Should have just sold it in Germany

[d7fresh]

Hi there,

I have a 2017 NIU N1S that I bought second hand in Germany last year. It was all good when I bought it, except for the error 67 code since the SIM card was no longer functioning. But otherwise, I really enjoyed it and it worked well for me for over a year.

In August this year, I moved with my company to London. I did think about selling my N1S, but ended up moving it to London with me. Lucky for me, my company covered the cost. I had done a bit of research and found that I could get it registered in the UK so long as I could get the speedometer to display MPH instead of KPH. No problem, right?

Wrong. Remember I mentioned error 67? Because the SIM had expired, NIU could not remote into my bike to change the dashboard from metric to imperial. OK, off to my local NIU dealer for him to do it with his H1 tool. But the H1 tool was brand new and didn’t like communicating much with my original 2017 ECU. Further complicating matters, the N1S was never sold in the UK in 2017; they only got the NQi starting in 2018.

The NIU helpdesk said that the solution was to buy a new ECU. The one supplier in the UK was completely out of stock, so I searched German suppliers. I found a store near Berlin selling an ECU on eBay, so I dropped 300 € and ordered it. The rationale being, if I can’t get it registered here, it’s useless, so I may as well invest the money in a new ECU. Unfortunately, the German ECU was a v2 unit and the QR code was not functioning, so the SIM card could not be activated, the dealer couldn’t change the units with his H1 tool, and NIU advised me to get a new V3 unit.

After sending the v2 ECU back to Germany, I managed to track down a v3 ECU in the UK. This time I was able to activate it and connect to it with the app. Happy days. Or so I thought. While NIU could connect to it remotely, they couldn’t change the units. The dealer was able to connect to it with his H1, but couldn’t change the units. He was also having problems connecting to the display unit within the H1 tool menu. On top of that, there was a strange thing happening where after 30 seconds of riding, the display would suddenly change and start displaying the battery percentage where the speed should be. Also, my odometer, which should have started from zero, was jumping around from 44,000 km to 89,000 km to 12,000 km. It was bizarre, and no one else seems to have had this problem. After a dozen or so emails with NIU, they advised me that to fix the problem, I needed a v2 dashboard. So I gritted my teeth and ordered one through my dealer.

Yesterday, I dropped my N1S off at the dealer for him to swap out the dashboard. This should have been an easy process, but as usual, it wasn’t. The dashboard was not powering up at all when plugged in. We tested it on another NIU that was there (a NQi GT) and it powered up just fine. I know that there are a couple of extra wires on the new dashboard (pink ACC wire and orange TP32 wire), but these should not have prevented it from powering up.

After two hours, I had to leave, so we put my old dashboard back in, buttoned things up, and I rode the 2 miles home. As I turned on to my street, the power suddenly cut out completely. No lights, no acceleration, nothing. Luckily, I was only a few minutes from home, so I pushed it.

At home, I tried everything to get it working. I checked all of the connections and nothing was loose. I pulled the battery and plugged in the charger and the charger had the green light only. It had been at 100% before I left home earlier, but I would have expected it to charge a bit. I then put the battery back in and plugged the charger into the bike. Now the bike turned on and the rear wheel would spin as usual when I twisted the throttle. But when I disconnected the charger, the bike switched off after a few seconds, and the app told me that the battery was disconnected.

With the charger plugged back in and the bike on, I checked the battery in the app and saw that it was at 91% (which is also what the bike said) and had a score of 90.7. I ran the Smart Check and the bike scored 100%. As I was about to exit the app, I noticed one strange thing: the GPS was telling me that my bike was in Bristol, over 100 miles away. The map showed my bike in the actual, correct location, but text at the bottom of the map also said that I was in Bristol. Very odd.

This morning NIU informed me that I need a new BMS, which I know is built into the battery. Technically, the battery could be disassembled and a new BMS could be installed, but that’s risky and I have only managed to find one vendor (in China) selling a BMS by itself. A new battery is out of the question as it would cost more than the bike itself. At this point, I am on the verge of giving up and either selling my N1S or parting it out.

Does anyone have any bright ideas? Or is anyone interested in taking this off my hands entirely or piece by piece? I’m open to anything at this point.

And by the way, if any of you are moving to the UK and thinking about bringing your NIU, DON’T DO IT! Just sell it wherever you are now and buy something else when you get here.

Cheers,
Doug

Attachments:

You must be logged in to view attached files.

[Axel]

Oh boy, what an odyssey!

Yes, the 2017 are slowly becoming a problem (maintenance wise).
Like with all Chinese products, there’s no real warehousing beyond 1-2 years. When dealers ran out of their stock, you’re more or less left to the used-parts market.

Your dealer tried to connect a 2nd gen dashboard… that won’t work, mate (been there, done that). For your model you will need the 1st gen one… Check my 2nd Gen Dashboard post to spot the differences. Green sticker on the back = 2nd gen.
Why is that? No idea really… I assume it relies on having TP32 and/or ACC connected to the ECU, which in our case has no clue about these signals.
Also the CAN bus protocol might be different (requiring the v3 ECU), which would explain your strange display experience.

Recommendation… mhhh, selling it in the UK will make the buyer (and probably you, too) unhappy.
Parting it out: Body-panels/chassis might sell, the ECU/dashboard/throttle are specific and nobody in the UK can use them… and thanks to Brexit shipping to the EU will make your prices quite unattractive.

But to be honest, if you want to drive your NIU instead of making it a “Bastelbude” (you should have learned that term in Germany ;-)), bite the bullet, get a new one and sell the old one in 2 batches: Parts compatible with the NQi stay in the UK, the others sold to a dealer in Germany who still has “2017 customers”. The v1 dashboard still goes for a whopping 180€!!

Cheers, Axel

[d7fresh]

Thanks Axel, unless my battery can be magically fixed, I will be parting it out. So if anyone in the UK needs any parts for an N1S/NQi Sport, let me know. As for the ECU, dashboard, and throttle, I will try to wait until I have a business trip to Germany (or anywhere else in the EU) and then try to time it so that they are sold and shipped while I am there anyway. It’s especially disappointing since I just put the nice green body panels on it (I created that body panel swap video).

And yes, I am already looking at getting a new one, although I’ll probably go for the GTS Pro this time.

However, if I can get the battery functional again, I had the idea of creating my own dashboard with a 3rd party speedometer, and then just using the app to measure my battery level. I would likely need to keep the NIU dashboard plugged in and out of site to make it work (unless the bike can function without the dashboard plugged in). The whole point of these changes I made was to get the speedo in MPH so I could pass the British MOT.

But I have slim hopes that the battery problem will be solved, so again, if anyone needs parts, let me know.

Cheers,

Doug

[d7fresh]

My battery is toast, so I’m officially parting out my N1S. If anyone needs any parts, let me know.

Cheers,

Doug

[d7fresh]

As per my last message, I have begun parting out my N1S. Check out the attached photo for what a mostly stripped N1S looks like. I still need to remove the wheels, forks and a few other things. I have already posted things for sale on eBay UK, but am currently limited as to how much I can post because I had to create a new eBay account (you can no longer change your registered country with eBay so my old account is stuck in Germany). If anyone in the UK needs some parts, check out:

Items for sale by d7freshuk | eBay

Attachments:

You must be logged in to view attached files.

[Author]

Posts