Lockdown Build - Wales

Very nice build! What’s the spec of your battery? Also, do you still get strong signal to your remote despite those carbon fiber lids?

Thanks Jezza, no I used a router to get the shape of the cut out and fine tuned the rest by hand. I lay the carbon in the hatch and vacuum bagged it to the shape of the cut out.

Thanks Vic, it’s a 14s 14p made of Samsung 30Q cells with 150A fuse. It has a 60A Smart BMS to, but it’s only there for charging so I can keep an eye on cell voltages.
To charge it I have a 18A charger with its own XT60 in a waterproof connector. So charge time should only be around 2 1/2 - 3 hrs.
I’ll build another battery eventually, once I’ve sold the 1400 18650’s I’ve got in my garage left over from the power wall I built.

That is a beauty! Great work Wardy.

Thanks Marc, appreciate that :call_me_hand:

Your board is very similar to Eduard’s @edivory board: high quality due to vaccuum bagging technique, board outline, electric hatch with same separate box for the ESC, Flying Rodeo motor, … Eduard made a separate carbon electric box though…

image

Yeah it’s not too dissimilar, a part from the battery I guess. I basically tried to copy the shape/layout/style of lift and fliteboard to be honest, figured I couldn’t go wrong if I did that.

I’ll be honest, it didn’t always come out the vacuum bag looking good. took a lot of sanding and epoxy to straighten it out sometimes. I made 3 hatch lids before I got that right :man_facepalming:

Very cool and very nice work! Can you give us an rough estimate of the costs and time?

Thanks DK :+1:, it took around 7/8 weeks to build. I started mid March, that includes working away for a week and waiting on parts for a week so call it 6 weeks.
Cost… god knows, I doubt I would have any change left of £3.5k if not slightly over that. You probably know yourself, once you commit to buying parts you’ve no choice but to keep ploughing cash into it.

But if the Miss’s asks it cost £1200 all in…

I must of spent around £60 on brushes and rollers, use them once and straight in the bin :man_facepalming:.

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£1200 all in sounds about right :joy:

3.5k is not to bad for a build of that quality. I’m still deciding on the electronics before I start my build. I like the use of the spare 18650’s but which cells would you rather have used?

I tried to keep it simple with electronics hence the 75/300 and no water cooling.
I made an electric skateboard last year and spent a fortune on it due to buying cheaper parts that were no good and then end up buying all decent parts in the end anyway.

I wanted to avoid that this time so bit the bullet and bought the top end gear first

The spare cells I was on about are from old used laptop batteries, spare from a power wall I built. I will sell them on eBay and they will pay for another 196 New 30Q’s to build another 14s/14p eFoil battery.

A smart decision and nice works !!
I think should add a simple water cooling part to the VESC aluminum MOSFET face because of no airflow inside the ESC box.
like this one:

Wardy, a question. You have the holes for the mast connection straight into the box. I saw on another thread that you were considering the sealing. How did you do this in the end? I am working on a new board too, with similar holes for the mast connection, but the sealing is still an open topic. I am afraid water will leak along the bolts.

I have no expirience with my VESC 75/300.
I planed to mount my VESC on the bottom of my aluminiumplate and hope it will be enougt cooling.
When not, i user 4 from those cooling devices ( i bought theme aready) for cooling.

I may still do so, I want to see what it’s like without first. My thinking is the thing is rated for 300/350A continuous and I’m typically going to be pulling around 60A cruising maybe less as I weigh 70kg, I would be slightly peed off if it Couldn’t handle that and maintain a decent temperature.

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I’ll take a pic tonight mate and show you what I did with it. :+1:

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I’m doing the same (Flipsky 200A in thermal epoxy to inside of aluminum box, no external cooling). I’ll report back how it goes on my build thread. Had to cut cooling due to time.

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I had the same thought: it’s built to handle so much more it must run cool by not pushing it hard. Let me know how it goes curious to find out.

Flipsky 200A can not handle 200A continuous. I has been discussed already in the “New Vesc 200A thread”.
I am running it without cooling, inside a waterproof aluminium enclosure, with thermal paste between the ESC and box.
I am pulling Max 34A battery current and it goes up to 53°C.
External temperature: 22 °C

I like your idea of mounting it on the top of the mast clamp, great for cooling.

I was toying with doing something similar to fliteboard, But that would of meant having someone to CNC a housing out of aluminium to bolt on top of the the clamp etc. Which lead to expense and more complex build.