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Very cool 
This LT is a truck with a tray bed, not an enclosed van, but many are vans and either way it is a commercial vehicle. Tony, I assume that you mean that regulations would be easier to work with for a commercial vehicle, right?Very interesting. A van and a Leaf transplant. That could very well be the only road to a DIY EV for me (regulatory barriers).
I'm interested in the details, but they're clearly not directly from either an LT or the Leaf. The LT doesn't have an independent rear suspension, and the Leaf (aside from not having similar hardware on the wheel end as the VW pieces being used) is much narrower than the LT. The front track of a 2017 Leaf is 1,540 mm (61″), while the LT is 2.085 m (6 ft 10.1 in) wide at the cab and 2.14 m (7 ft 0.3 in) at the flatbed, so the track must be substantial.The driveshafts? Are they a direct fit? Seems unlikely, maybe custom made?
That makes sense. The easiest fit into a third-generation Transporter (T3) might be a small Tesla Model S/X drive unit, because that motor sits behind the axle like the VW engine - the Leaf wouldn't fit with the T3 suspension and structure because it sits ahead of the axle line. The LT has lots of room to work with and the suspension is being completely replaced, but something like a T3 doesn't have that kind of space, and replacing the whole suspension doesn't seem like a good route for easy approval in a highly regulated country.I need a van with an elevator for a wheelchair in the back as my future means of transport.
Electric of course.
Because of strict regulations for the electrical parts I want use components and systems that have been declared road legal as part as a type approval.
Transplanting a drivetrain and the electrical system from a Leaf into an older type van (like a VW up to '91) with an elevator already fitted, seems to be the best option.
In addition to this project, Kevin's project and others have described building halfshafts which fit the drive unit one end and the base vehicle's hubs on the other end.So I'm very interested to see how this conversion goes. For instance the driveshafts. Apparently, they don't pose a big problem for the TS, but I'm very curious how he solved it, since they are clearly not from the donor cars.
Although he hasn't really started the installation yet - it's really just a positioning mock-up... yes, that's the arrangement I was suggesting for a T4.
Interesting thing about the T4, the rear hubs contain the same spline as the Syncro so all I had to do was pull out the blanking plate. It was a bit confusing at first because the ABS ring is not on the shaft but as part of a cup that fits into the hub (pics below). I machined the cup to allow the spline to go through to the hub, thereby keeping the ring.I see that you've switched from the earlier plan of adapting the original LT rear suspension into a deDion, to using a trailing-arm or semi-trailing arm independent suspension (presumably from a T4 Syncro). As long as all of the bits have enough capacity for this heavier truck, this seems like a good plan to me.
The photos are great, but it's a little hard to judge dimensions from them.
I did get the Nissan shafts which I disassembled to give me only the, hard to copy, spline for the Leaf output. I then welded flanges onto it to make adapters that will take a standard VW T4 shaft. It wasn't as difficult as it may seem.So I'm very interested to see how this conversion goes. For instance the driveshafts. Apparently, they don't pose a big problem for the TS, but I'm very curious how he solved it, since they are clearly not from the donor cars.
Good - I've seen some terrible air spring mounting jobs, and it's good to see you doing it properly. Presumably this will place the end plates aligned and approximately parallel at full compression.A little beginning for the air bag supports. The bottom clamp will have a 10deg or so bevel to take some stress out of the rubber.
The best that you can do with a single-arm suspension like this is to have the end plates parallel at one specific height. The best compromise might not put that at the normal ride height, because it is probably more important to avoid damage at the extremes of suspension travel.The bracket can be seen having a different angle to the support. The setup will have a much lesser angle when the weight is on it but it seems there is no way to eliminate it totally.