Torqueedo Electric Outboard - What's Inside, How To Fix - Do Not Buy!
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- Опубликовано: 2 июл 2022
- My friends at Xcel Marine gave me seven Torqueedo electric outboard motors. The story goes that these all belonged to a resort in Orlando Florida. They were used to power some tiny pontoon boats that guests could rent to drive around on a lake they dug to get fill to build the resort on top of. Florida swampland can be converted into valuable real estate if you dig up one part of the swamp, making an ornamental "lake" and pile the muck up to make dry land.
But I digress...As time passed, several of the motors quit working. They got some preliminary diagnosis written on them in magic marker or on red tags. At some point, there were only a couple of them working. Some kid they hired was supposed to take them in and recharge them when guests were done. One day he decided to put all the batteries in a cardboard box so he didn't have to make multiple trips back and forth to the dock. He tripped, dropping the box and made serious cracks in several of the batteries. Several others fell in the lake and apparently they didn't even try to fish them out. And that was just it for the Torqueedo electric outboard motors.
At some point, they were given to the mechanics at Xcel Marine. Greg wanted to use one of the batteries for an electric tricycle for his kids but was having trouble with the BMS in the battery. Eventually they gave the motors to Me in case I could make some of them work.
I cheated. I bought two used Torqueedo batteries on ebay. With good batteries, I was able to test the different components of all the motors. At first, I got a good battery, speed controlling handle, and lower leg with the motor itself working. With this one good set of components, I was able to swap out one component at a time so I could determine what worked and what doesn't.
This first step in the process gave me two good legs, two speed controlling handles and the two ebay batteries. From there, I could swap out one component at a time until I had sorted the working parts from the non-working ones.
One leg needs the power cable and plug, which I plan to scavenge from one of the broken ones. One of the handles works for now, but its plug is crushed, again an easy swap from one of the broken ones.
There are two more battery packs which look like they might be OK, except for huge cracks in the housing. One has a big crack across the top which leaves one of the little arms which grip the leg, very weak. My first plan is to drill some holes on either side of the crack and fill them with thickened epoxy with chopped glass fibers in it for strength and then lay fiberglass on the inside and outside while the epoxy in the drilled holes is still wet. The through-holes should hold the rest of the patch in place much stronger than just roughing up with sandpaper.
Another battery pack shell is in good shape except one of the nubs where it slots into the leg is broken off. My plan is to make a mold of that part from one of the other battery packs. Then I can use the mold to cast fiber re-enforced epoxy in the mold, effectively molding the nub onto the broken part.
For the legs that do not work, I plan to take the lower unit apart so I can connect to the three phase wires on the brushless motor. I can then use three of the four power wires in the original cable to carry power from an electronic speed controller for model airplanes down the leg to the motor. This plan bypasses all the Torqueedo circuitry, replacing it with the radio controlled electronic speed controller and a big lithium battery. This can be any 24 volt battery once the RC speed controller has replaced all of the Torqueedo circuitry. 
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I use the travel 1003 on my sail boat weighting 700 kg. The propulsion efficient is "really " great, even in windy conditions !! whatever you opinion on design my experience since 7 years using it on lake every year is very positive. As it is my safety motor, the price came as second priority, efficient first. (before i was using minolta 50 lbs, useless for me) . So for the newbies, try it first on heavy boat then comment. You will be surprised ...
Same. I used a Minn Kota trolling motor on my inflatable boat before getting the Torqeedo Travel 1003, and it just didn't have the power to cut through the wind or currents.
The Torqeedo was a lot more expensive, but provided a different level of boating. With the trolling motor, I struggled to get back at some locations. The Torqeedo opened up a lot more places to go boating for me.
Torqeedo has competitors now like the Chinese ePropultion and Newport motors, but after you consider the availability of parts locally, batteries and finding a service center in your area, I feel the Torqeedo is worth the extra money over them.
My approx 10 year old Torqeedo Travel 1003s was serviced this season (a service center 1 hour from me) and I was told very clean and corrosion free. I used it in both fresh and salt water, but as REQUIRED, I rinsed it with free water after use. A water bottle at the launch before leaving, and I was generally use the boat on a lake with in a couple days after salt water use to make sure the salt was thoroughly rinsed out.
I completely agree with your opinion that the motor should be up top. There's not business for electronics and electric motors under the waterline.
Thanks buddy..mucj appreciated
Thanks for the video. I had the opportunity to buy a 801 without a battery for cheap. I priced the battery and I can buy an excellent new motor for that price. I was going to try the 24V replacement fix like you talked about but the odds of all 3 boards working again led me to pass on the motor.
muito interessante amigo, parabéns pelo vídeo, parece um motor brushless de areomodelo.
Hi, do you have a photo of the gearbox side? I took off the wire harness and don't remember the polarity on the motor board, I also have a spare lanyard if you need one
The motors shown clearly look like they were abused by leaving them in salt water without rinsing them as Torqeedo has explained is required. This goes for any similar electric motor. I've seen videos/photos on ePropultion that were also rotted out. It's not the motors fault, but the users fault.
THESE MOTORS ARE NOT DESIGNED TO LEAVE ATTACHED AT A DOCK OR ON S MOORED BOAT IN SALT WATER.
I've been a Torqeedo Travel owner for 9 years as I purchased a used one that was 2 or 3 years old in 2013.
It's provided many wonderful adventures, not possibly previously for a small car owner without a safe place to store gasoline inside the car or inside my house as I have no shed.
I recently had mine repaired as the propeller & shear pin broke (it's a plastic propeller). I'm told they should be serviced every 5 years and most of the bill was for that, plus the $100 replacement propeller.
I'm told there was no visible corrosion on the motor that is more than a decade old. These motors are supposed to be thoroughly rinsed after salt water use. After each use in salt water, I rise with my water bottle at the boat launch, and try to take the boat/motor to use in a lake with in a few days to really wash out any salt build up. If your unable to take it to a lake in a few days, your should run the motor in a bucket of water and let it spin good or something similar.
Torqeedo was the first company to make a motor of this sort, and it's been knocked off by a few companies now, but Torqeedo is still has the largest distribution and are far more widely in circulation.
The longer I live, the more I think all that "all that glisters is not gold." I am so glad I never bought one. I don't know if I would invest any of my time in them. These types of things are all synchronous motors and have the great advantage of being brushless. As you say, it's desirable that the motor is up top. Consider this: I am buying lots of DeWalt tools intending to power them from direct solar it occurs to me that one could hook up a router or a drill to a shaft with a propeller on the end and mount it at the top of the transom like they do in Thailand, but they use car engines. Washing machine motors look like they have potential as well. Jamie from Mythbusters put a video on RUclips about converting a standard outboard motor to electric drive. I have often wondered about having a propeller at the front of a boat, but that is another thing.
I was never interested in a one of those things after I saw the price tag. I was wondering about you, hadn't heard from you in a bit. Glad you're ok.
Thanks! Had to do some stuff for a while so I could afford my boats. They don't let me video that.
I have torqeedo 2.0 R cruise. I can’t find the battery terminals that mount on top of the motor.
Is it ok to use a 4 awg cable run it to perko breaker then to 2 12v batteries?
Good to see a new video again :)))
This motors are really poorly built - thx for the warning!
More than a little frustrating to see the lengths Torqueedo went to just so you can't fix their product or use a generic battery.
@@ninehundreddollarluxuryyac5958 Actually you CAN use a generic battery to supplement the original one. I use my 500Wh 36V e-bike battery to more than double the capacity of the Torqeedo battery. All I did was to hook up the e-bicycle battery to the charging port of the original battery. Works like a charm.
Its a planetary drive gear reducer. Very fancy. They are a little noisy though right?
You can use a HIGH amperage rc brushless speed control to run the motor. just remove all the torqeedo boards in the pod. Trust me it will work. but you will need a new back cap that contains the seals. new o-rings as well.
I’m interested in the lower unit, if you can ship to Hayward, CA? Thanks
Hi Dave,
What impression do you have about your Torqueedo 1103C electric motor, now that a couple of years have passed? Have you had any problems or parts to repair?
Is it possible to bypass the gearbox then a smaller propeller I’m happy with the motor, but disappointed with the noise the gears make
These were free so I didn't worry about the price. If I paid $2500 and got one of these in return, I would be pretty upset when I learned that my 3 horsepower motor only uses 1.3 horsepower of electricity. Would also be upset that they leak, and the slightest leak ruins it.
In the meantime, I had been busy for a while but am not supposed to say.
It's widely known and even on the screen that it uses 1000w of power instead of 2307w required for 3 horsepower. But I like the fact you showed us how dumb this design is. I know gazelle (big dutch bike brand) made some electric bikes with the same type of design, circuit board tied to the motor, and it fails pretty often due to water damage. Would like to see an epropulsion if its any better.
I’m interested in the brushless motor if you have one that is working? Can you ship to California? If you one that is still working. Thanks
Battery rebuild can be done. Actually it very easy job. Dont worry about the epoxy. Rip it out and put new cells.
Is it possible to install a connection for an external battery and thus increase autonomy?
I don't think so. They made it with the circuit divided into the battery, lower unit and handle to prevent that. It might be possible to trick the circuit by charging the original battery so the BMS sees the right voltage from each cell group, and disconnecting the main battery and attaching a different one, with the torqeedo circuit still reading the original cells. The voltage is weird because it is 8s lithium ion, 30 volts, so you'd have to make your own pack because nothing off the shelf will work.
Yes you can use a battery to charge it, or what I do is use a solar panel attached to my boat Troll the whole lake and come back with the same percentage of battery
Very unfair to Torqeedo, a high quality electric boat motor manufacturer. The majority of electric outboards use submerged motors and componentry. This provides far better overall efficiency than a highly inefficient external gear train. Efficiency is vital for electric motors to reduce battery consumption and vastly increase range. The owner is periodically supposed to check the condition of the o-ring seals. Judging by the dilapidated motors you show, they are old (one was dated 2011) and abused. They don't become that corroded unless they're kept underwater when not in use and it's apparent that no one ever did any service on them for years as they would if they were a typical gas outboard that requires at least yearly service. If the o-rings were simply checked and replaced every 4-5 years, they wouldn't leak. You also need to ensure the prop shaft seals are not damaged by fishing line. One motor you show is completly entangled in fish line. If the owner simply checked it once in a while, the problem would have been resolved before damaging the motor. Another clear case of owner neglect. Just because the Torqeedo's require much less service than a gas outboard does not mean they're to be neglected with no service.
Further, the BMS circuitry you show is usually always internal to most sealed lithium batteries, that is perfectly normal, and very few such sealed lithium batteries are user serviceable due to the significant dangers involved, especially for a marine battery where a lithium battery fire could be disastrous. The Torqeedo battery internals you show prove the battery is very well made with a high degree of quality and safety judging by its looks. The cells are potted to ensure they do not become loose in a severe marine environment. If you want to see what a badly designed lithium battery looks like, just visit Will Prowe's superb RUclips channel. Unlike you, he knows the difference between a properly and improperly built lithium battery and demonstrates it clearly. Torqeedo is excellent and very helpful with battery service if you simply contact them and tell them the problem.
Additionally, it's perfectly normal to have circuitry in an electronic throttle. Putting all the circuitry for the motor, battery, and throttle all in one single location, as you think it should be, would be very poor engineering for this type of motor as it would require far too much interconnecting wiring. The interconnecting cables would require far too many connectors and be prone to failure. Also, you apparently don't realize that Torqeedo uses the same componentry for their Ultralight line of motors to reduce the cost of their products. The throttles on this line are remotely located, thus the need for onboard circuitry. The motors, throttle, and battery were all very cleverly designed to be compatible and largely interchangeable for a wide variety of uses. This also reduces the cost of replacement if one component were to go bad and greatly enhances owner serviceability by simply replacing the bad module, something anyone can do.
Torqeedo motors will last a decade or more if properly serviced and not abused. It's grossly unfair to show a bunch of old and neglected motors and then blame it all on Torqeedo with zero owner accountability. That's the same as showing an old, abused, never serviced gasoline outboard and blaming it all on Mercury for making a bad product. Grossly unfair.
I am not your oppinion. A friend of mine had 2 motors die because the underwater unit leaked. No replacement parts from torqueedo, they wanted $1500 for repair. Not nice.
@@olafschermann1592 If you go to their website you'll see that they actually have all replacement parts you could imagine: Stators, rotors, gearboxes, mechanical parts, etc.
Also, in their user manual, they specify a 2 years service check interval if you keep the motor in the water at all times (and 4-5 years if you only have it in the water when using it).
I appreciate the honest assessment of the motors and batteries. This video review is a joke.
Did you just remove my comments here? I was just trying to help people here repair their torqeedos using original parts available at the manufacturer's website...
Was it wrong to simply add the direct links to the original Torqeedo parts website?
horrifying! thank you for warning the world about this! an electric motor should not be this complicated! I was already sufficiently discouraged by the price tag! but this confirms it. Although, it's just a brushless motor, so surely you could use another BLDC controller with that motor, and not mount it underwater. water getting inside the casing wouldn't kill a brushed motor (you'd still have to dismantle and clean it, of course!)
Their battery packs are amazingly bad value. Torqeedo products in general cost about twice what they should.
It’s criminal how poorly designed, inefficient, and overpriced these motors are and how they hurt the electric propulsion industry with the bad experiences users have had after making the switch. The reason the gear reduction is so nice is because it came from the power tool industry. Another nasty issue with them is how notorious they are for shearing their prop pins which are undersized, especially considering the reduction and the torque created by having that small motor spinning up so fast. I suspect this was due to building around the “borrowed” planetary gear set and that coupled with the obnoxious whine it creates is why they finally went to a direct brushless deign with their 1101. Thanks for tearing them down and bringing their poor design to the attention of consumers. Being in the electronics biz, I can’t believe those circuit boards aren’t potted for protection.
Do you know some better brands? I was looking for epropulsion or modding a chinese one or building a direct drive myself, in the range of 2-6kw. Another factor with this small motor is that it does not have any direct cooling from the water. Direct drive ones *can* have direct cooling from the water.
@@robertjanbout1437 I don’t know if EPropulsion is a whole lot better with regard to electronics since they have the same features as Torqeedo with circuit boards and lots of connectors etc.. They do however incorporate cooling into their Navy line and their prop shafts and shear pins are appropriately sized. But with EPropulsions sales coming on strong with them ramping up production, there have been a number of reports of problems primarily related to cheap components and connection points. You might look into Haswing or Caroutes bigger brushless direct drive offerings. They are better priced and make use of standard batteries which is one of the problems with the other guys, and they don’t have a bunch of electronics, error codes, and extra connection points. Golden Motors also has a new motor line up if you need something more powerful.
Like apple, tesla, etc. I hate those user unfriendly politics.