Afternoon all.

5386 Views 28 Replies 4 Participants Last post by Duncan, Dec 29, 2010

Poohstyx

Discussion Starter · Dec 22, 2010

I've just started looking seriously into this electric vehicle malarky

Been looking for a few years, just waiting for the technology to improve.

Looking at the bits in the garage and thinking about doing some testing,
I've come up with this shortlist:
Rolling trike chassis including Reliant axle - 300kg
10 standard reliant batteries (12v, 9kg, 28AH each) - 90kg
Payload (me) - 125kg

Chassis weight is a guess and can probably be reduced to 200kg
Lights sorted, all LED with HID headlight.
Brakes left as original.

Minimum reqirements:
40mph top speed & range of 50miles - sufficient for to/from work.

Can I just bolt a motor to the diff and wire stuff up?

What motor?

Any comments or hints?

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Duncan

· #2 · Dec 23, 2010

Hi Pooh

What are the standard reliant batteries do you mean normal car batteries? - in which case NO it won't work!
You will get less than 5 discharges to 50% or less before the batteries are totally irredeemably dead

The reliant is the wrong way round - much better with two wheels at the front

300Kg is heavy I expect my four wheeler chassis and suspension to weigh less than that

Read up on some of the other three wheelers on these forums - its well do-able

Qer

· #3 · Dec 23, 2010

Poohstyx said:
Lights sorted, all LED with HID headlight.

Don't bother. Spare that money and invest in better batteries instead.

Poohstyx

Discussion Starter · #4 · Dec 23, 2010 (Edited)

Hi Duncan, thanks for the input.

Yep, hammerhead would be my choice, but I have to work with what I've got.
That, and DVLA effectively banning new hammerheads (unless they've changed the rules back in the last year).
Also, bearing in mind that if this project looks to be viable within my budget, I'll probably get a custom frame made - so the wheel-plan can be changed then.

300kg may be a tad heavy, as I said that was a guesstimate, full running trike with normal Reliant 850 weighs in at 430kg, so basically subtract the weight of the engine, box & fuel tank.
Besides, as to payload, I'm looking at a maximum of me and passenger or me and shopping. What will the max loaded weight of your 4-wheeler be?

So standard car batteries won't work?
So what do I use instead?
Leisure equivalent?
Sure lithiums would be good, but I don't have a few thousand laying around.

PS: Just remembered, 430kg for 'normal' trike includes me, so reduce frame estimate to 150-200kg.

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Woodsmith

· #5 · Dec 23, 2010

Poohstyx said:
Yep, hammerhead would be my choice, but I have to work with what I've got.
That, and DVLA effectively banning new hammerheads (unless they've changed the rules back in the last year).

Have you got a link to that with the DVLA?

I've not heard anything about that myself and I am in the middle of designing a reverse trike.

As to batteries you should either go with lithium or use proper deep cycle lead acid batteries.
Deep cycle will mean being able to use 50% DoD (depth of discharge) for around 300 cycles or there abouts. The internal structure of the cells are stronger and more able to withstand that sort of punishment without failing.
Car starter batteries are designed to do nothing more then deliver a few hundred amps for less then 5-10 seconds and then sit there for the rest of the journey on trickle charge to recover.

Poohstyx

Discussion Starter · #6 · Dec 23, 2010

Assuming the rules are the same for electrics and 'normals'.
A year or two back DVLA redefined trike from 'three wheeled' to 'three wheeled with two at back any one at front'.
They didnt change any of the other definitions to allow for three-wheeled variants.
So the only way to get a hammerhead through SVA was to have the treads on the same axle within 18" of each other, since this tests as a single wheel (like the piaggio MP3).
The other item to rise from this loophole is that if you build a car with both sets of wheels within 18", it would test as a bike

300 series tyres would still have you the width.

So, unless the rules have changed again since then...

Probably easiest to ring you're local DVLA testing station.

As far as the LED HID comment, LED costs £30 or less, HID is leftover from FJ1100 project.

So with the with reduced weight estimate (325kg plus motor and batteries), I guess the ultimate question is what motor/battery combination will drive this at 50mph for an hour?

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Woodsmith

· #7 · Dec 23, 2010

Ahhh, thanks for that, I will have to look into it in more depth before I commit any more time to my project.

I have been working on the draft MSVA booklet which has a section on steering requirements for quadracycles and trike with two car type front steerable wheels.
This is based on Duxuk (a member here) getting his reverse trike, Sparky tested and road legal earlier this year.

If it is the case that they won't register it then I might as well make it a quadracycle but with the weight increase I may as well go for a full car or conversion.

Duncan

· #8 · Dec 23, 2010

Hi Pooh

I am making mine loosely around the "Locost" design and I am aiming on an all up weight of 600 Kg

Here in NZ Subaru parts are widely available (and I had a dead Legacy) so I'm using Subaru mechanicals

I have spent about $1000 so far and I have almost everything except the batteries

50 miles worth of batteries (lithium) will cost
50 miles at 200 whrs/mile = 10Kwhrs -
cheapest lithium I have heard of - 3 Whrs/$(US)
10 Kwhrs = $3,300

I am building mine and hoping the price will drop further before I'm finished the build and have to buy the batteries
(I told the wife $18,000 - she was not amused - so I may be able to spend $4,000 without a divorce)

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Poohstyx

Discussion Starter · #9 · Dec 23, 2010

So it looks like electric power ain't feasible yet when compared to my usual ride.

Reliant robin/rialto.
£300 to buy,
£200 a year for tax, ticket & insurance.
5000 miles per year @ 65mpg.

Your battery cost would run it for over 5 years.
How long do batteries last?

Woodsmith

· #10 · Dec 23, 2010

It's not really a money saving hobby unless you have a lot of ability, spare time and equipment and can get hold of all the parts you need on the cheap.

My tractor runs on a motor that was given to me by a member here and the batteries were ex scrap yard from yet another member.
The controller was one of a pair of new controllers on ebay that were no longer needed by a karting business.

I was also given the tip off for the 11" motor I am playing with for the trike. I had to drive a 500mile round trip for it though.

I also found a 12" motor cheaply but a machinest's 'favour' spoilt it.

I am expecting to spend upwards of £3000 on lithium for the trike.

I have a Toyota MR2 rev2 rolling shell if you want something more 'sporty' looking.

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Poohstyx

Discussion Starter · #11 · Dec 23, 2010

Currently trying to reduce my number of vehicles

Run out of storage space

Woodsmith

· #12 · Dec 24, 2010

Poohstyx said:
Currently trying to reduce my number of vehicles
Run out of storage space

Tell me about it!

I have a Skoda Octavia, the MR2, a large open trailer, a large closed box trailer, a tractor, a tractor chassis, a pile of Land Rover wheels and fork lift wheels, a fork lift axle, two tons of fire wood, five tons of kerbs stones, bricks, cobbles, pacing slabs etc., a 35' scaffold tower and two 12' scaffold towers all cluttering up my drive. Then there is all the stuff in the workshops!

During this year, to make more space, we removed a large pile of granite and sandstone cobbles and paving slabs by using them to lay a driveway underneath everything and then removing the spoil to the tip. I was hoping to do like wise with the concrete kerb stones too but the weather turned against us. Hopefully next year that will get done.

Poohstyx

Discussion Starter · #13 · Dec 24, 2010

Yep, currently got:-

Bikes:
100c Moped.
Vmax (early, unrestricted).
FJ1200 (currently for sale).
FJ1100 (streeetfighter project when I get the bits together & some space to work).

Trikes:
Reliant (daily transport).
Reliant rolling chassis (dead project).
Venture (Vmax without the boost system).

Plus a trailer and 3 spare Reliant engines and boxes.

And that doesn't include all the boxes of bike spares collected over 20+ years

Anyway, looks like this is a non-starter at the current time for my requirements, I'll check back on it in a year or three when hopefully the motor & battery cost will be down to a reasonable level.

I've had another idea for town transport, but I'll start a new thread for that.

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Woodsmith

· #14 · Dec 24, 2010

Are those trikes just conventional Reliants or are they motorbike front ends?

I reckon an electric one of those would be cool.

Poohstyx

Discussion Starter · #15 · Dec 24, 2010 (Edited)

The current Reliant trikes are skeleton frame, bike front-end versions.
There are pics of the dead project on R3W and pics of the current daily driver on Yorkshire trikers

PS:
Registered with BVS, presumably admin will confirm me in the near future

Going by avatar & location, you are Night train on there?

Woodsmith

· #16 · Dec 25, 2010

Yep, that's me. Not easy to miss.

I'm not very active there but I do meet up with, and help, another chap there who is doing a long range Berlingo EV with about £30k of lithium in the back.

Duncan

· #17 · Dec 26, 2010

Hi Pooh,

So it looks like electric power ain't feasible yet when compared to my usual ride.

Reliant robin/rialto.
£300 to buy,
£200 a year for tax, ticket & insurance.
5000 miles per year @ 65mpg.

You have got a loooong wait before anything using new parts is competitive with using old stuff

You will need to wait until EV's are mainstream and then ten-twenty years after that so that the used stuff is on the market - 2040 or thereabout

The cheapest way of doing things is your way with an ancient Reliant Robin!

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Woodsmith

· #18 · Dec 26, 2010

It's the usual thing that the killer cost is the batteries.
Followed by the controller and charging system.

All the rest can be done really low cost.

Woodsmith

· #19 · Dec 26, 2010

Re: http://www.diyelectriccar.com/forums/newreply.php?do=newreply&p=218Afternoon all.

Poohstyx said:
Assuming the rules are the same for electrics and 'normals'.
A year or two back DVLA redefined trike from 'three wheeled' to 'three wheeled with two at back any one at front'.
They didnt change any of the other definitions to allow for three-wheeled variants.
So the only way to get a hammerhead through SVA was to have the treads on the same axle within 18" of each other, since this tests as a single wheel (like the piaggio MP3).
The other item to rise from this loophole is that if you build a car with both sets of wheels within 18", it would test as a bike
300 series tyres would still have you the width.

So, unless the rules have changed again since then...

I have just looked up the latest ammendment to the MSVA and reverse trikes are still accommodated as motor tricycle alongside heavy quadracycles both using car type steering systems with two wheels at the front in so far as the construction is concerned.

You can down load the MSVA inspection manual here alongside the guide and application form. It is a 2.01mb PDF and the steering is mentioned at the top of page 112 section 14/4.

However, in the glossery (and I would have less conviction on this being all encompassing) it does define a Motor Tricycle as having a single front wheel and motorcycle suspension.
This is equally problematic for the Motor Quadracycle too though I would see both of these cases as an omission as the 'heavy' motor tricycle and quadracyle are not mentioned at all.
Page 203 section 29.

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Poohstyx

Discussion Starter · #20 · Dec 26, 2010

Yep, thats the problem.
You can construct it and it can be tested.
But it cannot be road legal since it would not fit into any of the existing classes, and therefore cannot be registered.

I would also see this problem affecting pedal trike conversions that go over the restriction limits.

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