Water ingress has caused 2 problems. One was the motor cable end plug cracking and allowing water in and shorting the electrics. That cable has been redesigned and apoears to have cured that problem. The other is water ingress getting past the motor crankshaft bearing seals and eventually damaging the bearings. One significant cause of this was pressure washing so that should be avoided. Other causes may be submersion or general bearing wear which in turn will render the seal inneffective but I would suspect inappropriate washing has been the main culprit. So I would not worry. Even after the end of warranty Spesh are prepared to do a discount and the chances are you will get more use out of the Levo in 2 years than you would an analogue bike in 5!
Water ingress has caused 2 problems.
Water ingress has caused 4 problems that I am aware of.
The 2 you mention above and.....
The 3rd is an issue with the double green O rings around the motor plug. These O rings do not prevent water ingressing into the motor socket. The water ingress corrodes the terminals in the plug and also the terminals in the socket. I have repeatedly had this issue on both my 2017 and 2019 Levo’s.
Yes, there is a ‘sort of’ workaround but this is not a ‘proper officially released by Specialized fix’. If water is getting in past these 2 O rings this indicates to me that the socket is slightly too big or the size of the O rings on the plug are slightly too small. As yet, I do not believe a plug with larger O rings has been released by
@Specialized Rider Care . My temporary fix is every 2 weeks I take the motor cover off and pull the plug out, clean and dry both the plug and socket, spray a small amount of electrical contact fluid in and refit the plugs. There are other fixes but this one works for me and so far I have had no more issues.
The 4th is a water ingress issue on the 2019/2020 TCUs. These are clearly
not waterproof. I have had a number water ingress failures on my TCU’s.
Yes, there is a ‘sort of’ workaround but this is not a ‘proper officially released by Specialized fix’. If water is getting into the TCU then a new one needs to be released that
is waterproof. Wrapping it in tape does not work in the conditions I ride in. My temporary fix is to remove the TCU shake out as much water as possible and they dry it with a paper towel then put it on the hot water boiler overnight so the heat dries it out. There are other fixes but this one works for me and so far I have had no more issues.
Water ingress getting past the motor crankshaft bearing seals and eventually damaging the bearings. One significant cause of this was pressure washing so that should be avoided.
I am fairly certain bearing seals are primarily designed to keep the grease in and not so much to keep water ingress out unless the bearings have a triple lip seal. It is my understanding that there are no triple lip sealed bearings on the Brose crankshaft. It is also my understanding that there are no proper water seals on the crankshaft of the Brose motor which is why water gets in so easily and destroys the bearings. I understand that
@Bearing Man can and does fit an additional water seal when he refurbishes a motor.
The big question I have is why hasn’t Brose fitted a water seal on any of their 'replacement' motors? These motors have been out there in the wild for over 4 years now
……. Perhaps this is another question
@Specialized Rider Care could answer for us?
Other causes may be submersion or general bearing wear which in turn will render the seal inneffective but I would suspect inappropriate washing has been the main culprit.
Submersion will do it for sure as there are
NO water seals on the Brose crankshaft so the motor is more or less an open door if the motor is submerged over the motor cranks.
When I clean my bike. I use a very low pressure hose and a bucket of water. The hose is never directed at the motor. I have never pressure washed my ebike or submerged my ebike motor and yet 2 of my motors died due to water ingress. A friend who lives just down the road from me has just had his out of warranty motor fixed by
@Bearing Man. This too was a water ingress issue. My friend washes his ebike the same way as I do. So inappropriate washing is not the culprit in mine or my friends situation.
As most of you know, I live in Wales, it rains a lot here. I ride in the rain, when I ride there is rain, fairly large puddles and mud everywhere which I unfortunately cannot avoid. I am fairly certain this is the culprit of my water ingress issues.
So I would not worry. Even after the end of warranty Spesh are prepared to do a discount and the chances are you will get more use out of the Levo in 2 years than you would an analogue bike in 5!
Would not worry? Specialized will sell me a new motor at a discounted price to replace my out of warranty motor that has no water seals in it. The exact same water ingress issue is very likely to happen to me again in the conditions I ride in. This is a mountain bike. It should be capable of riding in any weather condition….. Just so you know, 2 of my motors went within a year and had less than 2200 miles on them. My friends lasted about 1400 miles. All were water ingress issues. My other motor died due to a belt snapping. That had covered 2500 miles.
To be fair,
@Specialized Rider Care have been good at fixing
‘some’ of the issues by releasing rolling fixes. I realise that some issues take more time to diagnose properly and to come up with a proper fix that will actually resolve the issue. However, Specialized do not appear to be engaging on some fairly important issues with their existing customer base with older motors that have been outstanding for quite some time now which is why I am raising it on the forum.
Hopefully
@Specialized Rider Care will engage with us and let us know what their 'next steps' plan and timeline to resolution for above issues will be.
The photos below are a Brose motor that has never been pressure washed or submerged just good old Welsh weather 
