Hello all,
I’ve been working more on my electric skateboard and I recently switched to a chain from a belt. When I got everything attached for a test run I noticed my chain fell off when I tried to turn (bc the truck flexed and the chain lost tension). My question is, what are people with belt drives doing for tensioners? I looked into rigging one from a bike but if anyone has any advice let me know!
You don’t need tensioners for chains, but it sounds like you’re mounting the drive train incorrectly. Is your mounting plate attached to the board or the trucks? If it’s properly attached to the trucks, there shouldn’t ever be a difference in tension when turning; same goes for belts.
It’s attached to the board, the problem is when I’m riding and lean the trucks flex to one side or the other, which lets the chain loose. I tried tightening the trucks, but my thought was a tensioner would be the best way to go. Should I just shorten the chain again and test it out?
A proper drive train should be mounted solely on the trucks, not the board. Mounting on the board won’t work well or easily for that reason.
This ^^^^ ×100
this is using the @Boardnamics motor mount, and chain drive (as seen) when turning the chain should not loosen and as you can see i don’t have a tensioner as i don’t have any reason to have one 
. got any images of you build?
Yeah, here’s what my board looks like. I mounted the motor onto a piece of scrap metal and fixed that to the board. I’ll try to shorten the chain and see how that works, but if I can make it work without redoing everything that’d be great
These pics almost makes me wanna donate a motor mount to you
I would highly suggest grabbing yourself a motor mount from either www.boardnamics.com or some other seller on the forum (depends where you live) as your drive train overtime is going to become inefficient as hell and the wear on the motor won’t be healthy for it
This isnt going to work. How will you be able to turn?
Front two wheels I think? I’m kinda winging this as I go along. I fixed the tension problem by cutting slots in the mount and pulling it back until it was tight.
I’ll have the board fixed up in a day or two (hopefully), update you guys then.
Yea…the skateboard depends on both trucks to turn, not just the front.
Good luck!