YouTube - Broadcast Yourself.

$3000 for the brake kit!!! WOW!!! I could almost buy a lead acid battery pack for that much!!!!

Brembos are top of the line. Yes, $3,000 was kind of an ouch. And maybe a little overkill. The Quaif differential in the Getrag might be a little over the top too. But we're kinda building a dream car here - not Gav's EV.

Jack

marionrickard 2 years ago

BTW. We have longer higher resolution versions of these videos without being chopped up into these ridiculous 10 minute segments at evtv.me

marionrickard 2 years ago

So AC Propulsion recommends you buy their motor, Inverter and battery modules? Now that is good marketing....You buy everything from them and have to add in extra cooling holes and vents in the big metal box that it comes in? Sounds like a deal. Did you ever deal with Azure Dynamics? I have and they are pretty thorough in fiting the right system to the donor car you are working with. You can also get their stuff from Electro Automotive in CA. I am still watching vid 4 on brakes.

RocketMaker10000 2 years ago

Dear Jack,

I am not suggesting you sway from your build, I was just giving you my $0.02 worth so to speak. I look forward to your build and see how it works. I have emailed AC Propulsion a bunch of times and they don't respond. Hopefully your build will give us a good idea of how the Metric Mind components work. I think you mentioned that is where you got your compenents from. Anyway, I build EVs as well up here in NJ and just thought it would be good to let you know my experience.

RocketMaker10000 2 years ago

And I'm pleased that you did. I was sharing our thinking on component selection and some of the considerations we looked at.

We did speak with AC Propulsion on several occasions. You just have to be persistent. We even agreed to buy 5 of them (their minimum they claim) but when we started to inquire about battery charging parameters and how you program them, it got strangely quiet. And they suggested we use their battery modules.

marionrickard 2 years ago

Their modules use an older cathode chemistry often used in laptops and cellphones that we view as dangerous in a larger vehicle application and we would not have them in a car under any circumstances and with any BMS no matter how engineered.

We get our components from a number of places, but EVcomponents and Metric Mind have been very good recently. And of course eBay....

What type of conversion are you doing?

Jack Rickard

marionrickard 2 years ago

To have regen only come on with the brakes you are going to get a double whammy of brakes and regen at the same time and I would think that might take some getting use to as well. I am glad you are doing this conversion. I will keep watching. Keep up the good work.....

RocketMaker10000 2 years ago

Well, not precisely. We have power assisted brakes on our Mini Clubman. We'll tie the regen to the brake switch and leave the power assist off. A light touch on the brakes gives you regen. A heavier touch gives you regen plus Brembos.

The regen will be driver adjustable from none to maximum. So you "tune" your brakes.

Kinetic energy is MOST efficient at rolling the car forward. It only makes sense to convert it to electricity if you need to stop or slow down - ergo brakes.

marionrickard 2 years ago

We think this will work much better than the BMW Mini-E/AC Propulsion system. But if it doesn't, it is a software setup to change it to come on when the foot goes off the accelerator. And we'll still have it where you can "tune" it as you drive.

Jack Rickard

marionrickard 2 years ago

We looked at the AC Propulsion system and talked with them about it. It's rather keyed in with an obsolete battery chemistry, and we don't think its one of the best. It is interesting, in that it combines the DC-DC converter and charger with the controller/inverter. But it is enormous. The cooling is very poor. And it is not sufficiently configurable for our needs.

In any event, they will sell it to us, but they won't sell it to our viewers. WHy do a video on a build no one can do?

marionrickard 2 years ago

Dear Jack,

I didn't realize Tesla reengineered the AC Propulsion system. Thanks for the update. Regarding the Regen on the BMW Mini-E when I was driving it the Regen slowed down the car very quickly and I got use to it pretty quickly. I bet you won't see any where on the brakes at all. The feature I would like to see is a manual override so that if you want to coast with the kinetic energy you can override the regen. Continued....

RocketMaker10000 2 years ago

Jack,

You won't need to do anything to your brakes if you are going with an AC system. The regen will slow the car down on its own big time!!! I have driven the BMW Mini-E and the regen is awesome. The AC Propolusion powercenter is one of the best and is the same unit inside the Tesla. I am President of the NJ Electric Auot Association.

RocketMaker10000 2 years ago

First, the controller/regen in the Tesla and AC Propulsion I am told are NOT the same. This from Tesla. Apparently they started with the AC Propulsion system and then re-engineered it when it did not perform as advertised. They were a little vague on what that means.

Second, many of the MiniE drivers have complained about the regen. We intend to tie it to the brakes, not the accelerator, and make it driver adjustable.

I believe significant brake improvements are necessary for electric.

marionrickard 2 years ago

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