My name is Nestor, I live in United Kingdom (Bristol). I’ve been reading your forum for a couple of weeks and I am determined to build my first eskt8.
I am planning to use it to commute. 1.5 miles only but some uphill on the way.
I had decided my setup with two belt driven motors and 12S Lipo to make sure I have enough torque to go uphill. I don’t care about the speed at all (I am happy with 20mph).
Talking about the set up with a friend he strongly suggested to use hub motors instead. They are more quiet and the police won’t tell you off if you are behaving as you can’t really see the motors. (eskate not legal in the UK).
I don’t see much info or options online about hub motors:
Any suggestions about what motors and ESC would suit me would be much appreciated. I need big wheels because there is cobbled floor in Bristol city center.
By the way I am planning to use this battery, is it ok? I might even do 2p to get a big range:
GensAce battery
Budget as cheap as possible within the performance I need. Take those small but steep hills and around 10 mile range. I am hoping to buy the parts for around $600 (no BMS, will do the charge/discharge manually for now).
Upphill and hubmotors are two words that dsn’t go together that well. You’ll need some beasts of hubs to be able to tackle alot of hills without them glowing hot. I run MADHUBs and they’re among the biggest ones out there and they dont like hills either. If its your first build I’d recommend a belted setup.
As someone who’s made the switch from hub to gear drive, I’d also strongly recomend not going with hubs for a couple of reasons.
The difference in comfortability across cobble stone is HUGE when riding with normal longboard wheels instead of those thin PU sleves, and not to mention the lifespan of the rear wheels. Also, you could pretty much use as big wheels as you’d like with a non-hub setup. Traction is also greatly improved with normal wheels. Probably a bit more expensive initially but I think you’d save money in the long run. It all depends on wich hubs though, I’ve read that Hummie’s Hubs are something completely different from most hubs.
As for the cop-factor. Here in Sweden I still only (thankfully) get the wtf-look from the officers.
Unsure of your location, I’d dont know what vendor you should be looking at. But try to check with others then flipsky. Sure they have some competitve prices but sometimes you endup buying twice when buying cheap.
The truck sets looks abit suspicious to me. Probably a copy of paris trucks and not the highest of quality.
The wheels are flywheel clones and have been known to chunking quite easly. (can’t say I have personal experience there tho)
The rest looks okay but I see alot of people not getting help when thier ESC is dead on arrival or have other problems. Some seem really happy with them tho so its abit of a gamble.
Regarding the battery,it will probably work. Total current output of about 5x45A which is plenty. Your range wont be fantastic tho. Another brand Lipo that is quite popular are the graphenes on Hobby king. Might be worth comparing.
Not super knowledgeable on eletronics or batteries, so can’t help there unfortunately. Those wheels and trucks looks suspicious to me as well though. Trucks might be fine since you say you don’t plan on riding aggressivly, I would opt for bigger wheels though for comfortability. After switching from 85, to 97 and then to 107’s I can’t see myself going smaller. It also boosts your confidence and lesser chance of the board coming to a complete stop running over cracks and potholes.
I only weigh about 54kg with full gear on, so I’d image the difference in comfort being way bigger for you.
I live in England (Europe). I am aware Flipsky is not the best. I have been looking at Maytech too. Any other brands you could suggest?
This part list is for reference, I will probably buy parts from different vendors. I can see for example I can set Caliber II trucks from Amazon quite cheap…
Thank you as well for the input about the battery. I have looked at Hobbyking too but they don’t sell 12S with a good discharge rate. The plan is to try with one 12S battery and if it works ok add another one in parallel to get 10Ah. I have a double LiPo charger that hopefully will work with this.
I will try to get Paris or Caliber II trucks that I see are recommended. Any wheel brand or provider you recommend? I’d love 100 or 107 diameter as you have.
I understand that if it is an ABEC wheel it will fit any wheel pulley for ABEC?
I ride the Abec 11 Superfly 107mm (black ones) and I love them, they seem to be very popular among the community as well. I hear the Boa Constrictor 100mm are very well apreciated as well but I haven’t tried them. I was really interested in getting Torqueboards 110mm’s, but I’ve instead ordered a set of bergmeister pnuematics to see what the deal is all about. If I don’t like them I’ll most likely try TB 110mm’s next season.
Thank you @linsus , I might go for two 6s as I see now the 12S battery is quite large. Thanks for the links too!
Thanks @amanuelamanuel! I will see if I can find a deal for Superfly wheels.
Do you guys think one powerful belt motor will be enough for the hills I have to pass? I guess I better look for sealed motors as the weather in the UK is not great
Hey!
I’m in the UK Too and both DIY and prebuilt options are everywhere here.
If you have the time, I think DIY Is an amazing option. I’ve personally ridden through Bristol multiple times and the police are very friendly there and don’t mind you riding unless you’re being obviously obstructive to pedestrians/road users. Ride safely and they’ll be okay with you.
The prebuilt options you’ve got can be a bit underwhelming, while they’ll get the job done. Exway has poor range and on UK roads can be a really rough ride, and is really hard to do maintainance on as you have to take up the griptape for it, while the other budget belt options leave no real room for upgrades down the line, and if you do choose to make upgrades, you’ll end up scrapping large parts of the board.
DIY Is as easy to maintain as you’d like (My small commuter uses a simple wooden insert system with retaining bars, so I can open up the enclosures mid ride in a couple minutes.) You can also always grab a larger enclosure than you need and buy a larger battery or different ESC down the line.
At $600 you have plenty of options, I think I would tend towards a single 6374, a deck which can take larger wheels and either a 10S3P 30Q battery or some lipos as you’ve been looking at here. Flipsky ESCs can be okay, I personally have had mixed experiences with them. I had an old FSESC 6.6 Which blew after a year, and a recent 6.6 Mini blew after a week. With a distinct lack of options though, especially at 600 they’ll get you rolling in a pinch.
I would try to keep with larger wheels and flexy decks for ride comfort, although as wheels get larger I really personally love a good concaved stiff deck, example landyachtz switchblade or even an evo.
As for options for longboard trucks, our priced on calibers SUCK. They’re 3x as expensive as the US. You can mount to paris trucks with dickyhos, but both caliber’s and paris trucks won’t give you many options when it comes to pulley types and wheel sizes. If I were you, I’d go with Dickyho’s wide trucks, torqueboards 218mm or even evolve’s trucks
Hi all! Thanks a lot for the recommendations, it is very much appreciated!
@mutantbass I’ve seen the exway pro, it looks really cool and they claim it can do 30` slope. But as they have suggested above I think the hub motors could be not the best for cobbled floor. Thanks for the suggestion, I will think about it.
@Miniproto thanks, yes looks like people agree hub motors are not the best option sadly (hills and cobbled floor)
@Ben.Nexus really happy to hear from someone else in Bristol! Probably you know my commute route. Thank you for the recommendations, they are very valuable. I tend to go for the DIY because I don’t really want a longboard, 30" or 32" would be enough for me I think if it’s 10" wide. I’ve heard concaved decks are more comfortable too. If you fancy I would be more than happy to pay you a drink, have a look at your board and have a chat.
