Electric car conversion: Project ForkenSwift

[MetroMPG]

Various People start talking about low riding cars, including...

Originally Posted by SVOboy

When I dropped my CRX 3" I felt like I was the lowest person in the world, loved it. Need to get my shocks in so I can drop back to 2.5 or so.

lowest car i've ever driven was a 944 turbo (not counting a formula 1600 racer - basically a go kart on steroids). and probably nowhere near as low as the cars just mentioned.

the last gen metros are higher than the forkeswift generation ones. i'm sure it's exactly for the reason mentioned: to make you feel safer by getting your line of sight above truck bumper level.

...

what i did this weekend:



above: replace all divots! forklift divots anyway. fixed the driveway where the baker sunk in while parked.



one fish, two fish, red swift, blue swift.

...uhm, metro.

you're looking at $250 worth of suzukiclones sitting on the freshly repaired driveway. 2.3 total liters and 7 cylinders of fury.

picked up the blue one today. its problems:

- worn out ball joint (you have to change the entire control arm ... as luck would have it, my "parts car" has 2 new control arms on it)
- 2 bald tires
- a seeping gas line
- one small hole in the floor (2 in. dia.)
- misc stuff like seized locks, broken window crank, missing radio, etc

the woman bought it for $300 three years ago, and sunk $1500 into it since then. it has a brand new gas tank, radiator, catalytic converter, recent tune up. too bad all those parts are coming out. ah well, maybe they'll sell on teamswift.net.

will be swapping over the 13 inch rims (blue has 12s), hatchback (rust and broken lock on the blue one), and misc other bits and pieces. i like the look of the swift's aero headlights, but i would need to change the hood and bumper if i want to use them. decided not to bother. someone already asked to buy them anyway.

[MetroMPG]

haha. just realized how similar that pic is to the one i took during my brief period of mulitple firefly ownership:



for those who care, the story that goes with that pic: A tale of two Fireflies

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by RH77

This is completely random (as you know I tend to be), but has anyone considered a demolishion derby for vehicles like the Red Swift? Maybe it's the 4-years of living in the middle of nowhere and attending tractor pulls, but I yearn to experience a demo-derby. Big, rear-drive tanks are the norm, but what about a little maneuverable "firefly" with some un-drivable rust to buzz around the course and use the inertia to take out the opponents rad. Yeah, I have strange goals...

RH77

i don't yearn to crash into anything in the red swift! the way it is, it's got the structural rigidity of a wet kleenex box. i brake for flies now when i drive it on my street.

---

did the control arm/ball joint swap today.

also pulled the good ignition switch from the red car (man, that was a stupidly complex job.. but i guess that's kind of the point, so you can't steal them easily). the blue car's ignition switch isn't too secure - you could start it with anything approximately key-shaped.

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by someone

So you are building an electric car and know nothing about electric motors

ow! oh! ouch!

to be fair, i think it would be more accurate to say i know "next to nothing" about electric motors. this is an immersion learning experience.

if you knew what I know you wouldn't even think of getting started.

don't forget our low expectations: 48v; 40 mph (30 would be ok); 10 mile range (hell, 7 would be ok); acceleration best measured with an egg timer; hills to be avoided; shoestring budget (threadbare). basically we will deem this to a grand success when it moves under its own power at above a jogging pace.

thanks for the amp test lesson. i'll get to that once we move to the electric portion of the program.

so far this week i've been playing with the blue car: swapped the bad control arm/ball joint with a good one from the red car; swapped the rusty blue hatchback for the less rusty red one (sorry, the remaining pair of struts are weak and not worth sending); swapped rims; misc minor repairs; and... i've waxed a panel each day. as you can see from this pic, it was extremely weathered.



now it actually reflects stuff (well, some panels do).

my neighbour has christened the cars "superman cars" since they're now a mix of just the right shades of red & blue.

also, i've been pulling parts from the red car that people say they want to buy. i think i might make my money back!

[MetroMPG]

this evening's blue metro tasks: fixed the broken driver's side window lift mechanism & outside door handle; drilled & tapped a new bolt hole for the control arm rear attatchment bracket (i twisted the head off one when doing the swap); waxed 2 more panels.

just about all that's left to do before submitting the car for inspection is check the rear brakes, splice some neoprene into a seeping gas line & patch 2 small holes in the floor. and swap the blackfly's wheels over (blue car's tires are shot).

then it's motorectomy, part II: ICE-out!

[MetroMPG]

had the flu this week, so didn't get much done on the forkenswift project (or any project).

but... as of today i've sold enough stuff from the red swift that we've made our money back on it. (and there's still a perfectly good motor - with decent compression even - that nobody seems to want.) i think it's reasonable to expect that by the time i'm done parting out the unnecessary stuff from both cars, they will be "free" or pretty close.

[MetroMPG]

SVOboy is also good at finding/selling stuff...

Originally Posted by SVOboy

Sweet, that's awesome. I love when that happens for me,

A lot of stuff can be picked up for cheap and with a bit of effort parted for some reasonable money/parts you want.

This project is like, the best thing ever. You'll be the envy of the site pretty soon

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by SVOboy

I'm surprised metro motors even sell. I guess honda motors are so free because there're powerful replacements to them, *shrug*

small town. no craigslist. closest list is for ottawa - 100 km away. but i posted an ad anyway.

and while i was writing up the ad, someone contacted me through teamswift looking for the 1.3 for his sidekick. it's the first bite so far, and he signed up on teamswift just to contact me. so maybe that will work out.

[MetroMPG]

blue car update: leaky fuel line repaired; leaky exhaust patched.

the last thing on the list before taking the car in for inspection is patching up 2 small holes in the floor (but we all know what "very small" turns into when dealing with rust, don't we?).

the red car has been sitting, waiting for its motor-ectomy. we may end up doing both cars at once.

also, my buddy's father has a bush lot about 25 km from here, and we've decided we're going to hold onto the red car rather than scrap it once we've had our way with it - just in case we end up needing more parts... glass, fenders, whatever. so after the motorectomy, we'll pull it out there and park it.

[MetroMPG]

ah, rust.

weekend project #3 (of many)...

pulled up the carpet, got out the grinder, and transformed the 2 small holes in the blue car's floor into a small future welding project.

it's not nearly as bad as the red car's floor though.

i hadn't yet started grinding the red car. those holes (only 2/3 are visible in the pic) would have grown by at least 50% before i got to "good" metal (halfway to the hatchback by then.)

the blue car is very fixable.

driver's side: (click to zoom)



pass side:



despite having not been driven for 6+ months, the carpet underpadding was quite wet when i lifted it. just 1 small hole + always wet underpadding = accelerated & extensive rust.