Thank you Raghav. I can live without a loaner for now(have another bike luckily). Will log a request and ask them to pick it up.
I would say an issue like this warrants and proactive physical recall and fixing it. Doing it after the customer has suffered just kills the brand trust. Even a software workaround can be a solution in the meantime the physical component is fixed? cc: @abhishek.balaji
This is one flaw which Ather chose to ignore and it annoys me everytime i put the vehicle to charge.
When I charge, I don’t want to stop at 55% which is eligible for shutdown (because that’s too low to have as a backup when I need to travel).
I usually want to charge at least 80%. But then I won’t be able to use shut down. Throughout this covid period, 5x Power wasted in idle than riding. If shutdown option was available, idle waste would have been too small.
Until this problem was known, I used to shutdown every single time (except when I wanted to see ride statistics for any long ride). After so many warnings and disclaimer, I stopped doing it.
Even if it required hardware fix and physical visit, it was worth doing it. Because we are wasting energy unnecessarily. After all, Ather did not sell million vehicles to recall and that too all in Bangalore. It could have been done in phased manner over 6 months to all the old vehicles which has this problem.
Even now, this is not too late and Ather can definitely do if they really want to do. And I wish they do it during 4g upgrade.
Idk if there is a fix tbh. Because even athers which have been through this issue and it’s been fixed are still advised not to shut down often.
EDIT : I’m wrong
Second that. My battery has gone through so many more charge cycles than expected for that ODO reading. But I think shutting down over 60% won’t be an issue if yourw sure you’ll turn it back on when the SOC has dropped well below 60%. @abhishek.balaji please do let us know if I’m wring about this.
In the absence of the actual fix, may be they need a hybrid consumption mode if the vehicle is in standby for more than an hour? Where in it can shutdown all the non essential activities and can consume slightly more than the shutdown mode? Something like 1.5% drain rate? 2 months of idle drain is something we all can accept. However the current standby consumption is >3% that leaves your scooter drained within a month if parked idle. Most of the charging is done just to keep the scooter ready for those unexpected requirements?
I understand the electricals being burnt not being able to handle the surge after wakeup is a bigger issue. Not sure a mechanism which diverts the sudden draw(a surge protector) has already been designed or just a better component that doesn’t burn is being replaced in the BMS. But in any case they can prevent people from shutting down when the SoC is at a 80+% level as this is anyways supposed to be harmful for the battery. Containing high SoC and not using it is supposed to have an effect on Battery life and can possibly degrade the material. Ather can enforce a minimum shutdown SoC % or internally shutdown only after the safe SoC% is reached (not sure if this is being done?).
As far as I remember thru the discussions in forums on this issue, once fixed it won’t recur.
Edit: the below post confirms that it won’t recur after its fixed.
https://forum.atherenergy.com/t/ownership-experience/303/3206?u=prasathvishnu
I apologise, I wasn’t aware . I’ve editted my post too. @abhishek.balaji hey, if there is a hardware fix…Why isn’t this included in at least one of the periodic services ?? The 5k or 10k services. You guys changed my key set even though I had no issues to prevent any future issues. I think this BMS resistor issue is a bigger issue than a key issue.
Is it something that we can request ather to do in one of the service, in case I’m going to be shutting down my scooter often? Because I haven’t shut down my scooter since I heard about this issue and I’ve lost SO many charge cycles on my battery because of this.
Given the seriousness of the issue I think this should be a proactive plus an opportunistic fix(via when vehicle arrives for service). I don’t know whats running in Ather’s mind until @abhishek.balaji or someone from Ather can state their stance on the issue. IMHO this issue is a ticking time bomb for the vulnerable scooters out there.
I think I remember Abhishek saying it’s okay to shutdown the vehicle as long as you do it only once in a day or two. I’ve never had this issue even though I’ve shut down my vehicle at 93-95%. But then, I’ve only woken up the vehicle about a week later.
it happened to me after using the shutdown feature after an year. Only once I have shutdown the vehicle by mistake at 90+% and the last shutdown before the failure to wake up happened when the charge level was 60% I think. My usual wakeup from shutdown is once a week actually (don’t ask why I have a scooter 
)
So, you are lucky if it hasn’t happened yet, but I wouldn’t count on this being safe.
Only when it happened to me I asked few of my other Ather friends, its just that they didn’t tell me before but it had happened to them as well 
This question is to the makers of the Ather. With all due respects to this innovative vehicle there are a few ground realities that need answers. One of my colleague owns the ather for almost more than a year now. Recently there was a rat bite on one of the cable. To his shock he was advised that the entire harness of the scooter was to be replaced at a cost of around 10K. I am worried that this might end up paying the price of the petrol . Any answers to this?? Ather team , I hope you are taking note of this. Regards Sakith Gabriel
Sadly this is an industry wide practice, due to safety practices, reliably concerns and fire hazard concerns, the entire harness needs to be changed, and patch work cannot be done. There may be aftermarket garages which do patch work, for way cheaper, but that is a risk that you may or may not be willing to take.
We learnt a few years ago when a rat bit the cooling system harness on our family car, how a harness change costed over 1 lakh. We then spent a bunch of money rat proofing our garage to prevent any rat from getting in. Alternatively, you can regularly spray a repellant or a room freshner if the above is not possible. In the long run, it’s safer than risking some unforeseen damage to your vehicles, that can compromise the safety and reliability. The wiring harness being bitten off is a concern for any vehicle, not just an Ather.
My vehicle returned from the Ather service, it seems one of the wire at the PD had come off, so they had to reroute that wiring so that it won’t happen again. I don’t have the exact details on why and how can this happen. Will contact Ather and request additional details.
Also, it seems they had to do some routine check of the charging circuit which they missed and took the scooter again. Now, the explanation from the support was largely non convincing why the scooter had to be taken away again. Will post the details here if I find anything.
Thanks to all those who helped to troubleshoot this issue 
My ather was fine till yesterday, but today morning it was sluggish all of a sudden, as if there’s something that is hindering the wheel, it is slowing down faster than usual now. Any thoughts?
As such, my 450 never coasted as well as my 10yr old activa. Maybe give the belt a wash and check tyre pressure. If it persists. Report to Ather, could be a bearing issue.
Interesting, always felt the 450 coasted better than my Activa!
Check tyre pressure. If that is as per spec then it could be dirt/road grease in the belt or pulley. If you still have issues, suggest you raise a Support request on the app and have the service team look at it.
For real? I actually made a couple of videos comparing the free wheel spin of the Ather and the activa. I’ll try posting it sometime. But as such on a downslope. I feel the activa coasts better when the clutch isn’t engaged of course.
This One thing I felt was a big miss in the 450. I just assumed it was the belt drive. But even the front wheel doesn’t spin as freely as my activa.
Is this normal for the belt to be like this?
Well. It’s really hard to determine that by looking at it. If you haven’t had a service in a while. Maybe get it it looked at, and only if it’s affecting you in some way. Like reduced power or low efficiency or some weird sounds. If everything is well, then well ride it till the next scheduled service and they’ll take care of it for you then.
Looks ok to me from whatever I can see in your video. But as @Suraj_madhu has written if you don’t have any issues…just ride on! In your next service, Ather will adjust it anyway
