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Bafang BBS02 kit to get my wife riding again

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Bafang BBS02 kit to get my wife riding again

Old 07-26-22, 09:48 PM
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Broctoon
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Bafang BBS02 kit to get my wife riding again

My wife and I have been biking together for years, and it's one of our favorite activities. She's never been a very strong rider, but we used to go for lots of ten mile evening rides in our neighborhood, and up to 25 or 30 miles on Saturday morning brunch trips. She rides a Trek FX3 from about 2017 and absolutely loves it.

She was diagnosed with breast cancer last December and is now in recovery, following two surgeries, chemotherapy, radiation, and some other treatments that are still ongoing. She is expected to make a full recovery, but it will take many more months.

So, we decided an e-bike could be a way for her to start riding again much sooner. The treatments she's undergone have left her quite weak, and she probably won't be ready to ride her regular bike until next spring. She doesn't want to wait that long.

We shopped around for a factory-built e-bike and found some viable options, but nothing that she loved enough to justify the cost. Then she came up with the idea of converting her old mountain bike.

Before upgrading to the Trek FX, she was on a 1990s Schwinn mountain bike. It's a heavy, cheap-o, kind of clunky, near bottom-end bike... yet somehow she liked it and did fine with it. It has been sitting in our shed for several years, but was not in terrible shape.

I checked the tires, put in new tubes, replaced some cables, brake pads, chain... the maintenance items that typically need refreshing after several years. The bike rides pretty good again. I also ordered a kit from Bafang with 750w mid-drive motor, 48v battery (11 amp-hour capacity), and all the little bits and pieces to make it work.

It was not hard to install, and I'm pretty impressed with the overall quality of this kit. Obviously it's not as polished or elegant as a Bosch system, nor does she get tidy internal cable routing, disc brakes, wide tires, etc. that modern factory e-bikes come with. I don't think she cares. We're still getting everything adjusted and fine-tuned, but it looks like this will be a good solution for us. I'm hoping it will prove to be reasonably durable; time will tell.

The whole kit came to about a thousand bucks (1/3 the price of a new bike with a less powerful motor).

The idea is that she'll use her e-Schwinn to start riding again and gradually regain her strength. Eventually she will move back to her much nicer Trek, but will probably still go to the electric when the distance or terrain I want to ride is a bit too ambitious for her.

I will report back after we've put some miles on the Bafang kit.

Last edited by Broctoon; 07-26-22 at 09:57 PM.
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Old 07-27-22, 10:30 AM
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Good luck and keep us updated. I'm still impressed with my BBS02 after seven years hard use with no maintenance to the system and no problems with it.
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Old 07-27-22, 04:27 PM
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Yes, keep us updated. I intend to do what you did x2.
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Old 07-28-22, 05:24 AM
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I work in a bike shop and converted my Giant Escape using this unit. Closing in on 900 miles and it is great!
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Old 07-31-22, 08:33 AM
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I would highly recommend reprograming the stock BBSO2 because the factory programming is set for Chinese commuting, not leisure riding. The lower levels have too much punch and the throttle is set to max. Max throttle is dangerous in a chit chat situation where you accidently hit it.
Use 9 levels of assist. Program the first 6 or seven to about 5 precent jumps with the first level starting at around 8%. Set the speeds on those to 20 mph max Leave the last level (9) set unlimited for dogs and thunderstorms. Definitely get a Liekie ring for the front chainring as the standard Bafang has a bad chainline and tends to drop the chain.
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Old 08-01-22, 08:07 AM
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Johnnynerdout FX4 BBS02 Conversion YouTube

I have been contemplating a 2022 FX3 ebike conversion.

For safety disk brakes superior over rim.

Trek FX2+ with rack, fenders light, 20mph, 30 miles $2.5K

Maybe try out new FX5 carbon and other newer Trek bikes.
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Old 08-01-22, 12:09 PM
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IMHO, the Trek FX (hybrid) is great for conversions, as it is a pretty stable platform.
The schwinn is probably great too, as those old ones tend to be pretty overbuilt. Most important thing of course is that it has good brakes!!!

Hate to hear what your wife is going through, but sounds like you are doing great things to support her with stuff like this. Glad it is working out!!!
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Old 08-03-22, 02:35 PM
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Buy her the most expensive, trouble-free high-end and comfortable e-bike you can afford. I'm glad to hear she has a good prognosis, but it sounds like she has been to the Gates of Hell.
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Old 08-06-22, 11:33 AM
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I'm curious where people are buying bafang kits.

I hope I don't attract any spammers with this question
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Old 08-06-22, 11:59 AM
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Luna has them on occasion, Calif e-bike, Eunorau and Bafang has a store in the US AFAIK. That's just a few of the places. A friend just purchased one from Alibaba without incident.

Last edited by 2old; 08-06-22 at 12:08 PM.
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Old 08-15-22, 08:27 AM
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Originally Posted by unterhausen
I'm curious where people are buying bafang kits.

I hope I don't attract any spammers with this question
We ordered ours from EBike Essentials, here: bafangusadirect.

They have a pretty good website to help you select the right options, and most items are in stock.

We ordered on a Monday evening, and the kit shipped from So. California on the following Wednesday. Their only shipping option is FedEx, for $50.

We were annoyed that FedEx will only give an estimate of “sometime Friday” for delivery, and you must be present to sign for the package. So we waited all day for it to arrive, and the truck finally showed up around 7:00 PM. I think they need to step up their game for 2022, because UPS lets you see exactly where the truck with your package is located, in real time. Like, an actual map with GPS based location, updated every several seconds.

The kit arrived in good condition with everything we ordered. Curious thing was they didn’t include any instructions, not even a flyer with a web address for online instructions or video. There’s probably some YouTube videos that walk you through installation. I didn’t bother searching, just figured it out. Although I have no experience with ebikes, I’ve worked on regular bicycles quite a bit. I found this installation to be pretty straightforward.
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Old 08-15-22, 08:42 AM
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The most important aspect of installation (IMO) is to tighten the main nut affixing the system to the bottom bracket and its "jam" nut tightly.
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Old 08-15-22, 03:53 PM
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Originally Posted by 2old
The most important aspect of installation (IMO) is to tighten the main nut affixing the system to the bottom bracket and its "jam" nut tightly.
I can see how this is a pretty critical step. I spent an extra 10 or 20 bucks (don't remember exactly) when ordering my kit, and got the special tool for that lock ring/nut, so I would not have to mess around trying to tighten it with something not designed especially for that purpose.

The steel plate that goes between that ring and the bottom bracket shell and has two smaller holes to bolt it to the motor housing... that is one part that was not made to perfect dimensions in my kit. It would not quite fit in position without a little modification, and it's nothing to do with the bike. I took a Dremel tool to it and removed a little metal in the right spot, then it worked fine. Just an extra five minutes of work in an otherwise really well designed system.

The most time consuming part of the whole installation was placing a few little sensors (a Hall effect unit on the left chain stay, for bike speed sensing, and a little unit that the shift cable passes through, for shift sensing) and routing all the wiring neatly. You definitely want some zip ties for this kit.

There's a tiny magnet that attaches to a spoke to trip the speed sensor mentioned above each time it comes around. Works just like those cycle computers everyone had before GPS came along. The screw to hold that magnet on has a tiny tamper-proof Torx head, requiring a tool that I had neither in my collection nor the ones provided with the kit. I just cheated and grabbed the screw head with a vise-grip plier.

The only other snag (quite literally) was the screw coming through the bottom bracket shell to secure the plastic shift cable guide. This is part of the bike, not something specific to the Bafang kit. It protruded inward too far to allow the motor to slip through the shell. I had to remove it, shorten it a bit with my Dremel tool, and reinstall it. Then everything worked together just fine.

My only complaint with quality control, besides the aforementioned lock plate, is regarding the cheap plastic chain ring guard. It attaches to the chain ring with five tiny sheet metal screws that just tap into pilot holes in the plastic. One of them did not ever grab. I used gentle force and was careful not to overtighten, but I don't think that screw is doing anything. The guard is essentially held in place with only four screws.

Last edited by Broctoon; 08-15-22 at 04:10 PM.
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Old 08-15-22, 04:12 PM
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Looks like you learned the tricks the first time around; I'm not sure that I was as proficient. I discarded the plastic ring and used a "narrow-wide" chainring to retain the chain since I wanted to lower the gearing for off-road anyway.
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