Introduction: Powerful 2000W Electric Longboard

About: Industrial Engineer

Check out my new E-sk8

Hi everyone!

I decided to make an electric longboard this year. Boosted Board has inspired me and it's such a nice electric longboard, but so expensive (like 1500€ for the 2000W model).

Before I start I will explain some things because I didn't really want to copy the Boosted Board design.

First of all, I wanted to make an Electric longboard as thin as possible, so I used separate Lipo cells and made a very thin battery pack (12mm) so people won't see it from the side that it's an Electric longboard.

The second thing is the power, I would like a longboard with a power between 1500W-2000W, The motor can handle 2220W but I use a 6S battery so the power will be a bit lower like 2000W max peak but that's really enough, trust me ;)

The other reason why I use a 6S battery is because once you go higher than 6S the price of the ESC is so much higher like double the price for 8S or 10S, Also charging a 6S battery is much more easy than a 10S.

If we talk about speed, I theoretically calculated the board at about 46km/h so I would practically reach about 40km/h. And in reality I have tested it on the smoothest road in our town and I can ride 42km/h max speed.

So on the most roads I can perfectly reach 40km/h which is really so amazingly fast.

The battery with 220Wh will give me a 14km ride.

The longboard I ride for a while is a Madrid Weezer and it isn't an expensive board (only 100€) but it has a bit of the looks of a boosted board.

In total I have spent like 300€ for every single part (except the longboard itself) to convert my longboard into an Electric longboard

I think you know enough information to start the explanation how I made my Electric longboard.


! Video's coming soon so stay tuned by this instructable or my youtube channel !

Step 1: Collect All the Parts You Need

What do we need?

SK3 - 320Kv Motor: Hobbyking

You can use other motors too but I have calculated the speed and torque on this motor and it is the most powerfull in the 50mm diameter series and not very expensive (52€)

120A ESC: Hobbyking

This is a boat ESC and runs very smooth with no problems. You can also buy a program card for this ESC which I also did. You can change several things like acceleration, brake, cut off voltage,... -> Hobbyking

Lipo Batteries:Hobbyking

I bought 12 cells of these, so I can make a 6S2P battery pack, the cells are 5000mAh so a 6S2P will give me 22.2V and 10000mAh, enough to have fun long ride.

Another alternative to get a slim battery pack is this Multistar 6S 10Ah pack which you can disassemble, Here's a link how it looks like.

Transmitter and Receiver:Hobbyking

I used this controller because there are used a lot for electric longboards and there's a 3D printed version available which only has a throttle because you don't need a steering wheel on a longboard controller. BadWolf GT2B Case

So you need to unscrew the original controller and place all electrical components in the 3D printed model which is much more smaller. -> Step by step explaination

6S lipo charger:Hobbyking

Very nice charger 250W 10A so it will charge my battery in 1 hour! I know in the picture you can see I bought another charger but it's only 50W 5A charger, it was a very cheap one but it takes 5 hours to fully charge the battery so the 250W charger will be my next upgrade.

XT60 Connectors:Hobbyking

Very good connectors and the have a small lock which never came loose during a ride.

4mm Bullet connector:Ebay

this is to connect the ESC to the motor (ESC has standard no connectors so you need to solder them)

6S balance charger cable:Ebay

To charge the lipo battery pack you need 6S charging wire, this will balance and charge every cell perfectly.

Metal timing pulley 30T:Ebay

This is a 30 teeth pulley, 16mm wide (HTD5M serie)

(btw why buying expensive pulleys and belts on special sites like sdp/si when you also find them very cheap on ebay, but I have to say I had searched so fu*king much until I finally found the pulleys I needed)

Metal timing pulley 15T:Ebay

This is a 15 teeth pulley and has a 6mm bore which fits perfect on the motor shaft. (HTD5M serie)

Rubber timing belt 54T:Ebay

I bought 5 of these because if one should break I have some extra but until now no problems with my first belt!

If you want to calculate the center distance and other stuff very quickly -> Pulley/Belt Calculator (HTD5M serie)

Silicon Wire:Ebay

You will need silicon wire to make your battery, this wire is very flex and can resist high temperatures so if you solder your wires the isolation won't melt. I used 10AWG but 12AWG is a bit smaller in diameter and will also be enough, so just saying I'm using pretty big wires but they won't overheat.

Longboard Madrid Weezer:EuroSkate

Make an aluminium motor Mount: Download my inventor design

Rubber sheet like 1mm thick

Bolts and Nuts

Step 2: Make the Motor Mount

First of all, make the motor mount

I didn't made the motor mount by myself but asked my old secundary school if they were able to make 2 pieces for me. I designed the motor mount by inventor and it's specialy made for 2 speeds, so the slots I made to srew the motor in are wide enough to move the motor and adjust the tension of the belt.

I thought when 40km/h wasn't fast enough I can also change another motor timing pulley with 20T instead of 15T, this means the board should go like 55km/h. So what I want to say is that the motor mount is designed for 2 pulleys (15T and 20T) but I think I'm not going to change it to a 20T pulley because 40km/h is so fast.

You can buy motor mounts on some sites but they will never be exactly like you want them to be.

3D printing is maybe also an option but you need to make a stronger concept and use strong plastic and not the plastic you find in the regular 3D printers.

Step 3: Solder the Electric Parts

Solder the connectors to the ESC

the ESC has standard no connectors so you have to solder them by yourself

- 3x 4mm bullet connectors to plug the ESC into the motor (Female)

- 1x XT60 connector to plug the battery into the ESC (Female)

Solder and make the battery pack

first you need to know how to connect the batteries, so we are going to make a 6S battery pack.

This means 6 cells will get connected in serie which will make a voltage of 22.2V (3.7*6)

But I have 12 cells so you need to connect 2 cells in parallel, than you have 6 "packs" which you need to connect in serie. 2 cells in parallel will double the capacity and of course double the range.

Step 4: Some Changes to the Trucks and Wheels

Let the motor mount fit on the trucks

The trucks aren't perfectly round to put the motor mount on it so we need to make it nicely round with a lathe.

I made the whole part 16mm diameter and 75mm long from the outside.

Watch the picture where I mentioned the dimention.

Constrain the 30T pulley to the wheel

We have made 2 extra parts which fits into the wheel to make it strong and nicely centered.

First we made the wheels nice and round from the inside so we have also putted them into the lathe.

Both sides I guess 5mm deep to put the 2 alluminium parts into the wheel.

After that the 30T pulley needed a bigger bore like 20mm so it won't touch the truck.

Finally 4 holes were drilled through every part and we tapped M5 into the 30T pulley so the bolt isn't screwed fully through the whole pulley.

So now the hard parts are done and we only need to put everything together!

Step 5: Put Everything Together

The first thing I did was making a sketch on paper of the real dimensions to make clear where I'm gonna put everything.

First of all I have glued a piece of rubber to the underside of the board. Just to protect the battery but it's not very necessary.

Secondly, I drilled 8 holes (M5) into the board and directly through the rubber and plastic side rails.

After this I glued the ESC and Battery pack and the Receiver in the right position.

I didn't used a lot of glue to glue the battery, just a line of glue in the middle of the battery.

Than I made another piece of rubber to fit tightly over the battery pack and the esc, I made a hole into the rubber to plug in the battery into the esc and in my opinion it is a easy and clean solution.

Finally I needed to cut the plastic side rails round at the end so it would fit in the shape of my longboard.

Step 6: Pictures of My Final Creation

!!! I want to thank Robbe Derks who has helped me with this amazing project !!!

CNC Contest 2016

Participated in the
CNC Contest 2016