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My Modified Quickie F55s Powerchair.  |

See my review of this chair BEFORE modifications.

latest!  My new USED F55 powerchair!

There are 2 variants (as well as lots of seating and seat riser options) there is the F55, F55s powerchairs. Both are very similar.

The F55 is 4 mph maximum and has no lights.

The F55s is 6.2 mph maximum achieved simply by use of taller gearing although it has plenty of torque still and this version has lights to comply with UK law.

Since the slower one is only 200 pounds cheaper and 4 mph would drive most full time powerchair users mental we will concentrate only on the F55s 6.2 mph chair here! 

I feel I am pretty much of an expert when it comes to this chair, as I have had mine 5 years, and broke all the bits that can be broke, abused and tortured it, modified it and tuned it and wore out 5 sets of batteries and three sets of motors and gearboxes!

In this picture it has my "non standard" footrest plate fitted only.

 


If you have a slower F55  the 4 mph version and you would prefer it to go faster then you will only (!) need to change the pair of Motors/gearboxes as a complete assembly. You do not need the "full power actuator" that they talk about, because this simply works the lights!  But it still isn't a cheap modification!

The F55s PROBLEMS and how to fix them!

  • .1. It has an incredibly weak, wobbly cheap, and nasty "swing away" pivot for the control pod. Consists of a bit of bent tin, and a wobbly rivet - have looked at loads of these on other peoples chairs over the years and EVERY ONE is loose and needs replacing!  Fortunately there is a "parallelogram" version which is also available (at a daft price) to replace it.  Although everybody at sunrise has no idea what you are asking them for... So actually getting one is almost impossible!  It is a part that is in the parts list - a .pdf file that you may download from here! (1.3Mb) Give them the part number and I guarantee sunrise or your dealer will only send you the wrong part about 5 times... I have one and its strong and solid. Recommended urgent fix!

  • 2. The same pod is strangely located on the OUTSIDE edge of the chairs arm. Meaning that the chair is wider than it needs to be and with daily use it gets banged on doorframes and this is the main cause of that other previous part to be b**g***d! Who the hell designs these things?  Fortunately if you raise the armrests a "notch" it can easily be moved to the inside edge, making it less liable to be damaged and more comfortable at the same time!  Which is a massive improvement in use. Another essential job that fortunately takes only a few minutes - my chairs total width is now two and a half inches narrower as well! 2 inches is a lot when you are manoeuvring on trains, inside restaurants, pubs, small loos or doorways at an angle.

  • 3. While we are still on the "pod" area, we have another problem! the "charging socket" is an XLR type connector - usually used for microphones and tiny currents. These can (they claim) take up to 10 amps for charging purposes. When they are new and making good contact they do this "quite" well, but are on the edge of their capability. Stupid design. This is not sunrises fault actually but Penny & Giles who make the control system (its a Pilot Plus 80 amp unit). It causes BIG charging problems with some types of chargers though. It starts to wear after a few months, and gets hot during charging. This is the key... It goes fairly high resistance. Not helped by also having a long thin cable also of high resistance, connecting the pod to the controller under the seat. Now, the clever intelligent charger (that senses the voltage accurately) "sees" higher voltage, and less current so it thinks the battery is more charged than it really is! My trusty digital multi-meter tells me this can be as much as 2 volts difference between batteries and the charger!  So poor charger drops back to a lower charging current too early in its cycle for fear of damaging the sealed batteries by "gassing"...  In reality it either never finishes the charge before morning, or goes onto a REALLY long final stage! So your battery cells never get equalised or properly charged and your batteries are useless. Simple solution, if you feel any heat here when charging, swap both the socket inside the pod, and the plug on the charger for new ones. Or better still, fit an external directly connected to the battery, charging harness with a proper power plug.

  • 4. Programming of the PowerChair is nothing short of unbelievable!  This is a much bigger problem than ALL of the others! As it is delivered to you it is all but un-drivable, If you can:
    a) get it to turn at all on carpet its a miracle! Or if it does it goes too fast and hits something...
    b) get it to go through a doorway without you losing fingers or smashing into first one side and then the other...
    Its as if the joystick is connected by a very loose rubber band! It bears no resemblance to what the chair does.

    Fortunately there IS an easy cure! But it cost me 270 Pounds and I had a massive fight to get it! It is the PP1b "programming box" DO NOT confuse this with the completely useless user version the PP1a programmer that so called "wheelchair techies" wave about. They LOOK the same. They are definitely NOT!  You NEED the PP1b and some skills and understanding to use it safely and properly. Hence my problem getting one. I had to sign disclaimers, jump through hoops, etc and lie! Anyway, if you want your chair to drive properly you need to reprogram it. It will be faster, accelerate and brake better, turn slowly and precisely in direct proportion to what you do with the stick with LOTS of torque, and you will never hit another doorframe! If you want me to reprogram your own chair, (ten min job) email me and I will discuss. For full details go to F55s Modifications Page!

MY REVISED SETTINGS ARE NOW IN A CHART AT THE BOTTOM OF THIS PAGE
  • 5. The motors and gearboxes are only supplied (Via EMD) as complete units. No spares are available other than motor brushes (these last two years maximum with full time use). They have two SERIOUS problems. I have had maybe 30 emails about the backlash or "clunking" that soon develops. It becomes "very tiring" to drive it like this. Although in reality it will never leave you stranded. The first thing to wear out is a tiny, easy to get at,  rubber "cush drive" Pictures say a thousand words so see below.

Unscrewing motor to gearbox bolts. Easy, and no mess. This separates the motor and gearbox. This is how you get to the rubber cush drive bits. This is serious problem one.

 

 

 

Now Separated (four Allen head bolts) with the new in this case rubber cush or "shock absorber". This rubber bit is what drives your chair! It removes shock, vibration from the driveline making the chair smoother and quieter. Shame its crap then... They always disintegrate, and drop out as dust! Then we have clunk clunk, metal on metal... Lovely...

 

The rubber bit put back into the motor side... You can use four bits of round Hoover belt (OK vacuum cleaner then!) If yours are ruined... Suggest you superglue them in to make assembly simpler, and maybe last longer.

 

 

 

 

Gearbox with rubber cush removed.

 

 

 

 

A close up of the part that fails and causes all the clunking... The middle bit is only needed to hold everything in place when you put it back together.

Only the four round bits do anything. So any four bits of rubber that are the same size work ok. (Vacuum cleaner belt... and a sharp hobby knife)

Mine now has four harder "nylon" based material (unknown name) now. So they don't fail any longer. Polyurethane or something...



The F55 Motors shaft showing the keyway that wears... The SECOND problem to check for is actually the easiest, but usually happens later on, is the wheel where it fits onto the shaft. It uses (incorrectly!  Ask any engineer!) a square "dowel" or key to transfer power from shaft to wheel. This can and does become worn, and the wheel retaining bolt does nothing to help here. Although tightening it up really tight "disguises the sound, so it can make it quiet for a short while. Also if these wheels are not put on correctly, with some copper grease or similar you may NEVER be able to remove them. Check now BEFORE you get a puncture!  If this is the cause of your problem then the official repair is to replace motors as a pair, and the wheels! Your bank will not like this! Its seriously expensive.

FIX for the SHAFT AND KEYWAY WEAR PROBLEM - I had this problem as well.  So I fixed about 3 problems at once! This requires some skill and engineering work, but allows standard trailer wheels to be used instead. These are freely available, cheap, slightly bigger, tubeless (far less punctures), and harder wearing. The tyres are also of stronger construction.

These wheels were 350 x 8 tubeless tyres on steel 8" x 2" rims with four mounting holes at 115mm PCD or 107.5mm radius if you prefer. After several days staring at all the bits a cunning construction plan filtered in to my brain...  I wanted Tank steering, with chain drive to the wheels, simple compact and elegant engineering construction. No yucky steel brackets, added on bits etc, much thinking, but little cutting!!! I chose these wheels because they are readily available, cheap, chunky, strong, tubeless (less puncture problems!) and I spotted them in a local car accessory shop...

Trailer wheel, now fitted on a turned down, and drilled and tapped ex pulley using a "taperlock" shaft fitting, because keyways are useless for reversing torque loadings...  Ask any of those people who have all that clunking on a powerchair. They wear and fret! Why they don't do it like this is beyond me!  Better pictures of how this was done on my home built Robot / Powerchair 4x4 base are here Once done no more keyway wear problems... And cheaper bigger (faster!) tyres...

 

FOOTPLATE MODIFICATION
I hate those standard "swing away" footrest bars! (See standard F55s picture) they stick out too far, and are too "wide" meaning that you get stuck when trying to get in and out of loos, or turn in tight spaces. It also gets in the way during transfers. So I made a alloy T shaped mounting so I could fit a "Viva" powerchair footplate. Opposite. This is narrow, rounded, and shorter.

Means easier transfers, better manoeuvrability in tighter areas like trains, loos etc. Definitely a major improvement.



Later on I made a lighter shorter
still Aluminium chequer plate version....

 

 

 

 

 

MOVING THE SEAT BACK
On the face of it pointless but...

  • It allows wheelies which whilst may not seem essential, allows me to "lift" the front wheels at will at low speed, so as to be able to get over thresholds, 3 or 4 inch curbs etc really easily with less of a jolt. And when leaving the pavement you can lift the front so as to land smoothly on the rear wheels.

  • Improves battery life or range loads. Did you know it takes more amps to turn than to go flat out? By MILES! This is because with most of the weight on the rear driving wheels the front takes less power to "swing" around.

  • Turns better on thick carpet - less weight over casters

  • Less likely to sink casters in sand/mud/snow or whatever.

  • Greater control on uneven surfaces. When you go up/down a ramp or over some bump in the path for example, on a standard F55 one of the rear wheels leaves the floor! These are controlling both your progress and your direction! So it spins around or goes in the wrong direction. Mine lift a FRONT caster instead as all the weight is over the rear. So I stay in control.

  • If a front tyre gets a puncture, it matters very little, because it just runs along merrily, on the other one! And the rears are very difficult to puncture since I now use stronger trailer tyres.

How?

On an F55 the only thing that stops you moving the seat back further is a small black steel bracket that is triangular in shape with three holes as shown in the picture. You just need two new 1/8 inch (3mm) plates with the holes drilled as shown in the drawing. You can see this bracket or rather my new stainless steel polished multi hole adjustable one in the other photograph just... Should have scanned one before I fitted them!

 

This the standard plate.

Dimensions shown need to be cut out of a new bit of metal and fitted as photo below shows.

 

 

 

 

Picture below shows the new one with all the extra adjustment holes allowing the seat to be relocated rearwards. In the picture it is using the second to last hole to the rear. This allows controllable wheelies at will.

 

BIGGER AMP CONTROLLER

Warning!

I DO NOT RECOMMEND ANYBODY TRIES THE FOLLOWING - unless they have a very real understanding of the possible consequences. These include fire, danger to public, danger to users, damage to wiring, controllers or blown motors or gearboxes. Remember a simple thing as a blown gearbox (Nylon gears!) can result in the chair doing a sudden turn off the path and into the traffic! Be warned, there are many other nasty possibilities too.

1) I intend to fit a 100 Amps per channel controller (in place of the stock 80 Amp one) as fitted to the new 8.5Mph Pride "Blast" 850 powerchair. This requires heavier battery and motor cables for fire and safety reasons, and to prevent voltage drop under load. Actually I had already done this for performance reasons.

Theoretically since the only time the chair ever reaches (draws) 80 Amps anyway (read with a clamp over cable type test meter) is when accelerating from a standing start for the first half second when trying to pick up the front wheels, it will not make any real difference to anything other than wheelies. But this is not the real reason for doing it! See other modifications planned later below. This mod is now done, makes wheelies REALLY easy! Otherwise performance unchanged as expected. See 2) below for real reasons...

Click for a better view! Click to enlarge
Picture 1 shows how simple it is to retrofit as they look identical.
Picture 2 shows the simple (and inadequate!) plug in connectors.  

2) Fitting much taller geared higher current draw motors. Now you think you know why I want more "power/speed" Now the motors I am looking to fit will be good for approx 15 mph and are much MORE efficient than normal motors. These are the brushless, gearbox less type that actually form the wheel itself. Some need a completely different controller. As yet I have not heard back from the suppliers. But if that fails then there are plenty of other options available. The reason I want no gears, and therefore no gear backlash, and lots of power is because I am currently working on a simple (!) circuit board that is programmable, and has a solid state "heading lock" type gyro, and wheel position/speed sensors. The Gyro is actually looking at pitch - not yaw as in the model helicopter it is designed for. I want to cut off the wheelie/ant tip bars and let the software and the sensors / gyro balance my chair for me! So it will balance on the rear wheels, and let me drive about in this configuration as I wish at up to 6 mph only. The reserve speed and torque is simply to allow it to balance as a reserve of power is needed in case it needs a burst of extra power to keep it's balance. Initially I intend to let my circuit override the control stick, and the Pod will plug into my circuit. Everything is small so will be under the seat and invisible.

When not balancing it will of course now be able to go much faster! Now does anyone have any ideas where I can get some real motors for this project? All info helps!

Advantages of a balancing chair are numerous, but include "laid back" comfort (while at the bar, or watching TV) and pressure relief. Also battery range will increase as the heavy front end will not always head "down" the camber, which requires extra power (lots) to keep going straight. And also when turning, or trying to keep straight you use energy to "swing" the forward weight about. By balancing all this disappears as the Centre of Gravity is directly above the drive wheels point of contact.

Also those horrid uneven pavements and surfaces that make the small front wheels chatter and cause me much muscle spasm is reduced as the big drive wheels travel over these surfaces easier. Plus, going up and down ramps and slopes your seat will remain level - no more falling out the front, or tipping over backwards.

And you can (have to!) cut off those anti tip bars that stick out the rear, as the gyro will not allow you to tip out. This means a shorter chair that can turn in smaller spaces.

I got this Idea of course from the IBOT . Balancing has LOTS of advantages, and I don't think it is that hard to do. We will see! Right now we have a B.A.E Systems solid state gyro, (Futaba radio control use them!) An electronics guy who is out of his depth we think... And a good programmer, most are useless believe me.  ANY suggestions or help or offers of suitable motors (even with gearboxes!) is very welcome at this point, as I am not sure what is available yet.

Since this was written I decided it may be better to experiment on a unmanned ROBOT Radio controlled  chair Base - Click to see!

Back to Full List <<<

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All information on this site is © of the respective writers & contributors, & John C Williamson
Email burgerman@ntlworld.com   -  20 Westlands Ave, Grimsby, N. E. Lincs, DN34 4SP, UK.

 

 

OK my new revised controller settings below THAT GIVE SOME REAL CONTROL BACK, use these at YOUR OWN RISK of course!  But you will not be disappointed.
 

Part A - (USER MENU)

(parts A and B (ENGINEERING MENU) must both be modified together or you are just wasting your time, and the USER settings used alone have not been tested, and may well make things worse.)
Std F55s settings My own revised settings
(USE AT YOUR OWN RISK)
     
Acceleration 
(effects the "5" speed setting end of scale)
40 100  (enough for wheelies in some cases - care!)
Deceleration 
(effects the "5" speed setting end of scale, when you release the stick)
25 40  (any more can be uncomfortable)
     
Turn Acceleration 
(effects setting "5")
A control delay, meaning it doesn't turn when you want it to, but does so a few secs later and accelerates!
50 100 (effectively disabled)
Turn Deceleration 
(effects setting "5")
Control delay, meaning it keeps turning after you wanted it to stop!
40 100 (effectively disabled)
     
Forward Speed
(effects the "5" speed setting end)
100 (gives 6mph max) 100 (gives 6mph max)
Minimum Forward Speed
(effects the "1" speed setting end)
20 (just too slow indoors) 26 (allows the "1" speed setting to be used indoors)
     
Reverse Speed
(effects the "5" speed setting end)
40 60
Minimum Reverse Speed
(effects the "1" speed setting end)
20 20
     
Max Turn Speed
(effects the "5" speed setting end)
40 45
Min Turn Speed
(effects the "1" speed setting end)
15 20
     
Sleep Timer 0 0
Joystick throw 100 all 4 100 all 4
Steer Correct 0 0
Elapsed time Reads total hours  
Read fault Log? There will be some, ignore it, most are unimportant!  
Preset Unit? NO NO
     
Part B  -  This is far more important! 
But you WILL need a PP1b programmer or you will not see this option list!
   
     
Enter engineering menu? Yes Yes
     
Soft Reverse? 70 75
     
Current limit? Max These 4 settings are 80 80  (100 on 100 amp units)
Current limit? Min designed to "save" your 60 70  (80 on 100 amp units)
Temp Fold back Controller & motors, if you are 55c 70c
Timed Fold Back worried leave these ones as stock! 30s  CL percentage 50 15s  CL percentage 85
 

Take care to get this following one right!   4 pole motors have 4 motor brushes, two pole ones only have two.   You may need to physically examine the motors.   Setting the compensation too high is extremely dangerous!  Take care and check carefully!!!
 

Compensation  -  2 pole motors - Earlier chairs.
This one is important, but if its too jerky, drop it back a touch!

Compensation  -  4 pole motors - Newer chairs.
This one is important, but if its too jerky, drop it back a touch!

40 m/ohm -
makes the chair feel "dead"

Varies Seems to be 35 on some or stock 40.

90 m/ohm - pretty smooth -
115m/ohm - very lively!

40 m/ohm - pretty smooth -
50 m/ohm - very lively!

     
Battery Menu - Cable? 40 m/ohm 40 m/ohm
Battery Menu - Gauge Cal 100 100
     
Park brake trip? Yes Yes
Front Drive? No No
Fast brake rate 90 100
Soft Stop Yes Yes
Set Inhibit (latched, active short) Yes Yes
Profiles 0 0
Swap motors? No No (you would crash!)
     
Minimum acceleration
(effects the "1" speed setting end)
35 100 (effectively disabled)
Minimum deceleration
(effects the "1" speed setting end)
20 100 (effectively disabled)
Minimum turn acceleration
(effects the "1" speed setting end)
40 100 (effectively disabled)
Minimum turn deceleration
(effects the "1" speed setting end)
25 100 (effectively disabled)
     
Erase timer Your choice! Your choice!
Erase fault log After repairs After repairs
Preset Engineering Menu? No No

Then test in an OPEN space!

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