Problems, of course!

Due to crazy schedule the car hasn't seen too much action, but a few things need to be attended to at this point. I drove the car a few times and noticed the current limits much sooner that it had before. I checked the controller setting and connections to no avail.
I drove the car for a while and it got a lot worse, the range is down to about half as well. I drove until out of power and checked all the battery voltages, and as expected I had a few very low cells.
I had never balanced the batteries and am not running a BMS so I was not overly surprised.
I decided to charge the car and see how many amp hours that it charged, the next day I check the meters and discovered the amp hour meter was no longer working, so much for the information I was hoping to gain. Plan B was in effect, I used my powerlab 8 and discharged the previously low cells to check capacity, it looks like 8% loss from new. This was not too troubling as I bought the batteries used and they have some age. I decided to charge every battery with the powerlab and note the charges.
After a week of moving charger leads, I found that on average I was able to put 9AH to 9.5 AH in each battery.
I had ordered a new meter assuming the old one was a goner, I should have done some troubleshooting first, seems the dc/dc converter isolated supply had died, meter ok. I now have a spare meter..oops.
The next mission is to drive the car and check the range and current, to see if anything has changed.
I will have to bottom balance the batteries as some point or buy a BMS system to take care of things.
I have yet to get the chargers swapped out, I have a Vectrix conversion I am working on as well and have the batteries for the quad to replace as well.

Winter Blues

Not a lot of new stuff happening with the freezing temps and too much snow.

I have found some brake issues, I changed the rear caliper but the problems continue and a new master cylinder has been ordered and received. The work had slowed due to weather and injury from an auto accident keeping me sidelined for 4+ weeks.

The PFC50 charger and J1772 interface is not installed yet and the brake issue hasn't been resolved.

I have been looking at options to cover the rear batteries that would be lighter than the aluminum plate I contemplated using. I am favoring Lexan but not loving the price for the thickness I may need for the package area.

The charger may fit well into the spare tire space, I would like to offset the 33 pounds by removing something from the car, not sure what that would be yet...

Improving things

 

 

I finally got around to changing the tires to the proper size, no more nasty noises on bumps and lower rolling resistance as well. I made an appointment to get the alignment done on all four wheels, as it turns out, the alignment was out significantly.

I decided to upgrade the charger, as the existing charger was not putting out full power.

I found a charger on Ebay that will work, with the added benefit of providing ability to charge from public charge points with an added interface.

 

 

I have many projects left for this winter, I need to finish the rear box cover and reinstall the interior. The brakes need to be replaced in the rear, the dash finished and stereo install completed to name just a few.

 

 

 



Getting ready to roll, got the body cleaned up a bit. I will eventually get it repainted, but going to drive it for a bit first.

More testing

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I have been driving and checking things out, I have a bunch of meters to keep me entertained.

The top is a amp hour meter and will show voltage and amps if needed.

The bottom set is one for each pack, front and rear.

The readings shown are after a 40 mile drive.

I still need to finish the dash, the meters have programmable outputs for control of external items and I plan on using some of them for lights and buzzers for low battery and range warnings.

I may use one to cut off the charger as well.

First Drive

I modified the indicator for the warning light panel to use some of the indicators for the error lights and run indicators that come from the drive. While I had the soldering iron out I wired up the isolated DC/DC to the amp hour meter.

I pulled wires to the interior for indicators, meters and switches.

After a glitch with the programming of the watt hour meter, I got it reading correctly, I dropped the car off the stands and moved it under electric power for the first time but I only went 15 feet.

 

 I checked the brakes, as the car had not been on the road for a long time. The rotors were pretty rusty and I may have to address some sticky calipers. The front tires are rubbing the spring mounts and I added 5mm spacers for now, I will get the proper tires in the future.

I aired up the tires and install lugnuts, each wheel only had 3 when I purchased the car.

I decided to not complete the dash and give it a test drive, I found a few issues, the tachometer was acting a bit strange, I decided to remove a few reflectors and drop the pulse input to the controller per recommendation of controller instructions. I reprogrammed the controller and changed the ramp and rpm limit. 

The tach was still intermittent, I finally realized that driving with the hood off was causing improper reading from the optical tachometer pickup.

I have a few issues with the brakes, as well as the the speedometer cable is causing a fluctuation in speed.

I did a quick acceleration test and it will burn the tires and accelerate pretty well, I saw 700 amps at one point, but the batteries were not fully charged.

After the test drive I dressed the wires under the hood and secured things. I cut the acrylic sheet and drilled and mounted it over the front batteries.  The electric vehicle stickers were installed as well.

The hoses for the cooling are connected, but I haven't filled the system or connected the pump. During all the testing the controller barely got warm and the fans came on for a little bit.

 

It Lives!

I wired up the low voltage and shortened the high voltage cables and hooked them up to the controller.

The controller set an error when power was applied, as expected. I hooked up the computer and after several attempts got the controller programmed and throttle calibrated. I started the controller and got power to the motor and checked the drive through the gears. The tachometer pickup could be better but I had a pretty steady reading.

I will need to adjust a few things after a test drive, which I hope to do this weekend after I install some meters to monitor the batteries.