Semi-integrated battery fuse replacement

[DickB]

How much of it is Rad's design vs them just buying whatever is available off the shelf?

As far as I know, the semi-integrated battery form factor is unique to Rad. So I doubt it is off-the-shelf. But, Rad may likely be relying on the battery supplier for electrical design. Even so, if Rad is dictating form factor, they could certainly be giving electrical requirements to their supplier - certainly they could specify fuse type and placement. I wonder if Rad even has an electrical engineer on staff.

[lest0034]

Hi all! I have not one but TWO of these batteries where the fuse blew on me... (yeah, I know. Makes me wish I bought an Aventon, tbh, but what do you do now).

I followed the instructions to replace the fuse and thought it worked, but now on BOTH, the battery power indicator light on the batteries no longer work. I brought the into a bike shop to see what they thought, and they put both on a voltage meter and they said they were fully charged? (I did plug both in, which were at one or two lines when I blew the fuses, overnight.). When they were charging, the two red dots on the charging box were lit (not one red, one green).

Verdict is out still if they are fixed but just the power light indicator is now broken on both...just seems odd. Anyone else see this happen?

[DickB]

There is a flex cable to the battery meter next to the 10A fuse. You may have damaged it. It will not affect use of the battery. Use the meter on your bike's display.

[Capt Slappy]

OK, so I went through this whole thread and I think I have an even newer battery that wasn't charging.  Got the bike in July.  Went through the pictures and video, but I do not have a fuse at all that I can locate on the battery.   Photo below.  They try something new but same issue?  Waiting on the phone for help over 2 hours.  RAD has got issues and it?s a shame.  Any help appreciated. 

[JedidiahStolzfus]

Can't be sure from the photo, but it appears the fuse is the white rectangular component on the right side of the photo.  It's soldered to two large traces.  See if you can research what markings are on that component.

[Ddaybc]

Capt Slappy,
You've got one of the new bms boards with two soldered on fuses. The white rectangle on the lower right of your photo is a 10 amp fuse while the white one on the left is a 40 amp system fuse. Both of them are soldered to the mother board. A ridiculous system developed by a moron (accepted as suitable by a currently moronic company as well) as the item is a $500 to $700 dollar part that won't be replaced because a 10 cent (maybe a dollar) user replaceable fuse can't be easily changed.
If I had one of those I'd solder short leads to the fuses and install replaceable fuses somewhere accessible and if the original fuse blows then your replaceable one would simply take over. I don't have one so I can't guess where to locate the replaceable fuses but one wouldn't need to remove the old ones even if they blew.
POS fuse/BMS design at any rate!

[DickB]

OK, so I went through this whole thread and I think I have an even newer battery that wasn't charging.  Got the bike in July.  Went through the pictures and video, but I do not have a fuse at all that I can locate on the battery.   Photo below.  They try something new but same issue?  Waiting on the phone for help over 2 hours.  RAD has got issues and it?s a shame.  Any help appreciated.

Look here: https://www.radowners.com/index.php/topic,1655.msg12657.html#msg12657

[Hareclips]

Had the same problem with the battery not charging. looked at the videos and read this forum. Took battery to bike shop that tunes my bikes and she (without looking at the video or forum) popped off the cover - and there was the blue vinyl. She sliced carefully and saw the 10 amp fuse.   

This was the first time she had worked on an eBike battery. We replaced the fuse and the battery is charging and working fine.

Like others, the display on the battery is not working. But I can see the charge on the battery with the bike display.  I'm going to just keep trucking and putting the miles on my Rad.

Why does Rad make such a bad design? Fuses are meant to be replaced - so why do they and others say they can not be repaired?

When I contacted RAD, the first thing they asked for was a photo of my Bike keys (yeah, they know where people are sticking them) and a photo of my battery charger port.  Wanted to see if there was a spark.  THEY CAN'T FIX THEM BUT THEY SURE KNOW HOW TO FIND WHICH ONES WERE KEYED!)

Does anyone from RAD read these Forums? They should.

[JimInPT]

We replaced the fuse and the battery is charging and working fine.

That's great to hear you're back up and running with that battery; the recovering engineer in me is sorely offended by that stupid design - you should be glad you didn't get a newer one with SOLDERED surface-mount fuses.  That's just insane.

Our older shark batteries have easily-accessible fuses on the bottom underneath rubber weather covers that just pop off.  So Rad used to know how to do batteries instead of doing their customers as they do now.  Sometimes I give my MiniST2 a little pat on the butt to show my appreciation and thanks I got her before Rad drove over a cliff.

More stupid design issues the last couple of years, too, but that's for other threads.

[GoBettyRVA]

I'll quote Brittany Spears and say "oops I did it again....".  Stuck the key in the battery charge port this morning when I got to work...spacey lately dealing with some family issues.  I'll be doing another fuse replace again.  And this time putting lime colored duct tap over the port when not being used.  I wondered about the person who said he'd done it more than once...now I get it.  I just hope the zap doesn't discharge the power left so I can get home!

[JSedge]

I believe the 2022 integrated battery has been changed. I had mine go bad and replaced and decided to take the old one apart. I don?t believe there are fuses in the ends anymore. It looks like the pcb is different as well.

[DickB]

I believe the 2022 integrated battery has been changed. I had mine go bad and replaced and decided to take the old one apart. I don?t believe there are fuses in the ends anymore. It looks like the pcb is different as well.

Look at posts #46 and #48 in this topic.

[radgranddad]

Yahoo!

With the help from the info posted here, I just "fixed" (okay....replaced a blown fuse) a Semi-integrated battery.
Feeling happy at the moment.

Not sure why the fuse blew in the first place.  We certainly did NOT stick the key in the charger port.

A few observations on the "repair" process, although the above post has a good summary and excellent info/photos.

0) It may not be obvious to everyone, but the fuse replacement occurs at the top charge port/gauge end of the battery (not the end near the high current connector to the bike).

1) I believe the (flat) screwdriver approach for removing the plastic cap covering the two screws would work well for most people.  ...as long as the wide part of the flat screwdriver blade is sharp/square and the right width.  The idea is to tap the plastic cap where the seam is to drive the plastic cap "open".  After getting one side of the cap loose, you may need to go to the other side to loosen the cap completely.  I actually used a small sharp 3/8" wide chisel that worked great, but same idea.  I have no gouges or scratches on the plastic cap from removing it.

2) Yea, the shaft of the T10 torx-head wrench has to be the long enough to reach the screw head in the holes.  As was mentioned, one inch minimum.  Almost had to buy a set with longer shafts, but had something just long enough.

3) I noticed the four torx-head screws had a small amount if blue loctite near the tips of the threads. I didn't bother to put any new on them.

4) Mind the gasket when removing the end after loosening/removing the screws.

5) The 10A (ten amp) fuses are readily available and are referred to as ATM type (mini, not micro).  These are the ones I bought/used: https://amzn.to/3UCuCHp.   Hopefully these are not junk.  Although with a package of 20, I can do a lot of replacements... 

Thanks to the people who put this info together, and best of luck if you attempt the "repair"!

*******  HAHAHAHAHAHA After posting this, I noticed there was a LOT more pages to this thread.  I just looked at the first page!
   Feeling even luckier that I had a fixable battery  **********
   

[rory]

I have a soldering set up and pretty good hang of it, so I think I could replace the soldered fuses. But I'm unsure where to source this particular style of fuse on the new batteries. Anyone with electrical/engineering background have any idea how to hunt these down?

Only asking because I have a 6+ en route to me from rad now and all this battery talk has me thinking I should have a plan if/when it happens to me. I'm assuming I'll be receiving the newer battery configuration with the soldered fuses. Maybe I'll luck out and get the older style though.

EDIT: Looks like I found it. It's a surface mount fuse (SMD). I'll need to get it in hand to see how easy it is to solder. https://www.tti.com/content/ttiinc/en/apps/part-detail.html?partsNumber=0451010.MRL&mfgShortname=LTF&customerPartNumber=&minQty=1000&customerId=

[Steve06]

Way to go, Dick; nice work and I'm sure she appreciates having a working spare now.  Seems like a pretty dumb engineering design to prevent easy inspection and access to a 10-cent part that's designed to break and be replaced.  Reminds me of the new keylock design that can't shut down power to the bike at all.

you forgot to mention the key is generic and anyone can buy one. i don't get the point of the lock on the 6 plus.