Mobility scooter mods

[Harry Bloomfield]

She has now had to have a mobility scooter, so I'm quite busy modifying that at the moment, to make it more usable for her. I am absolutely astounded at the poor design of them, if this one is anything to go by and the profit they make on them.

So far I've had to make a small ramp, to enable it to climb into the hut where it is stored, from alloy chequer plate, supported by timber. Add brackets to accept oxy bottles, adapt a flight bag on wheels for shopping and devise a support bracket to take some of the flight bags weight. Fit yet another 13amp outlet from which to charge it's batteries. The flight boarding bag proved to be a much better fit, than the purpose made items and much cheaper. It comes with an extendible handle, wheels and rucksack type straps, enabling it to fit straight onto the seat back.

It has a reversing beeper/piezo sounder which was inaudible, due to the manufacturer fitting the sounder in heat-shrink, several nuts bolts and brackets holding nothing.

Still to do is the lamps to be changed for LED's so as to conserve power.

All good fun, but has anyone come across a forum for modifying and improving basic mobility scooters please?

[Davey]

Searching newsgroups only produces odd ones, (Russian Mafia?), with the Italian Motoclismo Sports being relatively well-populated. Otherwise, it seems ripe for somebody to start such a group. I could have run down two of them yesterday, no flags, no license plates, crossing the road one after the other.

[alan_m]

[Bill Wright]

I have two in use and I'm impressed by both. Both are made by Pride. The standard of construction is very good. Of course there are little design niggles, but generally I'm impressed.

if this one is anything to go by

I'm wondering if you bought from a high street shop. Prices there are sometimes twice what they are on the internet. The two I've bought recently were (a) £870 internet, £1799 shops (b) £2,150 internet, £4,999 shops. I've had good after sales service from the supplier.

The same applies to batteries and other accessories. Take chargers for instance. Some of the ones in the shops are right old rip-off, and actually aren't very good chargers.

I suggest you make the hut very secure, and maybe alarm it. And put a greenhouse heater in there. Otherwise you will have corrosion and battery problems.

from alloy chequer plate,

Beware, that stuff is ridiculously slippery when wet. You wouldn't think it, but it is. In the end I had to cover my ramp with ribbed rubber. I was sliding all over the place.

supported by timber. Add

Are you sure they aren't already LEDs? I'm surprised if anyone is fitting anything else.

I don't know of one. Certainly the trade likes to think that all the customers are hopeless invalids who can't do a thing for themselves. They forget of course that some of the customers have husbands and wives who are highly capable.

I've had a quite a lot of experience with this game, so if there's any help you need please ask.

Bill

[Harry Bloomfield]

Hi Bill,

Yes, they are filament lamps - I've PM'ed you from the address on your web site..

[Bill Wright]

Yes, got that Harry, and replied.

How ridiculous to use filament lamps on a vehicle where range is restricted by battery life.

Bill

[T i m]

Talking of batteries and chargers ... Dad took to a second hand one of the small 'take down' trike scooters towards the end and because he liked it so much, bought a new one 'on offer' to keep the s/h one down the caravan.

He was generally quite good looking after the batteries, putting them on charge every so often during the winter etc. A while back (probably a couple of years after he passed away) Mum was looking to sell them and we suggested she kept the new(er) one for herself (although at 85 she is still pretty mobile) because I knew how little they can sometimes go for second hand and how useful it might be. So, in digging them out I discovered the batteries from the 'new' scooter were as_dead_as the proverbial ... and the older ones were tired but still useable (with restricted range). We leant the older batteries to the new owner (a neighbour) of the older scooter so they could see if was a) all ok and b) what they wanted.

I had the same feeling scrapping the batteries from the scooter that looked 'brand new' just as I do when scrapping batteries that look 'brand new' from UPS's. ;-(

Anyway, Mum needed the scooter recently (hurt her foot digging in the garden) and so I picked up a couple of replacement (Lucas) batteries off eBay but as we sold the charger with the older buggy, I'm stuck with either getting her just another 24V scooter charger or going to what I think I'd prefer, 2 x 12V 'automatic' motorcycle type chargers (Yamaha branded CTEK).

However, this means adding some extra charging connectors to each battery pack (they are removable as this is a take-down scooter) that may not be as quick / easy as the existing 1/4" type 'mono' charging jack or modifying the wiring to put a suitable charging point (3 pin XLR?) somewhere easy for mum to get at (and wiring / fitting the two chargers side_by_side).

I think there may be some sort of interlock on the existing jack socket to disable the speed controller when the charger is plugged in.

So, any thoughts on the idea of charging such batteries in series and do you think (like me) that charging each battery separately and with what could be a 'better' charger might be a good idea (I already have the 2 x 12 chargers available)?

Cheers, T i m

[Peter Parry]

Not quite, but

has few modifications done to overcome specific problems- search for "scooter".

[Bill Wright]

No, don't do that.

No, this is not a good idea. believe me, I have the T shirt.

Yes, the charger plug commons the third pin to the neg pin. This inhibits the machine. hence the current rip off. Machines have to be immobilised for air travel, so some eBay sharks are selling immobiliser plugs for £30.

Really you would be better just going down the conventional route and using a good (intelligent) 24V charger. I can recommend both of these:

Bill

[Brian Gaff]

Yes plus a lot are very silent and do not have any reflective or dayglo contrasting surfaces, being a boring dull blue colour. Who does the certification of these things? I understand the users do not need to pass a test and many have poor sight so tend to run into and over things. They need a rubber ring around them with a cut off switch.

Some still use lead acid batteries. Brian

[Brian Gaff]

What is the reasoning behind not charging batteries separately? I mean, I d have thought the fewer cells in series the better, unless these are lithium types with proper sensors fitted. Brian

[Muddymike]

She has now had to have a mobility scooter, so I'm quite busy modifying

Not a forum but Colin Furze has some interesting ideas!

Mike

[Davey]

It is amazing that Colin Furze is still around to invent more stuff, such as jet-propelled mobility scooters.

[Muddymike]

I know, you'd think he would have killed himself by now:-)

Mike

[Davey]

It must be something to do with wearing a tie at all times.

[T i m]

That would be my question as well.

Quite. I have tested enough 'batteries' (made from a pack of 'cells') to know that rarely do all the cells / batteries start off, let alone end up equal. Therefore, it's not long before the weak cells are being overcharged and over discharged (and or even reverse charged).

So, two 12V chargers working independently on two 12V batteries would always be 'better' in my mind than a single 24V trying to deal with the differences that are bound to exist between the two batteries. Even better would be 12 x 2V chargers, dealing with each cell independently but that isn't an option or really realistic here.

I've just bought a couple of packs of AA Ni-Mh cells and the first thing I do with anything like that is put them on my cycler / charger and test and mark their capacities. That way I can take my pick from all 8 of the same make / spec / age and try to use them in as close balanced sets (2's, 4's etc) as I can.

Cheers, T i m

[T i m]

It's interesting to see both Numax and Ctek are considered equally in some circles. ;-)

I may well go for the 'conventional' solution simply because it's easier for me and useable batteries aren't 'that expensive' these days.

Some of these scooters are though aren't they, you could buy a good second hand car for the price of some of them, even simple / small ones like Mums:

Except she has the FWD version, much better manoeuvrability (I should imagine) than the RWD model but might have less wheel spin in the wet or when going 'off-road'. ;-)

Cheers, T i m