Gav's EV Conversion 12 - Installing the Battery Racks

[wks1978]

Do you power the vacuum pump off the auxilliary battery or the main batteries?

[stugbroon16]

do u not need a cooling fan for the engine bay for the motor??:D

[spokehedz]

Nope. Most electric motors have a small impeller on the shaft to pull air through the motor keeping it cool... well, coolish. External cooling is always handy, but not always required.

[risc19]

Round bastard file. Ha!

[kdkinen]

really recommend you look into the bedini motor, i'm wondering if that could TOTALLY REPLACE many of those batteries

--of course it's an entire new thing to understand :l

but i think it could

[linuxbot3000]

@kdkinen

bedini motors do not generate power, just convert it

[edstar83]

Nice man. 5 stars. I'm gonna start on my car soon. Little nissan micra four door ev!! Hope it turns out half as good as yours!

[Schneebuddy]

I'm Thinking you could use some plastic marine battery boxes.

[rockwizclown]

whats the website u bought everything from?

[FlanneltheNerfer]

0:33 Made me cringe. Cut away from yourself dude.

[rplende]

You guys didn't just guess all this. Where did you find the instructions especially for the electrical side of it?

[cant7think7clearly]

There's a circuit diagram that EV America send with the motor/controller. Without it I'd be stumped.

[rplende]

Thanks Gav! Don't New Zealand or Australia have the right electric motors or was it cheaper to send to the U.S.? You have done a great job but what range do you get out of a single charge.

[daswada9]

@cant7think7what batteries did you use and what is the Ah ?

[faranglaw]

This is by far one of the best Elec.car videos..thinking of doing the same this year with a small Diahatsu mira.what I like a bout this vid. is you kinda learn as you go along...had to laugh at the shifter on the wheel nut in one of the earlier episodes.

there put on really tight (safety issue) the right sized socket and a piece of water pipe for leverage usually does the trick..and you need to put them back on bloody tight.you will need to stand on them..the gardening shears love it, good work

[FredrikMedia]

Love your conversion! I am eager to see your sollution with the battery chargers, if it is as simple as I think after reading on your site it would solve a great big problem for me. :D

And btw, isn't the motor supposet to be a little more protected against water/dirt/etc from under the car? (I live in sweden = dirt and rain all the time, poor cars.)

[cant7think7clearly]

You're right, it's in the rulebook for the motor to be protected from dirt etc here too. I'll build a simple splash guard soon.

Once the batteries are in, I'll build the charging system too. Full steam ahead a the moment. :)

[mrmrlee]

Enjoying your series immensely, Gav. A quick thought if you haven't done so already- you may want to place some sort of beefy rubber matting under/around that pump to deaden the noise, as well as some under all batteries for additional protection against damage.

[ForkenSwiftDotCom]

Gav - love the recharging light on the dashboard.  Nice touch.

[cant7think7clearly]

Hehehe, I like it too. Makes use of the old Low Fuel light.

[randycarter2001]

You're doing a great job. I'm a little concerned about your charger. From the looks of it, you are planning to use a bank of individual chargers. This plan has a drawback that you can not use "opportunity charging" by carrying your charger onboard. Assuming a range of 70 km, if you go to a friend's house 30 km away you wont be able to plug in and top off the batteries to guarantee you'll get home. Even just a couple of hours on charge will make big difference.

[cant7think7clearly]

Hi Randy! I'm going to mount all the chargers in a special box/shelf thing so I can carry it about if I have to for some reason. Having said that, the furthest distance we ever drive is a friends house at exactly 10km away so a lack of range shouldn't be a problem.

[erio6]

Jeez the under hood side of used car looks brand new, Gav you're a mechanics wizzard!

[Squidlover1000]

OK cheers, yes good luck mate.

[cant7think7clearly]

Oh, and the gas tank was liberated along with all the other bits at the "Transfer Station" (the tip).

I'm about to fill out a bank loan form for the batteries... Wish me luck. :)

[cant7think7clearly]

Good question. I used to get the occasional despairing thought that it's too big a project for my skills. I got those thoughts on the first half of the project.

I got through them though by writing a list of things still to be done and just focusing on one task at a time. I flew threw them and now my to-do list is almost completely ticked off.

[Squidlover1000]

Great series Gav. Couple of questions:

Do you still get times when you despair over the project or are you past that now?

And, what happened to the old fuel tank?

Cheers

[evrimv]

Tooooo many bolts at the back. Just 8-10 was enough i think. use a good heatsink and good thermal paste. Be careful applying paste as very thin layer and no air in between. You may consider a manual extra cooling fan for emergency. You will draw so much current. will need at leats 2awg cable between motor and controller. Find a huge welder and apply solder at crimp shoes to avoid slip out due to vibration.

Good job. Keep on. I envy you.

[blastergti]

Amzing! Keep going!! I cant wait untill next vid!!

[en3rgy187]

Thank you for your response Gav. Your day job explains the toner you were using... lol. Well I for one am very impressed by your undertaking here! Looks like you've done a lot of research with all the nik-naks like your heater and such.

For what it's worth, I can't wait for your next video!

Cheers again for your response.

[en3rgy187]

Hi Gav, I love watching your video's, the background music is especially wonderful and fitting.

My question to you is what is your current occupation and what, if any, training have you had that's helped you this far with your EV conversion?

Thank you for taking the time to answer my quesiton(s). Cheers!

[cant7think7clearly]

Hi There! By night I'm an EV converter but by day I'm a DSL/Telephone technician. It's a messy double life.

Oddly enough the years of training I did many moons ago hasn't been a heck of a lot of use with the EV. I wish they taught EV science in school, maybe then my marks wouldn't have been so low. :)

[GharedGhared]

Great! I'm really enjoying this process.

BTW, why are there rear ventilation fans?

[cant7think7clearly]

Ahh, part of the NZ rules. I need an extraction system to be operating when charging the rear batteries. It must also keep extracting for at least 3 mins after charging (hence the turbo timer).

[GharedGhared]

Probably a good idea as batteries can emit fumes while being charged?

[IQchallenged]

To reduce long term battery costs the a123 batteries (dewalt 36v) batteries would be the way to go as they have over 2000x recharge cycles (think some quote over 4000x) but initial purchase costs is high. I use them on my electric bicycle.

[gdoggod]

they did this on monster garage, the batteries cost US$70k but they were altairnano batteries

[tooomp]

I was sent this link from another YTer. Has anyone had any experience with the company?

world wide webb lionev dot com

[swissmoumout]

If you want lithium batteries, have a look on evforum dot net, there's a bulk order being organized. The more we order, the more discount (up to 40%)

[sasqoc]

Good to see you back. Nice progres. What type of battery did you order? Lead-acid, Nimh, li-ion? As i see in videos you friend is helping you a lot. Can he speak?:) Let him talk too;)

[cant7think7clearly]

Haha! I'll get Rob to narrate an episode!

I'm using 12 med-sized lead acid batts.

[tooomp]

Really cool!

I was wondering at this point in the project have you any second thoughts about the model you chose.

Also, I will be interested in knowing how you feel about your battery balance choices, once the car is finished and you have it on the road. Thanks again for this.

GO EV!!!

[coquivagabundo]

Hi Gav nice project.

just curious. how much weight did U removed from the engine bay and how much are you putting in?

anything higher than OEM is going to overstress the suspension and the steering system. just a thought. try to keep the weighy evenly distributed if possible.

cheers

[coreymon77]

great!

[cant7think7clearly]

Thanks folks! It took a while but the racks are in at last. I'm working on the last motor mount this week and installing the control-box and controller too.

The completion ETA is February but at this rate I'll be test driving by Christmas!

[jmoyet]

i was wondering how you were going to charge it.

the big question is how long is the range per charge is going to be once the car is ready for the road.

[ImYourLastResort]

Nice going! Great to see another video. :) Enjoying them as always.

On an aside : I remember in high school metalwork a lot of us having a good giggle at being given the proper name of "bastard file" for the tool we were using. heheh

[RoadRunnerLaser]

From what I remember, a bastard file is one with a cutting face consisting of teeth which are neither fine nor coarse.

Are you using your low-fuel light as the recharging light ? It's coming along well... Soon, we'll see you waving at the fuel-stations as you drive by.

[ripmeup]

A sheet metal sheild would be a added bonus of protection for the batteries. Great vid once again.

[beko105]

Its looking great cant wait until it is on the road. :-)

[leofurleigh]

Good to see you back here.