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Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Fri Oct 15, 2010 11:21 am
by julesbeauchamp
We've had a not-so-Nice car for three years. It has done 7000 miles and had two new motors a new set of batteries less than a year ago and now needs a new battery charger. The cost of this is £1800 plus VAT. I have now been told that there is a fault with a battery bank and this needs replacing, fortunately under warranty. I can't quite work out why the charger is so expensive and have asked for the old one back so that we can investigate it in our workshops.

It seems that Aixam ditched Exide and transferred its battery manufacture to China. The first lot of batteries turned out to have been bulked up with sand instead of lead. This was discovered as they failed, because they sell the batteries for scrap and when cut open out poured the sand.

I understand they now have a new supplier in China but as mine have failed within a year I am very wary of these as well.

Anyone else out there who can comment on the charger cost and dodgy batteries?

Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Fri Oct 15, 2010 2:46 pm
by GregsGarage
julesbeauchamp wrote:Anyone else out there who can comment on the charger cost and dodgy batteries?


The cost for all the warranty work has to come from somewhere, :shock: I think you could get a Zivan NG3 for less than half that. Problem is it would probably void whatever warranty you have left. As far as the batteries go, I have seen some very good Chinese products and some shockingly bad ones. At least if you buy from a local supplier it should be easier to sort out any problems.

Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2010 11:25 am
by CarlFuss
Hi
We have a "Nice" car also and have been experiencing similar problems. Our car is three and a half years old and we've done 10000 miles. We had the original set of batteries replaced after 20 months under warranty and now those batteries have been replaced, yesterday, again under warranty together with a new charger.
The new batteries are from China made by ABT here is a link to their website http://www.abtbatt.com/
the batteries are E-trek DM series 6-DM-76 you can get a pdf data sheet. They give the batteries a 1-2 year life
The garage doing the work is local to me so I went down during the change over, this is the label on the new charger, the only info I could get.
The garage said the batteries cost about £200 each, there are 12, and the charger about £1500 !!
As I got a 24 month warranty on the last set and expect to get it this time, could I get new batteries every 18 months for free

There must be a better way
Carl

Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2010 4:37 pm
by williambelow
out of interest, how was the conclusion reached that your batteries were faulty and needed replacing?

I was told mine needed replacing by Hiremech. I do believe it, as they can only manage about 16-18 miles maximum, so that seems like a reasonable justification - but I am interested to know how they decided that your's needed to be replaced (again!).

I wonder if there may be inherent faults with the batteries and charger/calculator?
Initially, Hiremech replaced my batteries - telling me it would cost £1500 + VAT. Then when I got the car home, I found the range was hardly better. When they took the car back for further investigation, they told me that the set of batteries they had fitted was sourced by them (i.e. not supplied by Aixam) - and that in order to work properly, it would need the "calculator" to be replaced, at an additional cost of £1,800 + VAT. The alternative they offered was to fit batteries supplied by Aixam (which would come with a free "calculator"?!?!) for £2,400 + VAT.
I struggle to understand why any commercial organisation would give away an allegedly expensive/valuable part for free. It just seems very strange to me.

I refused to pay the above, and told Hiremech to give me my old batteries back, which they did. That was almost 6 months ago, and I am still running on them, but having to charge the car every day.

Out of interest, who is doing your repair work for you?

thanks
Anthony

Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Sat Oct 16, 2010 5:42 pm
by CarlFuss
The firm doing the work is a local garage Town and Country cars in Ash, they are a Aixam dealer but new to the electric cars. I was getting about 20 mile per charge and rapidly getting worse, they did a check and sent the result to Axiam who said the batteries were at fault, so a new set plus charger. I think there is/was a fault with the charger battery combination but cannot find out what.
I'm assuming in 18 months I'll be going through this process again but really need to find a workable alternative.
There must be a battery charger combination somewhere that works.
Will let you know the range on fresh batteries when we get the car back

Carl

Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Sun Oct 17, 2010 10:55 pm
by ChrisB
Wow you Mega City folk are going through the wars a bit :shock:

Sounds like somethings not right, scarey to think there are batteries filled with sand :shock: as for the charger prices ......well :shock:

Its a shame, its this sort of thing that gives the poor old EV a bit of a bad name.

ChrisB

Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Fri Mar 18, 2011 5:25 pm
by subevo
i noticed a few for sale on ebay.no wonder.its def a rip off for the charger.you can get a zivan ng3 for less than £600.

im finished with lead.lithium is the way to go.good luck.

Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Mon Sep 05, 2011 9:43 pm
by matey
William
contact this person with your requirements i am just going through the same thing email shannon she has great knowledge as long as she has all the spec mention my name Paul Bennett pben43@hotmail.com
shannon electric charger(sales02@ebike-bmsbattery.com.cn)
Good luck

Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Mon Sep 05, 2011 9:46 pm
by matey
THIS COMPANY CAN HELP WITH ALL OUR PROBLEMS PLEASE SEE THE LINK
shannon electric charger(sales02@ebike-bmsbattery.com.cn)

Re: Expert battery advice needed - Aixam Mega City

Posted: Thu Oct 06, 2011 10:59 am
by ambey
Hello, I have had a Mega City + for 3 1/2 years and apart from 2 warranty exchange chargers has performed fine. ( both times the chargers failed because of their cooling fans )
The batteries are showing signs of age and am considering installing one of the Megapulse FAB-MK4 conditioning devices as seen in the Review.
Has anybody done this on a Aixam and if so are there any problems?
Does anybody have information on how the batteries are configured?
many thanks
John Harpur