An alternate battery pack

[Sumik]

There is a company in Czech converting trucks, buses and cars into electromobiles - Home - EVC group . I know them personally for several years from both sides as a customer and suplier. They electrified the car for my disabled sister as well - see attached picture. They buy cells in million pieces and produce their own battery packs.
They are ready to develop an alternate battery for us. They say the battery won't be better but also not worse than that one from ALTA. To develop it they expect that we buy 100 pcs of packs at least. They need one complete ALTA battery pack. It can be damaged but complete.
If you find it interesting and somebody is able to send me a battery pack, PM me.

 

[privateer703]

And they're sure they won't have a shipping issue?? I thought that was one of the bigger hurdles for those trying to ship bikes to EU.

 

[Sumik]

And they're sure they won't have a shipping issue?? I thought that was one of the bigger hurdles for those trying to ship bikes to EU.

To ship it to US they would have to submit a Material Safety Data Sheet (MSDS) for the battery pack. It's not a piece of cake but it's solvable. Batteries are beeing transported all over the world.

 

[Mikec265]

If they can send one of us a Sample pack first. Would suck to get 100 new packs that don't work.

 

[Mark911]

The "same of better" housing (form, fit, function) alone would cost a significant amount of money to develop the casting and the piece part price can't be cheap either. Did they give any idea what the packs would cost $US? There's plenty of pictures of our packs now, they should be able to give a "not to exceed" dollar value without an actual pack. If they need a technical description for their basis of estimate I can provide one.

 

[Philip]

They need one complete ALTA battery pack. It can be damaged but complete

I am skeptical because of this statement. If they are asking for just a sample battery pack, they are way underestimating its complexity.

It is not just a box with batteries. It has a built-in battery controller, other controllers and relays, and a multi-pin connector that sends voltages and CAN signals to the rest of the bike. It's not possible to reverse engineer those without having a complete bike and spending an enormous amount of time on trial and error and guesswork.

 

[Sumik]

OK. I agree with everything you write. The task is complex and difficult. At the other side I think it's better to inquire such a development at a company which has already developed and produced hundreds of batteries with all necessary controlers and relays for cars and buses than trying to bastle it ourself. I'm ready to invest a damaged battery if somebody is ready to sell it to me. The worst thing which can happen is that they say they are not able to develop it. And of course they don't expect that we order 100 packs at once.

 

[VINSANITY]

I believe Alta did a great job with high level engineering and safety features, automatic shut off etc - however the system seems a little bit over complex - I have high power electric bicycles (100v) that have pretty sophisticated battery management systems but they are less complex than Alta’s battery - thinking range or power output may be slightly compromised (10%) but possibly a more robust set up - common components in a welded aluminum case can work if we can get the right BMS board

 

[Philip]

I believe Alta did a great job with high level engineering and safety features, automatic shut off etc - however the system seems a little bit over complex - I have high power electric bicycles (100v) that have pretty sophisticated battery management systems but they are less complex than Alta’s battery - thinking range or power output may be slightly compromised (10%) but possibly a more robust set up - common components in a welded aluminum case can work if we can get the right BMS board

Yep, they can afford a 20% weight gain or a 20% range loss if the company has no ambitions of making their bike competitive. But we have a Zero for that already.

 

[Rix]

Yep, they can afford a 20% weight gain or a 20% range loss if the company has no ambitions of making their bike competitive. But we have a Zero for that already.

The truth comes out. We already knew this, but nobody came right out and said it. Philip IS THE MAN!!!!

 

[snydes]

OK. I agree with everything you write. The task is complex and difficult. At the other side I think it's better to inquire such a development at a company which has already developed and produced hundreds of batteries with all necessary controlers and relays for cars and buses than trying to bastle it ourself. I'm ready to invest a damaged battery if somebody is ready to sell it to me. The worst thing which can happen is that they say they are not able to develop it. And of course they don't expect that we order 100 packs at once.

At the moment it's going to be difficult to even locate a pack to buy. We may however be able to get samples of the individual components as there has been some battery parts emerging from the Alta factory sell-off. Plus it would be far less complicated to ship those parts compared to a complete pack.