Dieselboy getting his goal with his heavy SUV!

[TimV]

After driving 440km without the alternator activated. I saw an indicated lower fuel consumption of 10% on the scangauge.

The fuel gauge witch is extremely acurate to my surprise showed an lower fuel consumption of around 4 to 5%.

But for my spare time. I needed to do a round trip (total km = 550km) in less then 6h. (2 stops in that trip to pick up some goodies secondhand). This meant that i needed to drive the speedlimits of 120km/h (75mph) and in some places (around 175km =110miles total) a speedlimit of 130km/h (81mph).

Yesterday i filled the tank up. Because the next day fuel price went up. I did 999km with the tank and filled it up with 61L gives an average off 6,1l/100km.

That is extremely good. Normally this trip with winterdiesel the consuption is somewhere around 6,8l/100km.

This tank i cant do a full tank eather. I need to do that trip of 550km on monday again. Hopefully if i can leave on time. I can drive only 100km/h. I need to make only 1 stop.

Hopefully i can make my trunk reorganase. So it looks cleaner.

[TimV]

Today i did the round trip of 550km, and yes, i was motivated enough to drive only 90 to 100km/h!

What does this mean?

Well, in combination of the alt delete and the long trip.
This is the result, going to a new best tank (I will break the best summer tank record with winter diesel )



Now i have enough capacity to do long trips without the alternator. I should be able to drive an entire week to work without charging.

In the below pic, from left to right: (20HR) 85Ah, 75Ah, 75Ah, 92Ah, 105Ah = total of 432Ah(20hr).
The maximum capacity my charger can handle: 450Ah

The cleaned up trunk (notice the strap over the batterys to nicly hold those in places, just in case...)

[TimV]

Today. I filled up. I broke my best winter tank by far. And was verry close to the best summer tank!

1296km with 69l. There was 3 more liters left before the empty tank warning light would come on.

5,32l/100km or 44.17mpg US.

Best summer tank to date is: 5,21l/100km or 45.14mpg US.
Only a 0.97mpg difference!

[TimV]

This is a pic of the dashboard when i had 1256,7km done.
I had around 100km left of range.



I did a little tweaking to the batterie bank i had in the trunk.
I taped all the poles of the batteries, except for 1+ and 1-.

Maked an mounting harnes (witch is held in place left and right by the with of the wood, and up+down & front+back by the yellow strap that holds the bank in place.



I added a relay between the black negative wire from the bank to the 1000W inverter (from 12V DC to 230V AC).

Then i put the switch from the inverter on "on".
I plugged in this 1500W heater.
Set it at position "1" (=750W)
Position "2" = 1500W
Position "0" = OFF

The red switch at the shifter controlles the (200A) relay.



And by that it controlles an 750W cabin heater
Witch is trapped and held in place between the net and the back seats.



No more cold in the car.
Now I only need to install an remote controlled relay in parallel with that red switch and i can remotely start the heater to preheat the car.

The only down side to this, is that in winter, when i use the heater until the engine is at operating temperature, i need to charge every 2 days, instead of every 4 days (yes, i only work 4 days in a row ).

[TimV]

The results are in for the year 2016. I filled up the last time this year.

I drove 21807km with 1274,2liters. Average of 5,84l/100km.
I did drove this winter with my car to holiday. Something that this car had never done before. So to be fair i take those 2 tanks out of the year average to have a more reliable number to evaluate the cars (and my) progres.

21807km - 1900km = 19907km
1274,2l - 127,56 = 1146,64liters
Gives 5,76l/100km

[teoman]

Awesome. Just read your whole thread.

Would you consider activating the alternator when the brakes a re applied to charge back your battery bank (and even save a bit of your brakes).

[TimV]

The time i brake is so short. It isnt worth all the trouble to get that to work. I only brake to come to a complete stop. And most of the times, the engine isnt running then.

[teoman]

Your alt delete solution is pretty cool. But the electric heater seems a bit wasteful to me.
Seat heaters:
You could try something like this:
Look what I found on AliExpress
High Quality 12V car heated seats /Winter car seat heater car seat heating cushion universal car seat covers-in Automobiles Seat Covers from Automobiles & Motorcycles on Aliexpress.com | Alibaba Group

My car has them built in. Maybe you could use these and dial down your heat.

[TimV]

Thanks. But the coolant heater sit in the return line of the cabin heater. So all the hot coolant is for the engine to speed up warm up time. And not to heat me. I aim good resistant to cold. Nothing a thick jacket cant handle

Edit 1: I still have to go for the shorter belt to not turn the alternator. But i need to find a way to not have to charge 2 separate batteries. Starting batterie and the deepcycles in the trunk.

Edit 2: The 750W heater is no longer in the car. It is in use to heat the bedroom. Females dont like a chill bedroom to sleep in aperently...

[TimV]

Today i finally got to work, in converting a multibelt viscos clutch fan, to manually controlled electic fan.

I was annoyed for a long time to hear the fan kicked in because of the grill blok when the coolant is only half warmed up... And other times when it wasn't nessesary.

So first step, remove engine cover and fan shroud:


Next up, remove the viscos clutch, Didn't had the right locktool for the pully, so i just removed the fins of the clutch
That will do the trick to.


Then remove the front bumper and headlights to gain acces to both sides of the radiator:


Compare size:
I have a second one in the garage, but i don't think i need both.
Lucky me, that i tested the fan before i installed it. The blue wire is positive and the black wire will be ground, otherwise the fan is running in reverse and will not work efficient.


Fan installed and working (on/off controlled with a red switch in the cabin):


Next i reinstalled the fan shroud so it completly looks stock for an untrained eye.
Then installing the bumper and head lights.
Lucky i found my mistake before it was way to late
Can you spot it?


Total hours spend: 5hours
Installation cost would be around 50euro.
But had the fans laying around and all the other material, so real mod cost now, is 0euro.

It should give me a 3-5% gain
1250km x 1,03 = 1287km
1250km x 1,05 = 1312km
Hopefully it will be enough to break the record 1302km tank!