Introducing: Silent E! RubeRally pix 2010-04-13!
judebert
familEE
The electric Wagon is "finished"! I've driven her to work two days in a row.
Here's the virtual tour. All these images are 600x400 for low-bandwidth people. You can click them to view 2160x1440 (!) versions, if you're interested.
I couldn't take a picture of the driver's side, because there was a car in the next space. The front was full of landscaping, and I didn't feel like getting in trouble with the tag office.
There are several blemishes that need attention:
This molding looks salvageable. Maybe I can paint it. I had to rip out the 4WD components anyway, so I shouldn't be sporting that decal.
This is annoying. I can't think of a damn thing to do about it, except perhaps bondo. Or a new door and molding.
This clearcoat will probably be treated first. I think I'm going to turn the whole area into a big high-voltage caution sign.
There's another dot of rust I want to take care of, but it won't be so easy to cover up. If I'm lucky, I can do well enough with some touch-up paint.
The paint here has just faded beyond all plausible explanation. I can't imagine touching it up. Maybe I can get a full-body decal or something to cover all those sins.
The bumpers are scuffed on opposite corners. I can't afford new ones, though. I'll probably just ignore this, at least until I've got a bunch of money. (An unlikely occurrence for a man with three daughters!)
The interior is unexceptional: the rear seats are good, including the knobs, but the front seats are pretty much destroyed. I may experiment with reupholstering them if I get some time.
The EV components are mostly complete. I still need to get the tachometer hooked up, which is largely a matter of finding the right wires (I hope). I want to install a rev limiter so I can allow other people to drive it. Then I want to find alternate uses for the fuel and temperature gauges.
I usually start in 2nd, but today I accidentally started in 3rd. I didn't notice any difference. I can go from 0 to 40 without shifting. I tried pacing a BMW as he pulled away from a light, just to see if I was overestimating my acceleration or something. I kept pace with him easily, and at 20 he suddenly fell back. He had to shift!
It's not a race car or anything, but it's more acceleration that I usually use. Plenty for my 6.5-mile each way daily commute.
The only problem is that I need to walk about half a mile from my parking space to my building. I'm thinking of getting an electric skateboard to keep in the trunk. Then I'll just need to learn how to ride an electric skateboard.
Here's the virtual tour. All these images are 600x400 for low-bandwidth people. You can click them to view 2160x1440 (!) versions, if you're interested.
I couldn't take a picture of the driver's side, because there was a car in the next space. The front was full of landscaping, and I didn't feel like getting in trouble with the tag office.
There are several blemishes that need attention:
This molding looks salvageable. Maybe I can paint it. I had to rip out the 4WD components anyway, so I shouldn't be sporting that decal.
This is annoying. I can't think of a damn thing to do about it, except perhaps bondo. Or a new door and molding.
This clearcoat will probably be treated first. I think I'm going to turn the whole area into a big high-voltage caution sign.
There's another dot of rust I want to take care of, but it won't be so easy to cover up. If I'm lucky, I can do well enough with some touch-up paint.
The paint here has just faded beyond all plausible explanation. I can't imagine touching it up. Maybe I can get a full-body decal or something to cover all those sins.
The bumpers are scuffed on opposite corners. I can't afford new ones, though. I'll probably just ignore this, at least until I've got a bunch of money. (An unlikely occurrence for a man with three daughters!)
The interior is unexceptional: the rear seats are good, including the knobs, but the front seats are pretty much destroyed. I may experiment with reupholstering them if I get some time.
The EV components are mostly complete. I still need to get the tachometer hooked up, which is largely a matter of finding the right wires (I hope). I want to install a rev limiter so I can allow other people to drive it. Then I want to find alternate uses for the fuel and temperature gauges.
I usually start in 2nd, but today I accidentally started in 3rd. I didn't notice any difference. I can go from 0 to 40 without shifting. I tried pacing a BMW as he pulled away from a light, just to see if I was overestimating my acceleration or something. I kept pace with him easily, and at 20 he suddenly fell back. He had to shift!
It's not a race car or anything, but it's more acceleration that I usually use. Plenty for my 6.5-mile each way daily commute.
The only problem is that I need to walk about half a mile from my parking space to my building. I'm thinking of getting an electric skateboard to keep in the trunk. Then I'll just need to learn how to ride an electric skateboard.
Comments
You took pics of all the blemishes and put them up, and didn't even put up any pics of the most interesting part! The batteries and 'engine'. :P
If you're embarassed of your wagon, don't be - it rocks!
Edit: like now!
The engine bay. 4 batteries up front, along with all most of the major components and a vacuum pump for the power brakes.
The major electrical components. The long black rectangle on the left is the speed controller; the blue sliver is the motor (better look at that in a second); the silver box on the right is a DC/DC Converter (works like an alternator, converting 120V from the main battery pack to 12V for the accessories).
The motor itself. Jim Husted of Hi Torque Electric painted it blue when he rebuilt it. I like it. I just wish I could afford to paint the car appropriately.
The dashboard. It's pretty much normal, except that the gas gauge always reads "E" and the temp gauge never moves. Oh, and the big round gauge we screwed in on the left. It's an E-Meter, or Link-10. It has a bar to tell me how much of the battery pack is left, and a display that can tell me the main pack voltage, the current, the kWh used, or the time left.
The rear seats are actually in terrific condition. Observant readers and parents will notice the optional child-debris package. I made her clean it up right after I took the picture.
The seats fold up as usual. You'd never even know it was different from a standard Wagon.
Pick up that rug, though, and you can see the battery pack. There are six batteries here, and a big plywood brace further back under the floor metal where two more batteries once resided. I broke two batteries and rearranged them like this. The blue stuff is pool vinyl, to keep any stray battery acid from corroding the box. Since these are AGM batteries, that should never happen, but it's no big deal to protect it anyway.
Here's a top-down view of the rear battery pack. Those electronic boards on top of the batteries keep them from getting overcharged, which would ruin them for sure. The red lights are telling me these batteries have gone low. They'll turn off when the battery is fully recharged.
The hatch is nothing unusual, either. Just some spare parts and other things a Wagonist might need.
But in the space where the spare tire used to go, we mounted the charger. This is a Manzanita Micro PFC-20, a very capable charger. It can charge a single battery or a whole pack. It can pull up to 20A.
This is how I refuel! In the big pictures, you can glimpse the pathetic little "120V 60Hz AC Only" sticker that I added. I really need to replace the "Unleaded" sticker.
That's pretty much it! I suppose I could put it up on jackstands and take some pictures of the wires running underneath the car, or the weird mount we had to make for the half-axle. But that would probably be overkill.
If you have any requests or questions, I'll be happy to address them here.
And yes, those are Saturn rims. I wanted cheap aluminum 15" rims, and I got these from a junkyard for $25 each. One is badly scuffed, and one is out of true. But they're working very well for me. (Opinion based on three days of driving.)
I commend you on your Silent E!!! You did a great job for sure! Now the questions...
How far or how long can you go on a single charge?
How long does it take to fully charge?
And if you don't mind, what was the cost incurred to go electric?
Thanks again for posting these photos!
Definately one of the most interesting out of the ordinary wagons.
More info!!!!
really cool!
i assume from that, he has a transmission.
Yup, the stock 4WD 6-speed manual transmission. And yes, I had to remove the drive shaft (and, in fact, the entire rear drive train) to fit the batteries under the seat. Next time, I think I'll start with a Wagovan! It'll make the rear brake upgrades feasible, so I can put in more/bigger batteries.
There are some direct-drive electric cars, but they use LOTS of current to accelerate. That usually means big wires, big motors, and big heat. I wanted something ultra-reliable, so I stuck to off-the-shelf parts and modest requirements. I'll let the dragsters do the stress testing and use whatever they find to be reliable. :twisted:
The cost: I utilized used parts wherever possible; the entire process including the car was around $7000. My budget was $9K, but it evaporated over the duration of the build.
Range: I haven't quite figured it out yet. In an ideal world, I could get 22 miles before I started damaging my batteries. In this universe, I damaged the batteries. I had to remove two out of the twelve, and I'm not sure how much the remaining batteries will still hold. It's looking like about 14 miles.
I'm only using it as a commuter vehicle and grocery getter, and I live only 6 miles from work. I should probably just bike there, but it's Florida and I want something to keep the rain off. And eventually, air conditioning.
Worse yet, I chose the smaller batteries based on anecdotal evidence. Had I gone with the big ones (Optima D31 Yellow Tops) I could probably get 30 miles or more. But that would require suspension upgrades, and I'm not sure where I'd fit them all (maybe tub out the rear). So I guess I lucked into a good decision for my situation.
My wife thinks there's a new battery pack in my future. And who am I to argue with her? :P If so, I'll probably go for similarly-sized Hawker batteries, which carry a little more lead, and so would extend my range just a little bit. But since I can already get to work, I think I'm going to save the cash.
Recharge: Depends on how big a plug I've got and how empty the batteries are. At home, with my standard 15A plug, I can recharge from the work trip in under 3 hours. At work, with their big 20A plug, I can recharge in 2 hours (ready before lunch, even when I arrive late). I recently drove to a party at a friend's house. His plug was weak, and I tripped his circuit breaker. 4 hours of recharging, including the down time.
I'm still working on it, because when I damaged the batteries, they became severely mis-matched, and some of them get full before others.
It's possible to recharge these batteries in minutes, but you need wires as big as a fire hose! And stuff gets hot, too.
very inovative and very cool!
Yowsa! I haven't even tried that yet. I might be able to lay down some rubber, but I don't think I can make much smoke.
Meanwhile, I've got the crappy cellphone video my wife made during my first-ever run two years ago on YouTube.
I never got to drive it with the original motor, so I can't tell. It's got lots of low-end torque, though; it's surprising when it starts moving, especially if I've got my foot too far down.
But the controller is programmed to ramp speed up, so I can't break the tires loose unless I rev it up and drop the clutch. And I don't want to do that, since I broke my motor last time by revving it too high.
Once I get my rev limiter installed, I'll give it a try.
Working on some rolling videos.
"We haven't got enough power to pass! Everybody pedal faster!"