed up after few months of riding. we wanna see clean and beautiful parts!
now the biggest change - from quite a long board to something short. trying again skateboard deck with trucks on the tails I’ve been pushing some time ago. guys were buying the decks for some fun projects as well, so why no to join
and this is where the reason for the time trap starts.
got the deck, pretty neat, interesting colour.
drilling the holes
this is where my usual “sorry, living in a dorm, don’t have everything” starts. I don’t have a flexible straight edge. if it looks straight, it is straight
drilled from the underside, countersunk for some peace in mind
truck assembly
the deck with pads and baseplates.
baseplates from old caliber II trucks, I’m giving them hard time and they still hold up quite nicely. I’ll not torture them much longer though, will be replaced in a future build
the pads are actually sleeping mat, that kind for 2 bucks or something, great padding material. can be drilled with a wood drill by hand. cool and oddly satisfying!
feels kinda fine. little less torquy, mainly because of those 94a deck-side 91a road-side bushings.
wheels
here they are!
btw, michondr, you might ask, what hanger is that? that’s pretty wide! that is a 240 fatboy hanger. love them so much! with those 6" china pneu they are similar width as the Thorium AT with 6.5" urban threads and 230mm hangers. nice!
now, you might say that those tyres look disgusting. and you’re absolutely right! I pulled them through hell (7th screen) and a lot of kilometres
so, lets change that!
fix the orientation of the inlet, the pattern, take pulleys off
the pulleys need to be changed ASAP anyway. (new already printed few days after this build finished to have some spare) but now, we wanna ride!
so, lets throw in the drive, and lets go!
drivetrain
chose the esk8 in desperate times after my motor journey. ok, let’s break up my motor journey:
step 1) - APS 6384S 170KV 4kW
well, this sonovabitch kicked the journey with my previous board. the journey of power, fun and speed. after shredding it uphill, at the peak, I slowed down and realized that a magnet in one of those motors came loose. great news!
step 2) - dual APS 6384S 170KV / SK3 6374 168KV
this is probably the era when my boards started becoming a Frankenstein every single time. but hey, it works! quite a quick fix, I had the motor laying alone in a closet, I could give him the taste of sunshine and neverending tarmac. and the KV kinda matches.
and for those wondering, it worked quite fine! then the phase wires started to short circuit inside and the sk3 was glitching when under no speed. nevermind, possibly too much water?!
step3) SK8 6374 149KV
kinda fine for the price. a bit bulky, a bit pain to shorten axles, a bit janky on fast riding setup.
and mounts and belts - 50t wheel, 16t motor. 270ish belts. boardnamics mounts without idler
battery
ah, yeah, the battery. reused the same lipoly pack from the drowning board. I already had the wiring for that - two xt90 in parallel, 4 of those in series. there is a bit of cable clutter in this configuration, but hey, it works.
some case for the battery? naaah, takes too much time ti acquire. I wanna ride the board!
this might do it, for now
you might have noticed that the similar theme is noticeable on the unity case/enclosure. it’s fine, temporarily, basic… definitely nonpermanent . paper tape and zip-ties are gonna save the world
riding
…and this is where the reason for the time trap continues…
I went outside in full armour, without a surgical mask at that time.
first step on the board was fun, I managed to step partially on my unity, and the JST connector slightly bent outwards. oops, will be careful next time
the first turn. this board does not turn at all.
- if I have comfortable wide stand, I have wheelbite even while riding in a straight line.
- or I can have narrow stand, be able to turn, but have no stability to accelerate and break.
the temporariness was definitely fine. this board cannot be ridden. back to the drawing board
…are you starting to catch the flow of a time trap? …
[the time trap street edition]
sooo… street wheels? but first, time to clean the table
I wrote a friend for some 3d printed parts… either finished STLs or plans like this (when you have handy screenshot tool, its fun)
and the result came some time after that!
wheels
I had old Kegels laying around, so why not to use them? the axles on the fatboys are too long for normal longboard wheels, so I had made spacers 20mm long, 8mm ID 16mm OD. works quite fine, had to fix tolerances with a drill. no big worry though.
perfect sizing!
and that’s fckin wide. megacool!
now time for the pulleys.
went to a hardware store (this time with a surgical mask) and got myself a M5 tap, a tapwrench, a 4.20mm () drill and some bolts. its like 5 minutes on a board through calm hood waving on my boosted
doing this the second time. previously I used an electric screwdriver and melted the plastic all over the tap. not great. so this time with more effort, time, care and love.
this felt like the first proper craftmanship on the whole build.
and I was gifted with heart-warming amount of trueness in how the pulleys run!
battery
ok, this might fit! and it does!
I kept the charging port inside because it was inevitable that I’ll go inside the enclosure. also, paper tape is not a great obstacle to pass
unity enclosure
this was originally the plan, why to care about waterproofiness, use the minimal space possible!
top mount will be the fatboy unity heatsink
after adding a switch and small adjustments for sensor cables is the time to drill. the plan was to screw from the bottom, through the predrilled plastic in the heatsink which has M3 tapped holes.
what do you think I forgot in there?
backup plan. I grab the M3x50 screws, hoping that they are sufficiently long. nope! exactly bottom of the deck to top of the case. new plane - I can screw through the tapped holes from the top with shorter screws, and from the bottom with the longer, it will surely hold self-tapped in the plastic.
also the orange condom on the unity is too big. well, here you leave, waterproofing.
throwing it all together
…yeah. still lots of paper tape, zip-ties and sleeping mat. once again gym stretching rubber solves the dilema with holding down the battery enclosure.
sharp eye might notice that the cable from battery to unity is hidden under the deck, held in place with, you guessed it, a paper tape
so how does it ride?
it rides. that’s what it does sometimes well, more often scary. it’s quite a lowrider. the clearance from the mount bolts is about 7 mm. I aready brought the screw head and aluminium down a bit. I’m thinking about writing the bolts to “hardware store to-buy list”.
the amount of torque is very pleasant. with the sensored motors you can pull the trigger really fast while leaning forward and the board accelerates so fast that wobelling is a thing. definitely more adrenaline during takeoffs compared to having it set for 60kph on AT wheels.
the posture is fine, my front foot is pointing in the direction of transition to the tail, back foot the similar, but it leans against the unity enclosure.
carving-vise, it’s really stiff. the extended angle of the trucks make it so that less lean is required to turn, but the tough bushings keep it mostly straight. will try to change to stock caliber bushings, they are way softer and mushier, it might make it better
to explain some things:
- the pulley on the front right wheel cannot be taken off unless I cut screws
- the amount of applied griptape equals exactly the amount of griptape I had on hand
- the gym rubber was replaced to green, as my roommate wanted to return his
- the sticker on the battery is just shoved under the rubber. too lazy to open and tighten it
at least we’re having lots of fun out of it in our Prague group
[the time trap clud edition]
this is probably the future. I’ll change the wheels to something bigger to restore some ground clearance. now you have to think about every little bump on the ground and cannot go very fast. also you can feel the mounts scraping the ground. not good!
this will hopefully help the shaking as well. it immensely bumpy ride resonating in the whole back wheel assembly. it almost sounds like all the magnets in the motors will break into dust.
conclusion
well, I can always say “I did it for the science!!” I’m looking forward to try it on some sweet tarmac we have here, but that must wait for some warmer weather.
here is a MetrPro record from today’s pilot ride
so guys, how DIY is this build? happy to hear your thoughts