Experience with eBike conversion Bafang 750W motor and UPP 13AH Battery.

I paid about $2.2k including tax to have Schwinn Hybrid bike converted to eBike in May 2020. Battery pack weight was about 9lb and motor was about 8lb vs the bike weight about 23lb (Aluminum body).

With a throttle only max speed 28mph on flat road. I used it mostly for weekend rides 10 miles round trip 800 to 1000ft elevation gain. Battery was 48V 25A rated 13Ah with USB outlet. I used the USB just once for my phone in 15 months. After riding about 150 miles on inital charge it showed about 25% battery after I used an average of 10% pedal power assist which is 2.5A and 48V or 120W. I barely compensated for the extra weight and did not really use Pedal Assist to make biking easier. I used max pedal assist or throttle only when I was riding 2 to 4 miles round trip tennis courts about 2 to 3 times a month depending on weather.

Suddenly the battery died and will not charge. Green light indicated that battery was fully charged. I took it to the same place which did conversion. They asked for $435 for the battery. Their labor rate is $90 per hr. So I assume that they would have charged me 525 plus tax about $570 but warranty on the battery was only 1 yr even though "expected lifetime" is 5yrs.

I contacted 5 local bike shops. 3 do not service eBikes. 1 did not respond and 1 said they if I buy the battery, they could install for $50 to $100.

I looked and found a 10Ah battery without USB Hailong battery plate, without USB $270 including delivery on eBay. A light USB battery pack I have will do the job for the rare case. For my usecase a larger battery was only more weight. This one was about 2lb lighter and range is still probably lot more than I need. Manufacturer's instructions interestingly suggested that I charge the battery fully and discharge it 3 to 5 times initially to make sure that I get max capacity. I guess I have to use the throttle or max pedal assist just to drain the battery. The instructions also called for not exposing the battery to over 113F or below freezing temp which may happen anywhere in the US in a garage. They suggest bringing the battery inside on such extreme days. They also suggested that I charge it to at least 60 to 80% once in 3 months regardless of use.

All I needed was a hex wrench and a heat gun or hair dryer and a 1/2 inch heat shrink wrap for $2.50 at Harbor Freight. I just removed the old battery by unlocking it with the key, cut off the old shrink wrap and disconnected the plus and minus Anderson connectors, removed the battery plate with hex wrench and installed the new plate, slid the shrink wrap over the power cable, connected power and used heat gun (also $10 at Harbor Freight but any hair dryer would do the job). In 5 min $272.50 I was back in business.

A friend of mine bought a brand name eBike and he too had to have the batery replaced. Luckily for him it was under warranty but otherwise brand name ebikes with propreitary battery would probably cost a lot more.

I looked at the instructions in the manual of the battery. Chinese manufacturer. I asked a friend of mine who is in the business of building solar and battery backup solutions if it is worth paying a 50 to 60% premium for battery buit using 18650 cells by Panasonic, LG or Samsung. He told me that premium is not worth it because the warranty is still 1year even with those and the premium is not worth it because they by no means last 50 to 60% longer. Tesla uses CATL Chinese cells in many of their cars.

Is it worth replacing the a dead cell? It takes about 30min perhaps to open the battery pack and check each of the parallel cells. 10Ah battery I bought is made up of 13 3.7V cells in series to add up to 48V, 2.5Ah each 4 cells in parallel 10.5Ah. I would have to open it and check 13 of the parallel cells to determine how many are bad. Then the entire parallel set of 4 have to be removed and replaced with cells of the same voltage as the rest. Even then I would have a mix of old and new. A professional service would charge about $200 to do this. Still warranty would not get extended. DIY requires investing $60 in a low cost spot welder, $10 for nickel strips, $12 minimum for 4 cells retail price and 2 hrs total labor perhaps. So spending $82 vs $272.50 for a new battery pack 1 yr warranty and 5min of my time was easy decision.

I looked at many videos on youtube on eBike DIY including how to replace the battery, install the motor, sensors for speed, gear change, throttle. You could buy a kit for about $1100 with parts and tools including tax and shipping vs $2.2k I paid to convert my bike. I think it takes max 4hrs to do it. There are lots of videos on youtube. If you are a DIY person, give it a shot. I told my friends that if they or their friends want to convert their bikes to electric or replace battery, I can help at no cost as a community service.

Hope this helps someone save time and money. Happy riding!

Rover Dog sitter does not do any vetting of dog sitters

 We tried River dog sitter where we left our dogs with dog sitter.

2 out of 4 times, there were too many dogs at the same time handled by just 1 person and we had injury to deal with while abroad. Luckily our son was in town and he took dogs to the vet. It took 2yrs for Rover to disqualify that dog sitter.

We interviewed 2 others taking care of dog sitters. One was accepting big dogs in downtown area with a very small yard. That person should not have been allowed to dog sit even a single big dog let alone 2. One was a teen ager on a tourist visa visiting her sister with no dog experience and legally allowed to work in the US.

We hired a dog sitter to stay in our house and take care of the dogs. 2 times the dogs were fed 3 hrs late and we had to call a neighbor to help. 2 times, the dogs almost left out compound because of damaged fence panels not noticed by dog sitter before letting the dogs out and once when gardener would come from a side gate and dogs should not have been allowed outside. On a hot day dogs were left in the back yard all day. When we came home we found that both dogs lost a lot of weight because they were underfed. This dog sitter was barely in the house and rushing to her parents house for food and shower. She was just not equipped to stay in our house and take care of the dogs. She actually complained to Rover that we were rude to her when we almost lost our dogs due to her and 2 times they were exposed to high heat and hunger.

Rover gave us no compensation and no phone call either.

APPASO Touchless Kitchen Faucet with Pull Down Sprayer, Motion Sensing Activated Hands-Free. Replacing IR sensor.

 Summary:

It works but very poor customer service.

https://www.appaso.com/pages/home

https://www.amazon.com/Touchless-Kitchen-Dalmo-Fingerprints-Resistant/dp/B07SRB12MD/ref=asc_df_B07SRB12MD/?tag=hyprod-20&linkCode=df0&hvadid=385178072563&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=7889088171146804546&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9032008&hvtargid=pla-820815725179&psc=1&tag=&ref=&adgrpid=78829232096&hvpone=&hvptwo=&hvadid=385178072563&hvpos=&hvnetw=g&hvrand=7889088171146804546&hvqmt=&hvdev=c&hvdvcmdl=&hvlocint=&hvlocphy=9032008&hvtargid=pla-820815725179

Details:

Feb 4 21     

Item received and installed in 20min and worked. I did my own install.

Mar 25 21  

Stopped working and replacing batteries did not help. Sent seller message.

Seller insisted on video showing failure but no way offered to upload video to seller other than review on Amazon or sharing on google drive.

Mar 29 21

Seller sent IR sensor and replacement controller tracking number with 5 to 14 day delivery time. Luckily the faucet was working without controller in manual mode.

Apr 3 21

Received IR sensor and replacement controller with no instructions and no video on Youtube or their website. Controller is external and needs just water to be shutoff and 3 hookups but that did not solve the problem. The IR sensor needed replacement. Sent message to seller but got reply next day (sun) that office is closed and they would respond next week.

Here is what it took to replace the IR Sensor.

1. Completely uninstall the faucet.

2. Twist open a big ring and inside it pop out a plastic piece holding the hoses and wire.

3. Remove hot water hose and mixer hose to get access to the IR sensor inside the faucet.

4, Remove a bolt holding the IR sensor inside.

5. Remove the IR sensor and replace it with the new one.

6. If you do not have a magnetic screw driver, it is a pain to put the bolt back.

7. Reconnect the hot water hose and the mixer hose into the faucet.

8. Close the big ring holding the hoses and wire. Ignore the plastic piece holding the hoses and wire. It really does nothing

9. Re-install the faucet and hook up the controller.

10. Turn on the water valve for hot and cold water and test.

It worked but took me over 2hrs with no instructions or help from the Appaso.

I guess other touchless faucets are similar and I hope this helps someone. Best to ask for replacement faucet and not try to replace the IR sensor inside the faucet. It is trivial to replace the controller box. If you were call a plumber, you probably would be advised to get new faucet and get charged once for visit and 2nd time for the install.

Please read before you buy Nest Gen 3.

 I had Nest Gen 2 since Aug 2013. No failures at all. I did not bother with self learning mode.

5 years later in Aug 2018, I decided to replace it with Nest Gen 3 and 3 sensors to better control the temperature in my house. 2yr warranty.

Mar 29 2019 Battery stopped charging.

Mar 31 2019 Google shipped Nest replacement. I received it in 2 days and shipped the bad unit immediately. I kept getting reminders that they did not receive the return even though I had proof that it was delivered. Finally they acknowledged the receipt of return on Apr 22nd.

Aug 29 2020 11pm. I saw that Nest was offline on the App on my phone. I went and saw that it was not connecting to wifi. Battery was low. According to instructions from the previous experience of bad battery, I charged it not for 1hr but 9hrs using micro USB and at 8am next morning battery was only 3.75V which was supposed to be enough to connect to Wifi. The unit would not see any wifi networks including hot spot on my phone inches away. Apparently Nes gen 3 has a known issue of failure in wifi chip on top of draining battery.

Aug 30th Sun 4pm. I received return label for the bad unit and I was promised a replacement to be shipped in 1 business day. Warranty was expiring on that day! They took another week to let me choose how I want the replacement. 1. Return the bad unit and wait till they receive it and then they would ship a replacement. Note that it took them 3 weeks after I shipped the bad unit for them to receive and then few more days to get replacement. 2. Ask for Advance Exchange and they would send me a link to order replacement unit for $190 at put a hold on my Google Pay account to that extent. I asked for Advance exchange. They took another week to send me a link to order using Advance exchange and then another week for me to receive the replacement unit. The return is expected by Sep 23rd back at Google and I have no idea when they will actually remove the hold on my Google Pay account based on previous experience when I get too many reminders to return the bad unit if though I did immediately.

No replacement shipped even by Friday Sep 4th. We had 3 days of 110 deg weather forecast Sat to Mon. I went to Home Depot and bought Nest gen 3 and it was working perfectly. I asked Google if they can give me credit for the unit I bought. They would not.

Sep 19th I received the replacement unit from Google and warranty would be extended for 90 days.

I returned the unit I bought at Home Depot because Google asked me to "work with the retailer".

If you do not use the so called learning capability of Nest you have other choices from real thermostat manufacturer Honeywell Lyric T5+ if you do not need additional room sensors. It $70 cheaper than Nest gen 3. There is Honeywell with 1 remote sensor $200 and 2 more sensors can be added for $65 vs $220 for Nest Gen 3 and 3 pack of sensors for $100. $320.

There is also Ecobee and I know people who are very satisfied with Ecobee and Honeywell. If my Nest gen 3 dies after 90 days, it will be replaced by Honeywell.

Summary: Google Nest has reliability as well as very poor support and you have other choices now.

One final thing I did not really with any support from Google. A 24V transformer connected between C and Rh provides 200mA to keep the unit always powered rather than depend on 20 or 40mA provided if you do not have C wire connected. There are other ways to connect C wire you can find on youtube.

Also, you can find videos on youtube how to replace the battery on Nest. I ordered one. You get the idea? If you buy Nest, better be prepared to fix it yourself or just by some other brand.

Hopefully we will come out stronger after Corona Virus. We all can do a lot.

Governments:

1. Hopefully realize that the old saying health is wealth. Health of people is as important as the borders and security of the country.
2. Important to health is climate/environment, quality of food which can prevent diseases.
3. Healthcare must not be linked to job so that people are free to change jobs without concern for medical care as it is in the US.
4. 24/7 Internet is as important as electricity as proven by the need and ability of the people to work without overcrowding cities and creating the need for huge office space.

Large Corporations:

1. Identify the most productive employees who did better working from home than in the office.
    Allow them to work from home and save office space and cost. Ensure that all employees who can work remotely are trained and ask that they work from home for 1 day a week and save on office space. Provide ergonomic furniture to employees working from home. Pay for high speed internet at home.
2. Identify suppliers closer to the demand and use more than one supplier in different geographical regions to avoid supply chain disruption.
3. Conserve cash and cut back stock buyback and give bonus dividend based on profits but not increase or decrease regular dividend to encourage share holders to hold stock.
4. Increase Hygiene and continue to maintain more social distance than earlier.
5. Replace landlines with cell phones for all employees and use wifi onsite.

Small Businesses:

1. Focus as much as possible on delivery or takeout and save retail space.
2. Make hygiene and health of employees higher priority. Offer more sick time in exchange for working remotely or coming to work during peak requirements.
3. Follow as much as possible what the large companies are doing.
4. Where there are a series of restaurants one the same street, create a common outdoor and indoor dining area as in a food court in a mall which can be smaller than the total outdoor and indoor dining space in each restaurant. That saves on rental cost and utilities. Some supplies for takeout and paper napkins, salt, pepper, sauces can be bought in bulk in Individual packs. Linen can be also handled in bulk.

Individual Employees:

1. Set aside time and space to work from home and maintain hygiene.
2. Prepare meals at home from simple ingredients instead of ordering food or buying frozen dinner to cut costs and eat healthier.
3. Dress as if going to work to be presentable on video conference even to customers.

People in General:

1. Follow as much as possible from above.
2. Depend less on disposable supplies and cleaning supplies.
3. Maintain more social distance than earlier.
4. Get to know your neighbors. We need each other more than we think.
5. Minimize shopping trips and trips to doctor's office by using online services.
6. If you have 401k account, realize that now is the best time contribute max by cutting costs
    - Buy a decent certified used car good enough for local driving and reduce loan.
    - Make your coffee at home, pack lunch. Socialize at a coffee shop instead of dinner.
 
Colleges and Universities:

1. Offer more classes online and cut costs in classrooms, facilities on campus.

Students:

1. Unless labs is required, enroll in as many online classes as possible and see if at least 1 yr of 4yr college can be from home. Use the savings to create proper ergonomic space to study at home.

Very difficult to buy a Tesla Certified car

3 days ago on Friday morning at about 9AM I saw 2 Tesla certified cars about 400 miles away. There was no phone number to call. Only 2 choices.

1 pay a deposit
2 Request a call back with your name, email address and phone number.

I had questions and so I submitted a request for call back.

As of now, no acknowledgement even by email that I wanted call back. No call back.

Is this typical?

Here is update. At about Noon on Monday I received a voice mail regarding the car. By then I had my car repaired and I was wondering if I should delay buying another car given the slow response by Tesla and new models such as Ford Mach E, Rivian R1s looking very attractive.

On Wednesday night almost 4 full working days from the time I contacted Tesla, I received email with phone number to contact.

As a sharp contrast, when I bought Lexus certified car last time, I saw the car was available 1hr away. Called at 9AM on a Saturday. Paid cash and drove home the car by lunch time. In this case if Tesla answered on phone all my questions on Friday morning and followed up with email immediately, I could have flown on Friday and if I liked the car, I would have driven back 6 hr 400 miles.

Is your Vizio smart TV suddenly turning on at night?

My setup was Vizio M 558 TV and Onkyo Avr TX-NR-626.

I enabled ARC only on the Vizio TV. Connected a Roku box, a bluray player to the TV.
On the Onkyo Avr I had to enable CEC AND ARC AUTO.

TV was suddenly turning On at random during the day or night. I called Vizio support and the only suggestion was to toggle power mode from Eco to Quck Sar and back to Eco. It did not help.

I found out that using chromecast built into Vizio or linking Vizio to Google Home requires power mode to be Quick Start.

Now there is no random turn On of the TV.

Samsung has 21 day exchange policy for replacing defective tablet.

I hope to help someone interested in buying a device from Samsung. I was lucky for many years with Samsung products.

Smart phones, TVs, Bluray players, Refrigerators.

First sign of trouble was Microwaves which started failing just after the warranty period.

In Dec 2018 I bought Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 from Costco. Barely few months later I noticed random failure of Apps and random  reboots many times a day. I was hoping that software update would fix it. All it got was security updates and it is running Android 7 when 10 is now the current release. I sent it for repair in October. Here is their repair process.

1. They send you shipping label and it takes up to 1 week for them to receive the unit.
2. They take 5 to 7 business days to repair and another 5 days in shipping. So, from the time you send the device to the time you get it back can be more than 2 weeks.

I found that the Tablet still shuts down after charge to 100% and can suddenly reboot. I sent it back on Nov 2 and 10 days later I was sent back the unit saying there is nothing wrong. On Nov 13 they agreed to send me replacement. I was told to expect a shipping label to return the device. On Nov 15 Friday morning, I was told that they need receipt. I went to Costco and got a duplicate receipt and sent it. On Nov 18th Mon, the status is RMA was approved and when I called, I was told to just wait for the shipping label to return my unit. On Nov 19th, I was told that it would be 21 business days from Nov 13th for the replacement for identical and equivalent device. That makes it mid Dec for me to receive a replacement.

Very disappointing that both quality and customer service have gone down.