About us
Founded in 2019. By Aleksandar Pasic, PLANET3 started as an idea, a solution to a problem that the founder and CEO was faced with when he purchased the latest Specialized Turbo Levo e-bike and discovered the fact that it was severely restricted in terms of speed. Since the bike was just recently introduced to the market, there were no existing solutions to the speed limit problem. After a few hours of late night web searching and nothing to show for it, an idea of a solution was born after attempting a rear wheel swap and noticing the layout of the speed sensor and magnet used for measuring speed. “I bet you could squeeze a planetary gearset there and slow the magnet down” - the thought came as if from nowhere. Well, not exactly from nowhere - it helped a bit that the CEO is a mechanical engineer. Several hours of playing with feeler gauges and CAD software later, the first PLANET3 was drawn up. Over the next few days a prototype was 3D printed, installed on the bike and Voila - it worked! A planetary gearset with a 3:1 ratio, hence the name PLANET3. What started as an attempt to solve one’s own problem, quickly grew as a crowd favourite on Facebook and forums, spreading somewhat like wildfire and 5 years later there are more than 10 000 PLANET3 units happily orbiting all over the world.
The Electronic Evolution
PLANET3’s venture into e-bike derestriction didn’t stop there. After finding out some limitations of the mechanical derestriction devices when trying to fit them to different e-bike drivetrains, our in-house engineering brain started working on new solutions. This brings us to the most recent PLANET3 development; an advanced e-bike derestriction chip called PLANET3-E. Where the mechanical device stops, PLANET3-E takes over. It solves almost every problem other derestriction device manufacturers wouldn’t solve, such as:
Problem solving - OEM connectors
Proprietary connectors - how do you connect your advanced chip to the e-bike motor if the motor manufacturer doesn’t want to sell you the connectors? You make your own. Sounds easy enough, but when you start to dig a little deeper you discover some problems. A connector has to be made of what’s called a “technical/engineering plastic” - something dimensionally accurate and stable, but also mechanically tough and durable. These have to be injection molded in tools/molds, which you have to make on your own. A month later a system of hand-held tools for injection molding of e-bike connectors was developed completely in house.
Problem solving - DIY Injection molding machine
But how do you inject these technical plastics into the tools? This was the next problem to solve. Low-pressure molding solutions for DIY are readily available, but you cannot injection mold technical plastics with 8-10 bar of pressure. You need 200+ bar (~3000 psi) of pressure and nearly 300°C (~570°F) of temperature for Polyamide 6 with 20% glass fiber to even start flowing. After sending out requests for quotes for the most basic injection molding machines capable of fitting in a room instead of a hall, you are met with pricing of ~$50 000/EUR. You can already guess.
Problem solving - Infrastructure for the future
PLANET3-E is the only electronic derestriction device (so far) that is fully updatable via Bluetooth and capable of rewriting its own firmware. Other devices, even when they feature Bluetooth capabilities, are only using Bluetooth for data transmission and display (something like telemetry) because it’s a lot easier than dealing with bootloaders, memory partitions and CRCs required for an actual useful capability. If all of this is going over your head, this reads “PLANET3-E can continue to work after the e-bike manufacturer changes something in their firmware rendering all the competing derestriction devices obsolete”.
The other side (that wastes money)
In the case of our CEO, the trend of solving-one’s-own problem is not limited to “work” i.e. e-bikes. Alex, being a mechanical engineer who previously worked in Motorsport, suffers from an affliction of being too poor to be able to afford a Porsche, but well-off enough to be able to afford several old BMW M cars (especially if they’re in various stages of disassembly). Thus, you can potentially benefit from his problem-solving abilities if you also suffer from the BMW affliction.
The E46 M3 - A childhood dream car
His high school dream car was an E46 M3 slicktop with a 6-speed manual transmission. It only took about 20 years but on his 34th birthday he gifted himself a very nice example from Japan with less than 40 000 km on the clock. You know when they say “never meet your heroes”? Well, it’s somewhat true. Let’s just say the car presented him with plenty of opportunity for more problem-solving.
OFHG - Leaky gut syndrome of the BMW inline-6 engines
One of the first things was the leaky oil filter housing gasket which was re-made with some geometry optimizations and a switch to Viton (FKM) as the gasket material. At the same time, since the oil cooler lines connect to the OFH it was noticed that the weirdly sized o-rings fitted to the lines were also only available in BMW OEM material, so these were re-made in Viton to complement the OFHG and permanently solve any leaking of the OFH and the oil cooler lines.
The F10 M5 - The Daily Driver
Around the same time, Alex was looking for a daily driver in the form of a BMW Touring model. However, as the container coming from Dubai was only half-full with the E46 M3 and there were absolutely no Touring models for sale in Dubai (an F10 535i Touring was the goal), the next-best thing was purchased as a daily driver - an F10 M5 sedan. 😂 Let’s just say this car provided a LOT of problem-solving opportunities.
DCT Oil Pan - The Ultimate Solution
Even though the second-hand M5 was in all-around good condition, it had some issues. First one noticed was the completely wet DCT gearbox’s oil pan. Around 6 months after replacing the plastic oil pan and its seal with the OE replacement parts, it was realized that this was going to be a perpetually leaking item. After searching the internet and finding several aluminium DCT oil pan solutions, a conclusion was reached that none of these addressed ALL the issues. Some offered increased oil capacity, some solved the problem of the leaky gasket and some had higher internal baffles to fight the oil starvation problem in sustained G cornering. None did everything let alone everything well.
A DCT was borrowed from a fellow M-enthusiast for measurements and modeling and within 3 months of scattered labour a first semi-dry sump DCT oil pan was produced and fitted to the M5. It featured a completely re-usable Viton o-ring as the sealing element, increased oil capacity, very little loss of ground clearance, increased cooling capacity through fins, suction point dropped to the lowest point of the pan, trap doors that automatically close in the direction of the G force yet remain open when no acceleration is applied, usage of the OEM suction filter by Getrag and the stock magnet. It’s been on the car for 3 years and the DCT oil temps dropped, no more misshifts during long sustained cornering and no clutch slippage.
Brake Rotors - Solving the overheating of the front rotors
Another problem that was noticed were the front brake rotors which in their OEM spec couldn’t even get through the brake pad bedding in procedure without warping and shaking afterwards. After searching for AP Racing solutions and being told by their sales reps that there is nothing from AP Racing with a pad depth of 79-80mm, a decision was made to make-your-own floating rotors with a pad depth of 80mm which meant the stock Brembo 6-piston caliper can be retained. 72 cooling vanes instead of the stock 48, real floating capability to compensate for heat expansion, all-stainless steel hardware and a AW-7075T6 bell solved the brake overheating problem even with OEM pads on all but race track use conditions.
The E39 M5 - The Forever Car
Due to constant issues related to the twin-turbocharged and impossibly-complicated-to-cool S63 V8 in the F10 M5 which was now more than 10 years old and started behaving in accordance with its age (read: everything made of plastic or rubber started to crack, leak and generally go to hell), the idiot writing this decided that it’s not worth the hassle and that it should be replaced by a “less complicated and more reliable” daily driver. You’re thinking: Honda Jazz! You are, however, wrong. Another favourite activity of the protagonist is scouring the FB Marketplace at 2 AM looking for shitboxes. Thus, it happened one night in 2023. An E39 M5 appeared for sale in Spain and it also happened to be the cheapest running and driving car offered in the EU at that time. Obviously, the next day phone calls were made, friends roped into sharing the 2000+ km drive back, airplane tickets bought and a trip to Madrid was under way. The car was everything you should expect from the cheapest E39 M5. For now, due to “work stuff” the E39 project is on the back burner.
There are several ongoing projects for the E46 M3, the F10 M5 and in the future, for the E39 M5 so you might want to keep an eye out on our Car Stuff section of the website, but the point here is to let you know this isn’t some made-in-China bullshit but one man fixing things that are wrong with the stuff he buys. If you share the same problems, you’re welcome to have them solved by PLANET3. 🙂