The first day on the road was nice in many ways, but had a few drawbacks that I'll discuss in a moment.
The car is quieter than ever. The new vacuum pump seems to have two stages. The first stage, and loud one, seems to draw the vacuum down pretty quick, but then it switches to a different mode where it becomes much quieter and to finish the job. It's important to note that when I say "loud stage", that is relative. It is still 1/3 as loud as the old pump. The nice thing is that it never seems to go all the way back to the first stage in normal driving. It just kicks in with the second stage when I hit the brakes. It's so quiet, I can't hear it in the car. I can feel it in the floor, because it's mounted very near my feet, but I can't hear it at all. I couldn't be happier with the new pump.
The drive line is beautiful. There is no wobble, which I expected, but it's actually smoother than before. I'm not sure if this is due to the fact that the motor is better balanced than before, or because the flywheel is absolutely balanced now. My bet is on the flywheel. In either case, it's great!
On the very first drive, I pulled into a local shopping center, and a mother was waiting to cross the street with her little girl. They paused and waited for me to pass, and I parked near by. The mother then told me that her daughter thought my car was very pretty. I thanked her and told them that it was also electric. The mother stopped dead in her tracks and said "You're kidding." "Nope!" I replied. She simply said that it was cool and amazing. A nice little interaction.
Now for the rough bits. Driving in Phoenix, in the summer time, at 1:30 in the afternoon, with out AC sucks. There is no other way to put it and no way around it. It was 110°F in my back yard before I left, which meant it was easily 115°F on the black top. It takes almost no time at all for a person to get really sick of that.
Apparently, the Zilla does not like it either. Towards the end of the trip, I noticed the "Check Engine" light flashing slowly. While I can't say with certainty that it was caused by high temperatures, based on a number of factors at the time, it certainly seemed it. I didn't have a chance to get the error codes off the hairball before they'd been pushed away by different ones (I was doing a little experimenting). But I did put my hand on the controller to check and found that it was too hot to leave my hand on it. I measured it with an infra-red thermometer and found it was a 126°F. I verified the pump for the water cooler was working and the fans mounted to the small radiator were spinning. All is working, it's just too damned hot.
Sadly, adding AC to the system is only going to make things worse. I have no where to put the radiator for the Zilla except for behind the condenser for the AC system. So if that starts spewing out heated air from the AC system, the Zilla will over heat for sure.
The DC to DC converters continue to run their fans non-stop. The ambient air temperature, coupled with the heat they generate while operating must be above the temperature threshold. I'm not sure I can do anything about this. I'm going to prop a fan on a chair and point it straight into the back of the trunk. If they shut off, I know I simply need to find a better way of circulating air through there. If they don't, I'm not quite sure what I'll do. I let them run for 12 hours and found the fans and the DC to DC controllers sucked a full 500 W/hours from the main pack.
I'm still working on getting data on which will be the best way to go with the 12V system. Should I disconnect the DC to DC converters when the car is off, or the SLI battery? I have two pieces of data now. The one I mentioned in the last paragraph, though it's important to note that this was with the 12V SLI battery disconnected. If I shut down the DC to DC converters and let the battery handle the load, the car draws off only 44 W/hours. That tells me two things. One, at first glance relying on the SLI battery would seem to be the way to go; and second, these Iota DC to DC converters are energy hogs! I have more data to gather though before I make my final decision, and I'll share that later.
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
We're Back On the Road
I finished up a few things with the car this morning and then began the process of taking it down off the jack stands. Once it was on the floor, I started it up and drove out of the garage. No problems, on issues.
I took the car for a little 3 mile run, just testing out the drive line. It is as smooth as silk. No wobbles, and it shifts beautifully. What a relief and what a great feeling! I brought the car back and plugged in the charger. While I'd been working on the car, I'd made sure to keep the batteries at 50% capacity, which is the recommendation if you're going to store them for over a week or so. So now I need to charge them up.
I'm definitely going to have to do something about the 12 VDC system. The DC to DC controllers have decided they don't like the ambient air temperature here in Phoenix in the summer, so they run their cooling fans constantly. That could be a real problem if I park the car for a while.
I decided to simply disconnect them when the car was sitting idle over the weekend and let the small SLI battery take the load for any 12 VDC demands. In the 64 hours that it was running the show, it dropped from 12.8 VDC to 12.0 VDC. I need to figure out how much energy was consumed during that time. There is a lot to consider and a lot of data I need to gather before I decide what I need to do. But for the mean time, I'm going to have to watch the traction pack when the DC to DC converters are on, or watch the small 12 v SLI battery if I disconnect them. I'll keep you all posted.
But these are minor issues. The EV Z3 is back on the road!!
I took the car for a little 3 mile run, just testing out the drive line. It is as smooth as silk. No wobbles, and it shifts beautifully. What a relief and what a great feeling! I brought the car back and plugged in the charger. While I'd been working on the car, I'd made sure to keep the batteries at 50% capacity, which is the recommendation if you're going to store them for over a week or so. So now I need to charge them up.
I'm definitely going to have to do something about the 12 VDC system. The DC to DC controllers have decided they don't like the ambient air temperature here in Phoenix in the summer, so they run their cooling fans constantly. That could be a real problem if I park the car for a while.
I decided to simply disconnect them when the car was sitting idle over the weekend and let the small SLI battery take the load for any 12 VDC demands. In the 64 hours that it was running the show, it dropped from 12.8 VDC to 12.0 VDC. I need to figure out how much energy was consumed during that time. There is a lot to consider and a lot of data I need to gather before I decide what I need to do. But for the mean time, I'm going to have to watch the traction pack when the DC to DC converters are on, or watch the small 12 v SLI battery if I disconnect them. I'll keep you all posted.
But these are minor issues. The EV Z3 is back on the road!!
Friday, June 25, 2010
All Systems Go
I ran a final check of the 12v wiring this morning, and after I was convinced everything was OK, I connected the 12v SLI battery. The car came to life just as one would hope. All systems checked out. With a couple minor adjustments, the 12v system was healthy and ready to go.
I ended up needing to move the proximity switch for the power steering pump about 1/8". The power steering pump wasn't cutting off. I also had so shim the aluminum plate that the vacuum pump sits on because it was rattling and making a lot of noise. I shimmed it, and anchored it down, and now the new vacuum pump is so much more quiet than the old one. It was worth every penny.
Once I was happy with all the 12v systems worked, I turned my attention to the high voltage system. I double checked everything and threw the breaker. No big arcs, and no loud pops, so that's good. It was time to start the car up. A twist of the key, a click of the main contactor, and the car was live. I gave it a little throttle and the wheels started spinning. Excellent!!
Now for the real test. Was there any more wobble in the drive line? I revved it up to 4000 RPM and... smooth as glass. Then I ran it through the gears to be sure the clutch was working OK. Everything checks out.
I have a few more things to do before I take it down and drive it. Unfortunately, no time to do any of that until next week. *Sigh*
I ended up needing to move the proximity switch for the power steering pump about 1/8". The power steering pump wasn't cutting off. I also had so shim the aluminum plate that the vacuum pump sits on because it was rattling and making a lot of noise. I shimmed it, and anchored it down, and now the new vacuum pump is so much more quiet than the old one. It was worth every penny.
Once I was happy with all the 12v systems worked, I turned my attention to the high voltage system. I double checked everything and threw the breaker. No big arcs, and no loud pops, so that's good. It was time to start the car up. A twist of the key, a click of the main contactor, and the car was live. I gave it a little throttle and the wheels started spinning. Excellent!!
Now for the real test. Was there any more wobble in the drive line? I revved it up to 4000 RPM and... smooth as glass. Then I ran it through the gears to be sure the clutch was working OK. Everything checks out.
I have a few more things to do before I take it down and drive it. Unfortunately, no time to do any of that until next week. *Sigh*
Thursday, June 24, 2010
Good Progress
The batteries are all in place and anchored down.
Here's a shot of the front with all the batteries in place and anchored down. I've run new testing wires from each group of four batteries up to the little bus bars that are anchored on the back of the front rack and the front of the back rack. I've included a 2 amp fuse in line on each lead from the positive side. Any short will quickly blow the fuse and keep the wire from melting down and starting a fire.
Here's a shot of where I placed that one (ahem) extra battery. On the right is a shot of the battery box in the trunk as it was when I first finished it. On the left you can see the extra battery pushed down in the gap at the end of the box. It worked out very well, and was easy to get into place and clamp down.
After I hooked them all up, I went through and took a voltage reading on all the batteries. After sitting for over two months, with 2/3's of the batteries sitting in a box and the rest still wired up in the car, they each read 3.29 volts. I suppose I had no reason to expect anything different, but I couldn't help being impressed. These really are great batteries.
I want to go through and re-verify and recheck all the connections for the high volt system and the 12 volt system before I replace all the fuses and throw the breaker. I should be able to get that done early tomorrow. There are still a few things I need to do after that and before it comes off the jack stands, so a Friday launch is looking unlikely. But that's OK, I should be back on the road next week. Can't wait to feel that EV grin again!
Here's a shot of the front with all the batteries in place and anchored down. I've run new testing wires from each group of four batteries up to the little bus bars that are anchored on the back of the front rack and the front of the back rack. I've included a 2 amp fuse in line on each lead from the positive side. Any short will quickly blow the fuse and keep the wire from melting down and starting a fire.
Here's a shot of where I placed that one (ahem) extra battery. On the right is a shot of the battery box in the trunk as it was when I first finished it. On the left you can see the extra battery pushed down in the gap at the end of the box. It worked out very well, and was easy to get into place and clamp down.After I hooked them all up, I went through and took a voltage reading on all the batteries. After sitting for over two months, with 2/3's of the batteries sitting in a box and the rest still wired up in the car, they each read 3.29 volts. I suppose I had no reason to expect anything different, but I couldn't help being impressed. These really are great batteries.
I want to go through and re-verify and recheck all the connections for the high volt system and the 12 volt system before I replace all the fuses and throw the breaker. I should be able to get that done early tomorrow. There are still a few things I need to do after that and before it comes off the jack stands, so a Friday launch is looking unlikely. But that's OK, I should be back on the road next week. Can't wait to feel that EV grin again!
Wednesday, June 23, 2010
Apparently Late Night Math is Not My Strong Suit
Lots done today. Let's take a look at some of it.
This is the new location for the shunt. It's at the front right corner of the back battery rack. I had to cut and re-crimp a couple cables to get them the right length, but it worked out well.
Just to the left of that is the emergency breaker, or battery disconnect. I had thought that I'd mount it dead center on the back rack, but the cable for the positive feed to the contactor didn't reach the extra 2 inches. The symmetry in the engine bay will be off, which is kind of too bad.
Here's a shot of the new throttle assembly set up, installed and tested. It's difficult to make out what's what here, so I'll take another once the batteries are in. But you can see the cable anchor in the right side of the picture, and the pedal assembly just to the left of center.
And last we have a shot of the whole assembly mounted in place with the back row of batteries resting in their place as well. There's a bit more tie down work to do, then I can install the front row.
In addition to all that, I also got a few other things done. I re-installed the tray under the motor that holds the fan for the motor as well as the box that contains the new vacuum pump. I ran all the necessary power lines to the items and the vacuum line from the pump to the reservoir. I also installed the new cross brace that stiffens the chassis.
I don't think I mentioned it before, but the fellow that owned the car before me clearly ran it up on a curb or something. There was a bit of damage under the car, mostly cosmetic. However, the original cross brace took most of the abuse, and was a bit twisted. It still fit in place, but was very difficult to bolt in and was under stress once in place. The new one slipped on so easy, it was a pleasure bolting it on the car.
Which brings me to the odd title of this post. You may remember that I had 31 batteries up front in the original configuration. During the rework, I drew up multiple designs trying to get the cleanest install of all the batteries in as tidy a package as I could. Well one night, very late I came up with this design. It is the cleanest by far and I'm very pleased with it. There's just one nagging problem. There are 12 batteries in the front row, and then two rows of 9 in the back rack. In most worlds, that adds up to 30. Apparently for me, in the middle of the night, that sometimes equals 31.
For the life of me, I don't know why I never added them up again, but I didn't. (This is the part where you all laugh at me.) After standing and shaking my head in disbelief, I started laughing at myself. But eventually I started thinking about it objectively. This really was the cleanest design I'd come up with, and it's going to look great. I don't think I want to change it, or would have if I realized it at the time. There is room for one more battery in the trunk box. It will make the end of the box a bit cramped, and I'll have to redo some of the lines in there, but I think it's going to be worth it in the long run.
The worst thing is that it will delay my relaunch by a day or so.
This is the new location for the shunt. It's at the front right corner of the back battery rack. I had to cut and re-crimp a couple cables to get them the right length, but it worked out well.
Just to the left of that is the emergency breaker, or battery disconnect. I had thought that I'd mount it dead center on the back rack, but the cable for the positive feed to the contactor didn't reach the extra 2 inches. The symmetry in the engine bay will be off, which is kind of too bad.
Here's a shot of the new throttle assembly set up, installed and tested. It's difficult to make out what's what here, so I'll take another once the batteries are in. But you can see the cable anchor in the right side of the picture, and the pedal assembly just to the left of center.
And last we have a shot of the whole assembly mounted in place with the back row of batteries resting in their place as well. There's a bit more tie down work to do, then I can install the front row.
In addition to all that, I also got a few other things done. I re-installed the tray under the motor that holds the fan for the motor as well as the box that contains the new vacuum pump. I ran all the necessary power lines to the items and the vacuum line from the pump to the reservoir. I also installed the new cross brace that stiffens the chassis.
I don't think I mentioned it before, but the fellow that owned the car before me clearly ran it up on a curb or something. There was a bit of damage under the car, mostly cosmetic. However, the original cross brace took most of the abuse, and was a bit twisted. It still fit in place, but was very difficult to bolt in and was under stress once in place. The new one slipped on so easy, it was a pleasure bolting it on the car.
Which brings me to the odd title of this post. You may remember that I had 31 batteries up front in the original configuration. During the rework, I drew up multiple designs trying to get the cleanest install of all the batteries in as tidy a package as I could. Well one night, very late I came up with this design. It is the cleanest by far and I'm very pleased with it. There's just one nagging problem. There are 12 batteries in the front row, and then two rows of 9 in the back rack. In most worlds, that adds up to 30. Apparently for me, in the middle of the night, that sometimes equals 31.
For the life of me, I don't know why I never added them up again, but I didn't. (This is the part where you all laugh at me.) After standing and shaking my head in disbelief, I started laughing at myself. But eventually I started thinking about it objectively. This really was the cleanest design I'd come up with, and it's going to look great. I don't think I want to change it, or would have if I realized it at the time. There is room for one more battery in the trunk box. It will make the end of the box a bit cramped, and I'll have to redo some of the lines in there, but I think it's going to be worth it in the long run.
The worst thing is that it will delay my relaunch by a day or so.
Tuesday, June 22, 2010
Odds & Ends Part XIII
Lots to report today, but sadly no pictures. You'll just have to imagine how stunning the work is.
I finished the straps and mounting system that will hold the batteries in the rack that will be mounted over the motor. I still need to figure out how I'm going to get some brackets around the batteries to keep them compressed. I had it all worked out in my mind how I'd do it, but once I started working with the rack, I realized what I had in mind just won't work. Funny how that happens, you tend to not see in your mind's eye how different pieces will interfere with each other until you start assembly. Anyway, it shouldn't be to hard to sort it out, I'll just have to come up with something different.
Once I had all that done, I placed the rack in it's space so I could start figuring out how I was going to place some of the elements that have moved. I need to find new locations for the Link-10's shunt, the emergency disconnect, the bracket to hold the traction pack fuse and the anchor for the throttle cable. You may remember in a previous post I built the mount for the throttle pedal, but I hadn't built anything to hold the assembly that anchors the cable.
The shunt's new home was easy enough. It's going to be roughly in the same location it was, but I had to cut a small piece of angle aluminum to mount it to. Just out of dumb luck one of the new braces used to hold down the batteries was in the perfect spot to anchor the throttle cable. So that's sorted. Last I had to build a small bracket to hold the emergency disconnect switch on the front the new tray. I cut, drilled and had the whole thing mounted, and it looked great. Then I screwed on the big red knob that you slap to break the connection, and realized that I wouldn't be able to slap it down because it ran into the tray. I'm not sure if I'm just working too fast, or why I'm making such silly mistakes. Fortunately, it will be easy to fix that as well.
In addition I reconnected the lines to the reverse switch in the transmission. I really wish I had the proper connector to connect it up. I found the connector online and numerous places that sell it. It's about $4.00 or so, and it's made by Tyco. Would you believe every place that I could find it, it was out of stock, and had a lead time of at least 4 months. Apparently Tyco makes one batch a year and when they're gone, you wait.
I also ran an auxiliary 12 vdc line to the back of the car. This line is switched with the ignition. One of the things I found in the 2 months I was driving the car was that if the car sat idle for 24 hours, the 12 volt system would manage to drain about 1 kWh out of the traction pack. There are only a few things actually drawing power when the car is off, and they are drawing tiny amounts. The one thing that is on, however, are the DC to DC converters. They are providing 13.2 vdc to the car, as well as the SLI battery.
I know that you can leave a trickle charge on a lead acid battery forever, and it will always draw just a bit of power. I don't think they'll draw 1 kWh in 24 hours, but something is. I think it's either the DC to DC converters just using it up because they are inefficient, or the SLI battery is drawing it off. I'm just not sure, so I'm going to run some experiments. I'll disconnect each, one at a time, and watch what happens to the traction pack. When the SLI battery is disconnected, I'll look to see what happens to the traction pack and then I'll disconnect the DC to DC converters and see what happens to the SLI battery. If one of them is the culprit, and there appears to be no adverse affects to disconnecting it when the car is off, I'll use that new 12 vdc line to run a separate contactor that will disconnect the appropriate component when the car isn't running.
Lets see, what else is there to report. Oh, I also cut some plate aluminum to fit over the ends of the batteries in the front tray. This will make it easier to clamp them down and compress them. I still have to build that apparatus though.
Ok, that's it for today. Stay tuned because I'll have lots more to report tomorrow and I'll have some pictures up to show the progress.
I finished the straps and mounting system that will hold the batteries in the rack that will be mounted over the motor. I still need to figure out how I'm going to get some brackets around the batteries to keep them compressed. I had it all worked out in my mind how I'd do it, but once I started working with the rack, I realized what I had in mind just won't work. Funny how that happens, you tend to not see in your mind's eye how different pieces will interfere with each other until you start assembly. Anyway, it shouldn't be to hard to sort it out, I'll just have to come up with something different.
Once I had all that done, I placed the rack in it's space so I could start figuring out how I was going to place some of the elements that have moved. I need to find new locations for the Link-10's shunt, the emergency disconnect, the bracket to hold the traction pack fuse and the anchor for the throttle cable. You may remember in a previous post I built the mount for the throttle pedal, but I hadn't built anything to hold the assembly that anchors the cable.
The shunt's new home was easy enough. It's going to be roughly in the same location it was, but I had to cut a small piece of angle aluminum to mount it to. Just out of dumb luck one of the new braces used to hold down the batteries was in the perfect spot to anchor the throttle cable. So that's sorted. Last I had to build a small bracket to hold the emergency disconnect switch on the front the new tray. I cut, drilled and had the whole thing mounted, and it looked great. Then I screwed on the big red knob that you slap to break the connection, and realized that I wouldn't be able to slap it down because it ran into the tray. I'm not sure if I'm just working too fast, or why I'm making such silly mistakes. Fortunately, it will be easy to fix that as well.
In addition I reconnected the lines to the reverse switch in the transmission. I really wish I had the proper connector to connect it up. I found the connector online and numerous places that sell it. It's about $4.00 or so, and it's made by Tyco. Would you believe every place that I could find it, it was out of stock, and had a lead time of at least 4 months. Apparently Tyco makes one batch a year and when they're gone, you wait.
I also ran an auxiliary 12 vdc line to the back of the car. This line is switched with the ignition. One of the things I found in the 2 months I was driving the car was that if the car sat idle for 24 hours, the 12 volt system would manage to drain about 1 kWh out of the traction pack. There are only a few things actually drawing power when the car is off, and they are drawing tiny amounts. The one thing that is on, however, are the DC to DC converters. They are providing 13.2 vdc to the car, as well as the SLI battery.
I know that you can leave a trickle charge on a lead acid battery forever, and it will always draw just a bit of power. I don't think they'll draw 1 kWh in 24 hours, but something is. I think it's either the DC to DC converters just using it up because they are inefficient, or the SLI battery is drawing it off. I'm just not sure, so I'm going to run some experiments. I'll disconnect each, one at a time, and watch what happens to the traction pack. When the SLI battery is disconnected, I'll look to see what happens to the traction pack and then I'll disconnect the DC to DC converters and see what happens to the SLI battery. If one of them is the culprit, and there appears to be no adverse affects to disconnecting it when the car is off, I'll use that new 12 vdc line to run a separate contactor that will disconnect the appropriate component when the car isn't running.
Lets see, what else is there to report. Oh, I also cut some plate aluminum to fit over the ends of the batteries in the front tray. This will make it easier to clamp them down and compress them. I still have to build that apparatus though.
Ok, that's it for today. Stay tuned because I'll have lots more to report tomorrow and I'll have some pictures up to show the progress.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Front Battery Tray
Today I finished building out the front battery tray. Here's a shot of the assembly sitting on the garage floor.
Later, in the afternoon, I got the whole assembly mounted in the car.
That involved doing some minor, but time consuming work on the mount for the power steering pump. I had to keep it in the same position in the compartment relative to the steering rack. So even though the battery rack moved forward, and the pump had been attached to that rack before, I needed to keep the pump from moving along with it.
Now I just need to mount the back tray, secure the batteries to it, run all the interconnects, find a new location for the shunt and the emergency disconnect and then finish the mount for the throttle assembly. Then I can start checking all the wiring and start testing things. If all goes well, it will be out of the garage sometime next week.
Later, in the afternoon, I got the whole assembly mounted in the car.
That involved doing some minor, but time consuming work on the mount for the power steering pump. I had to keep it in the same position in the compartment relative to the steering rack. So even though the battery rack moved forward, and the pump had been attached to that rack before, I needed to keep the pump from moving along with it.
Now I just need to mount the back tray, secure the batteries to it, run all the interconnects, find a new location for the shunt and the emergency disconnect and then finish the mount for the throttle assembly. Then I can start checking all the wiring and start testing things. If all goes well, it will be out of the garage sometime next week.
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