Suzuki Van

Post by **Mark T** » Sun, 29 Mar 2009, 02:49

Finally, after 21 months my little electric van is on the road. Had to replace all the gearbox bearing and add a heat sink to the Curtis but now our EV cruises along happily. We've got the EV grin

Post by **weber** » Sun, 29 Mar 2009, 02:01

Congratulations!

Photos?

Post by **Electrocycle** » Sun, 29 Mar 2009, 02:04

yay for more EVs!

Post by **a4x4kiwi** » Sun, 29 Mar 2009, 02:48

Congratulations. Welcome to the growing club. That is 3 more in Sydney for March!

Post by **antiscab** » Sun, 29 Mar 2009, 09:16

awesome.
perhaps post some pictures of your no running creation?

Matt

Post by **Mark T** » Tue, 31 Mar 2009, 18:21

Here are a couple of pics of my Suzuki van conversion.

15 x 8volt Lead Acid batteries

Drive coupling with gearbox split

On the road at last

Post by **Gow864** » Tue, 31 Mar 2009, 18:29

I love the number plate "Ohm Boy"

Well done.

Post by **EV2Go** » Fri, 10 Apr 2009, 00:07

congrats Mark

Post by **ohmboy** » Sat, 29 Mar 2014, 15:53

It's now 5 years of EV motoring and my Suzuki van has clocked up 300000km, with over 21000km clean green electric power.

As you may know I upgraded the batteries from 15 Lead Acid to 400 Headway Lithium cells in early 2011, then added the final 50 cells a year later.

I've seen other EV owners use mismatched batteries and was expecting problems with the initial charge, but the Batrium BMS balanced the pack overnight without an issue.

The Headway cells perform faultlessly with the only problem being the BMS indicating one cell temp a bit high. Ended up being a loose connection getting hot.

This combination worked well for a couple of years but the Curtis controller needed an upgrade, so in August 2013 I fitted a Soliton Jr.

Power is improved and it's great to have all the added adjustability. A bit quieter than the old Curtis also.

In the past, on long high speed drives, my motor did run fairly hot. I was expecting problems down the track but the following day the Advanced DC motor quit on me, so I upgraded from 8 to 9 inch.

I had to redrill my adaptor plate and make a new mount. Motor weight went from 48 to 68 kg and it only just misses the subframe.

Ohmboy flies now. My next issue is gear change speed. With the bigger armature the old 3 sec is now a 4 sec delay between upshifts. I am considering an auto, but keeping my options open.

Other improvements over the past 5 years include, LED tail lights and front parkers, streamlined mirrors, mag wheels and lowered suspension, heavy duty coil overs and sway bar on the front.

I've been fitting a sound system recently, here is an iPhone controlled head unit I'm trying.

Unfortunately I can't find a head unit where I can play music and show my BMS/controller data simultaneously. The Batrium display, although not essential, is a big part of my EV experience. I may remove the original dash and fit the tablet in front of the driver.

I'll get back to tinkering and keep you posted on progress.

Mark

Post by **Adverse Effects** » Sat, 29 Mar 2014, 18:03

this is just a awesome big boy toy that go's so mush past a toy

well dome mate and fantastic build work

with the gear change carnt you make the controller pulse the regen or engine brake for like 0.25 sec every time you push the clutch in just enough to wash of some of the motor RPM

Post by **woody** » Sat, 05 Apr 2014, 03:12

No clutch

Old ideas I've heard from Mark:
Button on the gearstick which slows the motor by:
1) add an alternator and switch it into a load
2) friction something
New ideas:
Add a flywheel with weights which can be shifted radially - when they are allowed to do that the motor will slow like a figure skater coming out of a spin. Will work really well if your gears are equally spaced.
Not sure how much weight would be required for the motor or how to get the weights back into the center for the next gear change...
(Your ideas here...)

Post by **Johny** » Mon, 07 Apr 2014, 16:10

Go Headway cells!!! You've got 16 more than me Ohmboy.
It seems to me that the cleanest solution would be to put the clutch back in. That way that washing off that motor speed would actually be used in some small way to accelerate the vehicle. The fact that the clutch isn't used for slipping during take off (hopefully) would compensate for the extra wear during gear changes.
A big ask, I know, considering the whole vehicle is working so well as it is.

The other thing is to do as Adverse kind of says and to use the reversing contactor and throttle to momentarily wash off speed. It could be designed to operate under no load so the contactor gets mechanical wear but not electric wear and tear. Put the clutch pedal back in and all it does is operate a switch. Then some little PIC base gizmo controls the "wash-off" based on the switch telling you that the clutch has been pressed. Make it all do nothing if motor RPM is below some preset speed when the switch activates.

Post by **Adverse Effects** » Mon, 07 Apr 2014, 20:47

just a thought around it

small instant button on the gear shift that when pushed it tells the controller to add 5% regen to the motor that should slow it down real fast

you would only use it when changing up gears

after a wile you will be able to get it spot on with practice

[EDIT] thinking about it you also could use it to do a slow slowdown when driving as well and put some power back in to the battery's

Post by **ohmboy** » Mon, 07 Apr 2014, 23:30

I was thinking of using the plug braking feature on the Curtis controller before it expired. The Soliton Jr I'm using now doesn't have regen unfortunately. But I'd prefer to do something like this rather than fit a clutch.

Post by **Johny** » Tue, 08 Apr 2014, 15:24

Adverse Effects wrote:small instant button on the gear shift that when pushed it tells the controller to add 5% regen to the motor that should slow it down real fast

Yeah that'd be the go - except that he hasn't got regen. Regenerative braking doesn't come with your regular series DC motor setup. It can be arranged but is complicated to set up. There are threads on it somewhere on the forum.
This is a touch one. Just about anything you do will NOT help reliability.

Since there is very little power required to slow the motor under no-load I wonder if something simpler could be arranged that left the current motor/controller wiring alone.
For instance - injecting reverse current into the field that simply overrode the series current from the controller and have the controller just tickle up 50 Amps or so into the motor. The reverse filed current could come from a spare cell or a 12AH AGM via a resistor. Only needed for less than a second.
1/ Clutch switch detected (or push button on gearstick)
2/ Reverse current contactor closes (auxiliary contacts could disconnect throttle from controller input)
3/ 50mS (or rated time) after reverse current contactor closes, a defined input is fed to the controller - tickle up motor current. Maybe this could be done at the same time as the contactor - don't know.
4/ Some defined time later (500mS) the reverse current contactor opens and the input switches back to the throttle.
Maybe this could simply all be based on the pushbutton and the driver controls it.

R&D to see if it's feasible. First will this blow up the controller - I don't think so but input from others would be good here.
If it's safe than try this.

Arrange for about 20Amps of reverse field current. (Suitable 12V battery and around 0.6 Ohms of resistance at 100-200W - probably a length of wire will do.)
Big hefty switch to turn the reverse current on and off.

Switch open free run the motor up to 3000RPM.
Throttle off - close the switch - throttle on a little bit.
Open switch.
Did it slow down?

Post by **Johny** » Tue, 08 Apr 2014, 17:04

Just had a thought about my idea above. If the injected field reverse current is insufficient to strongly override the series armature->field current then the motor could easily be damaged. Having the lowest injected field current possible to "do the job" minimizes this issue as the armature current would be too low to cause damage. If the motor current rises even with injected current applied, then it will overcome the injected current and you would have almost normal field current anyway.
So, keep the injected field current (and armature current) just high enough to slow the motor in the time you want.
Motor current should be limited to half the injected field current so it doesn't "undo" the injected current.
No idea if it will work (or how well) anyway

Edit: I have great difficulty typing the word "field" without it coming out "filed".

Post by **Adverse Effects** » Tue, 08 Apr 2014, 19:05

thinking about it if you just shorted the inputs to the motor would that slow the motor?

sorry dont know much about DC motor setups

Post by **Johny** » Tue, 08 Apr 2014, 19:18

Adverse Effects wrote: thinking about it if you just shorted the inputs to the motor would that slow the motor?

sorry dont know much about DC motor setups

I think you can do that under controlled circumstances.
- If there was no power on the motor then shorting the inputs would not have any effect as there is no field current.
- If you cease powering the motor and immediately short it then the collapsing field would power the armature for a short time and cause braking but would depend a lot on the motor. I wouldn't think it would last long enough - but it might.
Big risk if you short the controller output at the wrong time.

Edit: Risk averted if you use say light wire (about one Ohm -fused as well) to short the motor.

Post by **woody** » Tue, 08 Apr 2014, 21:32

Is there a mechanical fix for this? E.g. Thicker gear oil, different synchros?

Post by **Adverse Effects** » Wed, 09 Apr 2014, 00:12

woody wrote: Is there a mechanical fix for this? E.g. Thicker gear oil, different synchros?

no the motor is the problem not the gearbox

the only way to mechanically slow the motor would be some sort of drag system but that would take a lot of modification and and expense

Post by **unheardofinstruments** » Thu, 27 Nov 2014, 00:08

shame you didn't get the motor with the shaft sticking out the other end
hydraulic regen is twice as efficient as electric and very simple using a gear pump/motor and electric/magnetic AC clutch and a reservoir/accumulator and tubing.
perhaps a belt could run off the coupler and go through gaps in the g'box bell??

Post by **EV2Go** » Thu, 27 Nov 2014, 23:57

He's using the Soliton Jr. I sure there would be something in it that could be used to simulate that function without additional expense.

Post by **T1 Terry** » Fri, 28 Nov 2014, 02:58

As far as the auto idea, I have a taxi built 3 sp borg warner in an EA Falcon I'm about to send off to the crusher. It would be strong enough to couple to an electric motor and give yrs of trouble free motoring.
I live just the other side of Wollongong so not far to travel down to get it if you are interested.

T1 Terry

Post by **T1 Terry** » Fri, 28 Nov 2014, 17:50

He is another outside the box idea, a push bike disc brake attached to the coupler and a brake lever on the gear stick. Then it's a simple cable hook up and you have your controlled motor speed reduction for up shifting. Does that sound easier than the other ideas

T1 Terry