EVRIC - Holden Barina (Swift) Electric Conversion

[euromodder]

Nobody's going to realize what you're driving

[MetroMPG]

Ric - congrats on the milestone!

[evric]

Hi,
It is such a long time since a added to this thread.
It is now 10 years since I started the Holden Barina conversion and the same time since I purchased the Thundersky LiFePO4 90Ah cells.
After I finished the conversion, I calculated that I would have a range of around 80Km (50 Miles) which I never verified, because I never let the battery pack get that low.
Now the cells are showing signs of age and deterioration as is have had the BMS alarm (for low cell voltage) at around 49km (30 miles).
It is very hard to tell which cell is causing the alarm, as the BMS just has a loop through each cell and when one cell goes low the loop is broken and the BMS master give as alarm. As soon as the load is removed the cell quickly recovers and acts like all the rest.

All of the cells still fully charge at about the same rate.

I now have to make the decision of what to do.
I would like to do another car (sports car) but that would cost around $40,000, but I want my wife to be able to drive my next EV.
So I have decided to just replace the cells with some CALB CA100's which just happen to be the same size as the Thundersky 90's...
Then when these have worn out, there should be plenty of used commercial EVs around for me to choose from.
Please note: At the moment, in Australia. the only fully electric cars that you can buy are the TESLAs (not Model 3 yet) and the BMW i3 - That's it.
We have many other types coming in the next 2 or three years.
That's it for my update.
By the way, I still love driving the little Barina EV. It is such fun.

[NeilBlanchard]

Can you upload some current pictures? That would be great! Some of us need pictures to help us learn.

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by evric

only fully electric cars that you can buy are the TESLAs (not Model 3 yet) and the BMW i3

You wouldn’t consider a Volt, I take it? Seems like it would have enough EV range for your typical use.

Congrats on your 10 year milestone!

[evric]

Originally Posted by NeilBlanchard

Can you upload some current pictures? That would be great! Some of us need pictures to help us learn.

Hi Neil,
I will do soon - in the mean time, there are many videos to watch on my website:
EVRIC - Electric Car Conversion

Eric

[evric]

Originally Posted by MetroMPG

You wouldn’t consider a Volt, I take it? Seems like it would have enough EV range for your typical use.

Congrats on your 10 year milestone!

Thanks MetroMPG,
The VOLT is a nice car. This car was only available for a while in the form of the first version. I did have a chance to drive one.
They didn't sell very well in Australia - so they didn't bring the newer, better version into Australia.

Eric