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Tr-Amp: 1990 Geo Tracker Conversion

65K views 117 replies 10 participants last post by  Yukon_Shane 
#1 ·
PeterH's Geo Tracker build threat has inspired me to final start one of my own.

First off it's worth noting that, when it comes to completing (or nearly completing) this conversion, I've found this group to be an invaluable resource. Without the assistance of the folks here there's no way I would have been able to get as far as I have.

I guess it's about time I stopped "lurking" around the forum and started contributing some of the things I've learned so far:)

Any comments or suggested improvements are truelly welcome.


Shane
 
#2 ·
So here she is, the 1990 Geo Tracker. I think this vehicle is an excellent candidate for conversion, it's light weight, easy to find parts for, lots of room for batteries and a strong suspension to carry alot of batteries.

This particular car was left at my home by a member of my family. He'd towed it up to the Yukon behind his RV during a family visit and the engine died. He was planning to leave it at an auto-reckers when I naively said "hey I could turn that into an electric car!"

Getting a donnor vehicle for free is awesome but I would a honostly suggest that anyone who is seriously considering doing a conversion give some strong consideration to their choice in vehicle beyond it's price tag. It's ALOT of work to convert one of these cars and you want to make sure that you're happy with the choice you make.
 

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#3 ·
Here's the obligatory empty engine compartment shot.

The tracker is a great candidate for conversion except for one thing...the 4 wheel drive (4wd).

Most of these cars came with 4wd and the 4wd components are: very heavy, prone to break, and (in my opinion) unnecessary.

After getting the transmission out of the car (picture attached) I took one look at the size of it and decided that I was going to ditch the 4wd, replace the transmission and drop as much of the 4wd weight as I could.

I estimate I was able to drop a good 100-200 lbs by replacing the transmission and ditching the front drive components.
 

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#4 ·
I decided to go with a clutchless setup. I'm still not 100% sure that that was the right choice, there are excellent arguments for and against. In the end it just seemed like the simpliest approach for my first conversion.

I found an excellent supplier in EVCoupler to supply me with the coupler and adapter plate. They had me send them down the original clutch as well as a template of the transmission bellhousing and measurements which they then used to produce the coupler and plate.

Unfortunately the coupler arrived a bit worse for ware (it's a long way fron Kentucky to the Yukon) and the adapter plate dimensions were off by a bit (probably my measurements).

EVCoupler made it right at no cost to me though. They're a great company and I'd recommend working with them to anyone.
 

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#5 ·
The Warp 9 motor that I purchased from Michael Golub (University of Alaska Fairbanks EV conversion guru) just barely fit infront of the steering linkage withe new transmission mounted in the original location.

Rather then shoe-horn it in we decided to raise the motor and transmission up above the steering linkage and move the whol setup forward a few inches. This results in the actual shifter being a bit more foward in the cab then I'd like but I think it'll be okay and I can always rig up a new shifter later if it really bothers me.

We mounted the motor at the front with a solid plate of steel that was then mounted to the frame. We also fabricated a simple mounting plateform off of the engine mounting that will hold the controller, etc.

It's probably a bit more rubust then is necessary but I think it looks pretty good.

Because the "new" transmission doesn't have that monster transfer case anymore we had to improvise a new mount for the transmission. It turned out a small peice of square tubing worked pretty well.
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#6 ·
After a fair amount of messing around I managed to get the electric vacuum pump kit to work properly.These kits (like alot of EV components) have pretty poor documentation and the set-up was a bit confusing.

In hindsight it seems fairly simple but I've seen a few posts on this topic with folks that had similiar problems to myself so just incase there are any "vacuum directionally challenged" people like myself out there the key to success is to ensure that the vacuum sensor is between brake booster and the one way valve.

If you have a brake reservoir (like I do) you may have a one way valve in the reservoir already in which case you can throw away the one that comes in the kit (putting it in will only cause you more problems).

Intuitively I couldn't see why it would matter where the vacuum sensor went until I realized the the vacumm pump didn't actually hold vacuum...I get caught up on the strangest things sometimes.
 

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#7 ·
For a controller I decided to go with the Evnetics Soliton Jr. For my budget and the performance I wanted to get from this vehicle I think that the Soliton Jr. is an excellent choice.

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At the time it was a tough decision for me between the Jr. and the Synkromotive controller. I still think that the Synkromotive looks like an excellent controller but I think that the Soliton was the right choice for me. I like the continous power rating, high voltage and water cooling options of the soliton product.

It's great that there is starting to be a bit of competition in this space. It's funny to think that when I first started contemplating an EV build the only real controller options were Curtis and Logysistems:eek:.

For the controller I've installed a basic computer cooling system that looks like it'll work well. I've also installed a netgain speed sensor so that the Soliton can feed me my motor RPM data.

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At this point I'm a bit stalled out until I recieve my batteries. I've ordered 50 Thundersky 100AH cells from CanEV that should arrive within a few weeks.

If I'm lucky I'll finish this build just in time to go for a test drive on a brisk Yukon winter day:rolleyes:
 

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#8 · (Edited)
Hi Shane!

Glad to see your build thread here. I could use some encouragement today! :)

The details of your build have rasied a few questions:

1. Where are you going to place all those 50 batteries? I went with slightly larger 160 Ah batteries and only 45 of them and fitting them all in is going to be a challenge.

I see in your photos that you have a nice big area over the motor. I thought that is where you were going to put some batteries till I saw the Soliton Jr. I'm waiting to decide where to put my cells until the motor is in place. So far, I've looked at putting 12 where the gas tank was, and another 20 beneath the driver's and passenger seat, by cutting thru the floor and putting 7 outside the frame and 3 inside the frame, both boxes starting at the point where the flat part of the floor starts behind the seats. I'm afriad I may have to give up the back seat and put some more batteries there.

2. How much did you have to raise the motor to clear the sterring linkage? I think you are right about being able to raise it a bit without causing problems. At least I sure hope so because I'll likely have to do the same.

Thought I was going to find out if my Kostov would fit tonight but the adapter that came today from Can EV isn't the right one. :-( The adapter fit the Kostov just fine, but it isn't even close to fitting the transmission even tho I bought their "Geo" adapter which is listed as fitting our donor vehicle.

3. Are you planning to heat your batteries?

4. Are you planning to heat the cabin? I'm betting you are... so I'm hoping you'll share your decisions for heat. I'll need to heat mine for sure.

5. What type of charger are you going to use? I haven't picked one yet... cause I think that the moment I do, someone will start selling a better and cheaper one!

Now aren't you glad you posted your build thread... I sure am! :)

Thanks,
Pete
 
#9 ·
Hey Pete,

It's nice to have another tracker build in the group!

I'm planning on putting all of my batteries behind the front seats. The 50, 100 AH cells should fit nicely in a box not much bigger then the trunk/back seat area. I'll be sacrificing the back seat but I don't see any way around that. The real quest for me is do I try and recess some of the batteries into the area where the fuel tank was? This blog shows a Lead-Acid conversion which did just that with some success. http://got-ev.blogspot.com/ You can see that he managed to get the back row of Lead Acids almost level with the floor but the second row had to be elevated to avoid hitting the rear differential. I could follow this example and probably get 20-25 cells recessed below the floor but then what do you do with the rest of them? I'm not sure it's worth the work but I might try it anyway just for fun. I'm going to wait for my cells to arrive before I decide. Let us know what arrangment you come up with and how it works for you.

The choice of battery capacity was a tough one for me. The 160 AH batteries will give you much better range and higher current but they are a bit harder to fit into small spaces and with my budget I would have had to go with a much lower voltage. In some ways it also kind of depends on what controller you're going to use. Once I decided on the Soliton Jr. I knew that I could go up to 340V with my battery pack so if I used a smaller capacity battery cell (like the 100AH) and found it wasn't enough I could always just add more cells later and increase the pack voltage/energy. If, on the other hand, you're controller is only good to 150V then you're better off choosing a higher capacity cell and lower voltage to start off with because you won't be able to easily increase your pack size later. Just one of the many choices I've made that I'm not 100% sure of...

I think I ended up raising the motor around 2 inches to clear the steering components. Like I said, it wasn't difficult to do but did leave me with the shifter in a bit of an awkward spot. I'm convinced I'll be able to fabricate my own shifter later that will work well but that may be more work then I realize.

I honestly think that the adapter plate and coupler is the most troublesome part of these conversions. The company that built my adapter plate insists on you supplying a drawn template because they've had so many problems with the same model of car having different bell housings. Even with the template the adapter plate depth was way off and the adapter plate had to be changed to fit my application. I think if I did this again I might consider working with a local machine shop to build the adapter plate. Atleast that way they can see what is required rather then relying on pictures and emails.

I'm not planning to heat my batteries directly, atleast not initially. I think that there is alot of merrit in heating the bateries; however, I'm thinking that if I ensuring that the cab is warm enough for me to drive the vehicle that might be good enough to keep the batteries warm enough to perform well. I also noted some data collected by Tesseract that showed that the internal resistance of these cells was very high when they are cold which say that they will kind of act as there own heaters as soon as you start running amps through them. That being said I'm speaking from a place of significant ignorance on this topic and expect to observe the performance of the cells very closely and adapt my approach accordingly.

I am definately planning to heat the cab, unfortunately I haven't made any decisions on that yet. I was hoping to have the conversion completed early this spring and have the the summer and fall to figure that out but of course my timelines have slipped. I'm leaning towards installing a ceramic heater into the block heater (fairly common approach); however, I'm not completely sold on that idea. It would certainly be alot easier to just tie in a water heater into the existing block heater and I think that propane heaters have some merit as well.

I'm also wondering if anyone has ever tried to use the waste heat from the motor to heat the cab. I know that Dimitri tied his controller cooler into his block heater to add some heat but the efficiency of the controller was such that there was very little heat to be had. The motor on the other hand is probably only 80-90% efficient and produces a bit of heat which a person might be able to tie into their air intake and use for some mild defrosting. Just an idea I'm toying with, I'll be sure to post what my final decision is and how it works.

Charger decision is another tough one. There are, what appear to be, some very good chargers available but they're really expensive. If you have the money I think you can't go wrong with the Manzinita. I, unfortunatley, do not have that kind of budget for this project and decided to go with the Elcon 2000+ charger. By all accounts Elcon appears to be a pretty good quality brand of charger that comes at a very reasonable price tag. The challenge with this (and other less expensive chargers) is to make sure that you know exactly what you're charger settings are before you order it because they have to be set at the factory. The Elcon has some user variability (10 pre-set voltages) but it really is key that you know what you want when you order it. EVTV did a nice little segment on these chargers last week (october 7th episode I believe) that you can check-out on Utube if you're interested. That show bores the pants off me but if you can stay awake there is often some good information convied.

Sorry for the long response, I hope it's helpful. I look forward to watching your progress.

Shane
 
#10 ·
Hi Shane,

Thanks for the great response to my questions! :)

Adapter... yeah... I'm about to box up and ship back the adapter I ordered from CanEV. It doesn't fit my transmission at all. Randy at CanEV understood the issue and suggest a refund. I'm thinking that I have an odd transmission because this is a factory 2WD instead of a 4WD. I'm going to look around for a local shop to work with. I agree, the adapter is a major pain.

Battery placement, I'm leaning towards giving up that back seat area also. At least till everything else is all working well and it is time to start revisions or improvements.

Charger... I will probably go with the Elcon also... haven't really investigated the subjuct but I like the idea of being able to adjust the charge parameters without having to go back to the factory... so maybe I'll save up for the Manzinita (sp?).

Heating. I like the idea of a small tank of water to provide heat for the cabin and the batteries if that proves necessary. Another local EV junkie has done something like that in his rig. I'll certainly share any information or plans I come up with when I get to that point.

I'm holding off on doing anything more on this project till I get this adapter situation resolved. Of course, that is top priority at the moment.

Thanks,
Peter
 
#11 ·
The charger is a tough call. I would have really liked to be able to adjust my parameters in the field; particularly as the thinking around charging seems to continue to evolve.

If you're either electronically inclined (or brave) you may also want to check-out this Open Source charger concept http://www.diyelectriccar.com/forums/showthread.php/10kw-60a-diy-charger-open-source-59210.html

I think that you may even be able to purchase a completed charger from emotorwerks for a reasonable price. something to think about...
 
#12 ·
Hi Shane,

I'm dragging my feet on the charger issue... hoping that by the time December rolls around and my batteries show up, there has been some movement in the charger world.

If not, I'll go with the Elcon and just suffer with a charger I can't reprogram.

Meanwhile, question: When you de-iced your rig, did you remove the Tracker's computer? I was working on removing all of the dashboard and everything behind it last night and it suddenly occurred to me to wonder if we need the computer for anything. I'm hoping not in a vehicle this old... I haven't pulled it yet, but I didn't take much care in cutting wiring from the old ICE either. :confused:

I'm removing all the old Air Conditioning plumbing from behind the dash and cleaning everything else up. Of course all that foam gasket material between the various air handling components is all long dry-rotted away so I'll have to come up with a replacement.

I am amazed by all the crap I found behind the dash and in the heater core and circulating fan area. You'd think the factory would design a better intake from the outside. Must have dumped 2 pounds of leaves and other junk from the various components in the dash! :)

Feels good to have some cleaning to do while I wait for a new adapter plate. Can't just sit on my hands for the next few weeks!

Pete
 
#13 ·
Hey Peter,

I didn't pull out the computer but I really don't think it would matter. Like you I wasn't terrible careful when pulling out wires and I haven't had any problems with any of the electronics that I wanted to keep. I think that the computer in this vintage of tracker is probably primarily emissions related so that the vehicle would comply with federal emissions rules. If I remember corrrectly it was around 1990 that all vehicles had to have an OBDII compatible computer that would allow the user to plug in and look at basic emissions equipment information (o2 sensors errors, etc.). That being said I'm no expert in this area and wasn't bold enough to remove the computer completely:).

On the dirty car front you'll get little sympathy from me. My tracker spent the last 5 years of it's life being draged behind an RV from one end of Canada to the other. I've found enough dust and sand I can probably make dent in reclaiming the tar sands:p.
 
#14 ·
Hi Shane,

I'm sitting in my hotel in Riyadh reading threads and spending money on ebay for parts. Told the wife to expect lots of packages while I'm away. :) Just ordered a J1772 receptical and control board for my build.

Question: What are you doing for an emergency disconnect on your build?

I'm hoping to find something that is enclosed and electrically activated to disconnect the main pack if needed in an emergency... or, if I need to disconnect for maintenance.

Any word on your batteries?

Thanks,
Pete
 
#15 ·
Hey Pete,

Batteries arrived yesterday! I'm super excited to break into them this weekend; I'll post some pictures later this week. The 100 AH are alot smaller/lighter then I thought they'd be, I'd measured the pack size out a few times but I guess I hadn't really given much though to how small each individual battery would be.

Emergency disconnect: I wasn't sure how best to approach this so I asked Randy at CanEV what they typically do/suggest. He supplied me with a high amp/volt breaker and what essentially looks like a choke cable with an emergency shutoff switch attached to one end. I'll drill a hole in the breaker switch arm, run the choke cable through it and mount the emergency switch in the cab were it's easy to reach in the case of an emergency. I think this approach is fairly commonly used, it allows you to physically disconnect the current from the battery pack without you having to put your hands anywhere near the high voltage circuit.

The breaker won't replace the use of a class T fuse (a definate necessarity) but it does allow you to diconnect the pack for maintenance and in the case of emergency, etc.

There are certainly more elaborate approaches including this device http://rechargecar.com/product/ev-ez-safe-disconnect

I think alot of folks also run a low voltages disconnect switch that essentially just disconnects the 12V power to the controller. This approach doesn't make alot of sense to me seeing as it's essentially the same as just turning your ignition off. That being said, in an emergency it'd be better to have a red button to push rather then trying to remember to turn off your ignition. With the evnetics controllers you can also achieve a similiar result by just pressing on the brake which (assuming you've tied into the brake light circuit) will cut current through the controller.

I hope that's helpful. I'll post some pictures once I get my disconnect installed and let you know how it's working.
 
#16 ·
Hi Shane!

What is the word on your batteries?? Your last post said they'd been delivered so I'm been watching and hoping for an update. :)

I've had to cancel my order for 160 Ah HiPower cells and I'm going with 130 CALBs. the CALBs might be delivered before the holidays but the HiPower weren't going to even be shipped till Feburary.

Thanks,
Pete
 
#17 ·
They arrived! sorry for the lack of updates, a combination of cold weather and a busy schedule has kept me from working on the project much over the past few weeks.

I ordered from CanEV which was a positive experience. Randy at CanEV was very good at communicating with me via email and letting me know when there were delays in the shipment, when they'd arrived at his business, and when to expect them at my door. That being said, I think if I was in the U.S. I would probably have ordered through CALIBPower and saved the wait times. The batteries arrived with all the hardware required (bolts, washers, connectors, etc.) and were very well packaged in two crates and strapped in groups of 5 as per my request.

I've started the process of top balancing the pack by putting all the cells in parrallel and using a small 3.7V, 10 amp charger from Chennic. Unfortunately I realized after connecting half the pack that I wouldn't have enough stock connectors to finish the job because they'd only sent me enough connectors to facilitate a series connection of the pack which is half the number needed to connect them all in parrellel. So I've been stripping out sections of 10 gauge wire to finish connecting the rest of the pack so that I can start the charging process.

Assuming the pack was shipped at half charge my little Chennic charger should take around 250 hours to charge the entire pack so just over 10 days! Actually now that I think of it, because the charger is just a simple constant voltage charger, the current will taper off over time so it'll probably take even longer....

Sounds like a long time but I can't think of a better way to safely charge 50 100aH cells in parrallel safely. Plus I'm not really in a hurry, I still have to figure out the battery box, BMS and state of charge metering. This little charger will ensure that the pack never goes over 3.7 volts, well below the 4 V limit of these thundersky cells so I think it's a good, low cost approach to top balancing these cells.

I should be finished with my wire stripping tomorrow and start the charging process so I'll post some pictures of the process.

On a more exciting note (battery charging isn't very exciting) I think I'm finally starting to get my head around the design of a reasonably priced fluid cab heater. Still in the conceptual stages but I'll post more soon.


Shane
 
#18 ·
Hi Shane,

How are you making out with the batteries?

I got my set of 45 CALB 130s a week before Christmas. They are still in the crates but I'm just about to mount the battery boxes. So I'm trying to decide how to keep them at a reasonable temperature.

Thanks,
Peter H.
 
#19 ·
Hi Peter,

I've been following your build, looks like your making great progress.

My build is getting close to complete now. It took me a couple of weeks to complete the initial top balance of the back with the little Chennic charger I bought (not sure I'd do it that way again). I put all the cells in parrell and just left the little 3.6 V, 4amp charger on it until the voltage of the pack came up to around 3.5 V and the charger was down to less then 1 amp. At that point I decided it was close enough.

Since then I've just been working on the battery box which should be done this weekend. I've sacrificed the back seat so the box location won't be too difficult but I'm really interested in seeing how you make out with your battery location(s) as I think your design will be much more practicle from a day to day perspective.

Received my miniBMS system this week as well so that's ready to go. The only major component I'm missing is the "fuel gauge" and other monitoring. I'm hoping to get this component from EMotorWerks who are working on a comprehensive monitoring design that I think will work well. Unfortunately it seems to be taking a bit of tiem for this product to be completed so I might have to go with something a bit simplier for now.

I'm still struggling with the cab heating design plan. I think I'm back to using a fluid/tank heater rather then the ceramic heater option. I've ordered a "Kat's" tank fluid heater from amazon so we'll see what that looks like when it arrives.

As for battery heating; my battery box is going to have a sheet metal base so I think I'll just mount a simple AC pad heater to the bottom of that sheet metal for now and see how well that works. It should heat the batteries evenly enough and I don't expect alot of heat will be require.

I'll post some pictures after the box is completed this weekend.
 
#20 ·
Hi Shane,

I'm having trouble with selecting a BMS at this time also. I was going with the centralized version of the MiniBMS until my local vendor told me he spoke with the engineers who designed it. They suggested I look at the Orion BMS because they have been having thermal problems with their centralized version.

The Orion BMS is more expensive but offers a lot more options. I think that includes keeping track of amp hours. I need to go back and re-read and maybe send them an email with more specific questions. If so, that eliminates the need to purchase a seperate component for counting amp hours as my "fuel gauge".

My local vendor has designed his own tiny tank heater for heating the cab. It went into a build and had a few problems so I think he is working on version 2.0 at the moment. I'll probably give version 2.0 a try because version 1.0 worked well, but lacked a few safety features that it needed. I'm waiting to hear from him on this subject.

Looking forward to your pictures... I'll update my build with some more pictures after I finish with the last two boxes and put them all in place. Not going to permanently mount them until I determine a good solution to the battery warming issue which is nearing the top of my priority list. :)

Thanks,
Pete
 
#21 ·
Hi Shane,

I'm having trouble with selecting a BMS at this time also. I was going with the centralized version of the MiniBMS until my local vendor told me he spoke with the engineers who designed it. They suggested I look at the Orion BMS because they have been having thermal problems with their centralized version.

The Orion BMS is more expensive but offers a lot more options. I think that includes keeping track of amp hours. I need to go back and re-read and maybe send them an email with more specific questions. If so, that eliminates the need to purchase a seperate component for counting amp hours as my "fuel gauge".
The designer of the MiniBMS system (Dimitri) posts on this forum quite a bit so you may want to ask him directly about the centralized option. I've exchanged a few emails with him and he's always responded quickly and been very helpful.

The fuel gauge incorporated into the BMS would be a nice feature for sure. I find it a bit frustrating having to seak out solutions for every component of the conversion, the more integration these systems have the better they are in my opinion. The fact that the Soliton has integrated contactors is one of the main reasons I like it so much. Now if we could just get them to fit a fuse, charger, and dc/dc into that controller box we'd be set:p.

I'm interested in the eMotorWerks Display because it promises to allow me to adjust my Soliton Jr. settings as well as monitor: battery temp, motor/batter amps, and motor/battery voltage. More then a person really needs but I like the idea of collecting this data.
 
#22 ·
Time for a small update and some new pictures I guess. As I mentioned previously I managed to do an initial top balance using a small Chennic charger. It took about 2 weeks and to be honest I'm not entirely sure the back is completely charged (sitting at around 3.35 V) but I think it's close enough to say that the pack is relatively well balance at the top and the mini-BMS should be able to take care of the rest.

Here's a quick picture of my top balance setup
 

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#23 ·
This weekend I manged to finish the battery box and get it installed in the car with the batteries. The fit is pretty good but there's still a bit of wiggle room for the cells in the middle of the back. I haven't used any strapping yet but I'm starting to wonder if it wouldn't be a good idea. I'm going to put see if I can't shim the sides and tighten things up a bit. My guess is that once the batteries are all strapped together there really won't be any movement anyway but that might be a poor assumption.
 

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#24 ·
I've decided to move away from the ceramic heater approach and back to the fluid heater. The ceramic heater design makes alot of sense to me but after monkeying around with two ceramic heaters for a month I'm just not confident in my ability to safely install these under the dash of my car.

For $40 I got his 120V, 2000 amp fluid heater from Amazon.com. At my pack voltage of 160V nominal I'm predicting this heater should put out approximately 3.5 kW which should be plenty. I'll run the fluid through the stock block heater unit using a small 12 volt solar hot water heater which is switch on with the heating element.


The temperature switch on this fluid heater appears to be a simply snap switch which I'm told (by the experts on this board) will likely not servive at DC pack voltage but should be fine at lower 12V dc so I'll wire the switch through the low voltage contactor line. That way if the heater exceed rated temperature it'll shut the heater off through the contactor rather then directly through the switch.

I have to say I'm suprised at how simple, cheap and easy to work with these little heaters are. just one bolt gave me access to the temperature switch and the connections to the heating element. I was originally concerned that the heater might fry at my pack voltage but taking the heater apart tells me that there really isn't much to fry. About the only thing I can think of is that the element would get too hot in which case the temperature switch would shut the system down. Let me know if I'm missing something here.

Can anyone think of a reason why running a 120V heater coil on 160V DC would be a bad idea?
 

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#27 ·
Can anyone think of a reason why running a 120V heater coil on 160V DC would be a bad idea?
I have done this with my 154v nominal systems and it work well.
With proper circulating pump, the element will never become too hot because it will be continuously cooled from water comming from the cabin radiator.
 
#25 ·
Nice progress Shane,

I've been fighting with my battery boxes and the support frame for about 2 weeks now. Think I have it under control for the time being. My troubles make me wish I'd have just given up that rear area for one big box like you did!

I loaded my Tracker up the other day with all the batteries and it only sat down on the springs an additional 3/4s of an inch. Was really glad to see that. My boxes sick down about 3.25 inches below the frame rails so I've got to watch my clearance once I get it out of the garage.

Have you tested your suspension with a full load of batteries?

What do you think should be the resting voltage on a fully charged cell?

I forget what type you bought and I'm still waiting for my charger to show up. My high voltage shut off point will be 3.6 volts/cell. Guess I thought that would be close to the resting voltage until you mentioned this...

Thanks,
Pete
 
#29 ·
Hey Pete,

I've been following your batter box challenges. I'm sure it's a bit frustrating but will likely be really rewarding when you get it figured out. My design is simplier but I think in the end you'll be alot happier not having a battery box in your back seat. I'm already starting to plan an upgrade that would involve finding a bettery location for these cells.

I've got all the cells sitting in the car now and it really doesn't seem to sag at all. I didn't take measurements but there appears to be plenty of travel left in there rear suspension and the car is sitting with a nice level stance.

My understaind is that these LiFePO4 cells have a resting voltage of 3.4 V when they are completely full and I think alot of people choose to stop them at a resting voltage below that (I think 3.35 is common). My cells are Winston 100ah cells which have a bit higher maximimum finishing voltage then the Calb's (don't ask me why) of around 3.8V but I'll be stoping mine at 3.6V average (pack voltage of 180V) and the mini-BMS will shut the charger off if any one cell hits 3.8V.

What I understand about these cells is that they tend to rest closer to 3.2-3.3 volts after either a charge or discharge. For example, if they are running low you might see them dip down to 2.5 volts while you're accelerating but as soon as you take your foot off the gas they'll go back to 3.2V. Similiarly after you charge them up to 3.6 they'll work their way back down to 3.3V.

Don't take these numbers as gospel though, I'm strictly going on what I recall from other posts.
 
#26 ·
About running those 110 VAC heater elements with 160 VDC. I don't think it will be a problem. In fact, I think that is exactly what is being done with a heater I bought, that will be delivered Saturday, from my local EV parts vender.

I would just make sure the entire thing is properly fused. I think it might also be a good idea to have a Winter/Summer switch to take the heater and pump out of the circuit IF you are going to try controlling the heater with the normal cabin fan switch and a relay.

I'll be doing that because in the summer I might want to run the fan without turning the heater.

I was going to use my soon-to-be-delivered cabin heater to also heat my battery boxes. But it seems that introduces a lot of other issues. So for the moment, I'm going to warm my battery boxes with a block heater just like you purchased from Amazon. Might even order one today! :)

I'll just have it plugged in while my EV is in my unheated garage to keep the batteries warm. Figure that while I'm driving, they will remain warm enough until I get home, or to another source of 110 AC.

Of course, experience will determine how reliable using a block heater to warm batteries will be. I keep being told that an electrical resistance heater approach will fail within just a few days...

Thanks,
Pete
 
#30 ·
I'm finding heating (both battery and cab) to be the most challenging part of this build.

At this point there seems to be very little consensus as to how warm the batteries should be kept or how best to warm them so it'll be a trial and error design for me. Through my day job I've been involve in a bit of research using Vaccuum Insulated Panels (VIP's) for building insulation and I'm thinking I might like to try something like this to insulate the battery box. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vacuum_insulated_panel . The panels we've been using are about 1/4 inch thick and R25 so they seem ideal for something like an automotive application were you don't have alot of space to install insulation.

Unfortunately if you start putting this much insulation in the box you have to start worrying about the batteries overheating which may actually be more of a longterm problem then if they're kept cold. You very quickly start to see a battery box design that's more complicated then the drive system (temperature controlled fans, heaters, ventilation, removable insulation, ....)

There's a poster here, DIYguy, who has put together what looks like a pretty good design for cold conditions http://www.diyelectriccar.com/forums/showthread.php?t=54878 . It'll be interesting to see how this design is holding up and if he's made any revision to the initial design after operating through a few seasons.
 
#32 ·
Tracker Guys (and anyone else): What is supposed to hold the two parts of the engine mount together? That is, what attaches the rubber to the metal part with the screw sticking out shown in the photo? Is it just friction, so the mounts have to have pressure on them at the right angle, or is it cleverer than that - is this just broken? What's the function of the circled tube on the transmission? It would seem to be just a vent, but it's so long since we took this thing apart we've forgotten whether there was ever anything attached to that (plus it probably had a 1/2" of grime on it when we first took it out - there was no silver showing on the transmission, anywhere). The bucket, that is just about the same size as the motor fits (it seems to even clear the front diff - that's good since this is my son's car and he wants 4WD). The motor fits to the transmission (and we can turn the motor by hand and watch the drive shafts move, so it's not binding). Now "all" we have to do is get it together. We do have a slightly easier time with batteries since we have only 33 100Ah cells. We figure ~22 in the back and the remaining 11 ??. Thanks,
 

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#33 ·
Hi there,

Shane, hope you don't mind me responding on your thread to this...:)

I'll throw in my thoughts... I'm about 90% done with my Tracker build... those darn battery boxes took up about 50% of the effort so far.

That rubber hose coming out of the top of the transmission... as far as I can tell, it is as useful as my appendix. I just cleaned it up and ignored it. I don't think I found anything about it in the shop manual I have for my 1991 Tracker.

Those motor mounts you show are broken. Mine were in the very same shape when I pulled the ICE. I bought replacements from an online source and used them to attach my 11 inch kostov to the vehicle. Of course I had to build my own attachment ring for the kostov.

I'm guessing you've visited my build thread also and have seen where I stashed all 45 of my 130 Ah CALB cells. Do you have a thread started on these forums?

Hope this helps...

Peter H.
 
#34 ·
Shane, hope you don't mind me responding on your thread to this...:)
Do you have a thread started on these forums?
I probably should start a thread, I don't want to hijack Shane's but since it's Tracker/Sidekick related, hopefully it'll add useful information in a spot where others will find it.

I'll throw in my thoughts... I'm about 90% done with my Tracker build... those darn battery boxes took up about 50% of the effort so far.
This conversions been going on for a while (to put it mildly!). We originally had some Lead Acids. We put those in a classic Subaru 600 "Electravan". We bought them used and ran that for a while, but now we have small Lithium packs for both. (Both still sitting around uninstalled...). LA would have been a real pain to install in the Sidekick.

The town is ~ 8miles edge to edge and the next significant town is 40+ miles away, so any range greater than round-town (so say 30 miles or so) and less than 100 is more or less wasted. So I'm hoping packing the smaller pack will be less trouble.

Those motor mounts you show are broken. Mine were in the very same shape when I pulled the ICE. I bought replacements from an online source and used them to attach my 11 inch kostov to the vehicle. Of course I had to build my own attachment ring for the kostov.
Makes me wonder what new mounts would add. The benefit is the rubber, everything else about them is a disadvantage.

I could line a motor mount ring with similar rubber (at similar angles?) and then just use the existing brackets on the frame as solid mounts. The trick would be to get the same cushioning, but I can't see how that would be too hard (or to critical). Probably a question for the larger group - someone will have experience with that.

I'm guessing you've visited my build thread also and have seen where I stashed all 45 of my 130 Ah CALB cells.
Sure, like this one, it's a very cool build. Of course, that the Tracker/Sidekick is itself and interesting vehicle and a good conversion candidate helps.
 
#35 ·
Sorry for not responding sooner; I haven't been posting as much as I'd like lately.

No worries about posting these questions here, I think it's totally relevant to the discussion of converting a Tracker and seeing as the three of us seem to be the only one's doing so we should stick together:).

Unfortunately I can't help you with the motor mount questions. Like Peter, I found that the front of the motor was running into the steering arm so I raised the motor up above the steering components, moved the whole drivetrain forward and built a custom mount on the front of the motor and mounted to the front crossmember.

The front of the motor is essentially rigid mounted now; however, the bolts run parrellel to the bumper so the motor can still move up and down freely if it has to. I'm not explaining this very well so I'll try and find a good picture.

Like Peter I'm not 100% finished yet and my car hasn't seen much road time (I took it around the block a few times last week but that's it) so I can't say with confidence that this approach is the best but it seems to be working well so far.
 

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#37 ·
Unfortunately I can't help you with the motor mount questions. [...]. I'm not explaining this very well so I'll try and find a good picture.
If I can see correctly in the picture, you didn't use the old engine mount points at all.

Like Peter I'm not 100% finished yet and my car hasn't seen much road time (I took it around the block a few times last week but that's it) so I can't say with confidence that this approach is the best but it seems to be working well so far.
Around the block is still pretty good. Of course, as with any project, the first 90% of the project takes the first 90% of the time and the final 10% takes the second 90% of the time.
 
#36 ·
Hey, I'm just glad to hear you got it out and around the block a few times! Congrats!! :)

I'm hoping to have a charger in my hands tomorrow evening which will fuel a major build push over the weekend. I suspect I'm still a month away from even backing it out of the garage!

Pete
 
#38 ·
It was pretty awesome. My first lap I had the controller set to 100 battery Amps max which was fairly slugish but once I cranked it up to 300 amps it was everything I'd hopped for as far as performance goes. I true test will be running it up a couple of the big heals around here.

I still have to: get the EMotorWerks Display up and running so that I can actual monitor what's going on with the battery pack; arrange a better hold down set-up for the batteries: and of course the heating system...I guess it never ends.

I can't wait to do more testing but my 6 week old little girl is taking up the bulk of my free time these days so it may be awhile. :rolleyes:
 
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