Paul & Sabrina's cheap DIY 144v motor controller

[jpirkola]

Originally Posted by duncan

Hi Guys
I have my Christmas present (controller kit) and I am plucking up the courage to start work.

Don't worry as long as your soldering skills are good, it will go well. I just finished assembling my kit and then learned something after the fact. Paul may have already notified you of this, but better to be safe. Check with him anyway just to be sure.

The heat transfer material you put between the heat spredder bar and the mosfets or diodes has peeloffs on both sides. It's not really apparent (at least it wasn't to me).

It's a fairly easy fix I'm told and it does look that way.

Hope this save you some time.

Jim

[harlequin2]

Originally Posted by duncan

Hi Guys
I have my Christmas present (controller kit) and I am plucking up the courage to start work
(the boss says I have some other work to do first)

As part of the preparation is it a good idea to tin the copper buss bars?

I thought that I had read it somewhere - on the Australian site?
But I can't find the reference

Should I tin?

Yes!
Its a good idea to solder the bus bars to the board as well instead of relying on just the bolt pressure.
I did it by using the big burner on our gas cooktop (when my wife wasn't home!). I coated the pcb area with flux, tinned it with a big old plumbers iron and kept it handy, then heated the bus bars (one at a time) on the gas burner until they were hot enough to melt solder. I then tinned the bus bar and while it was still really hot, squashed it down onto the pcb - I stuck a couple of bolts through the board holes first to ensure the alignment was correct. I then held a fair bit of pressure on the bus bar to keep it flat while it cooled.
The bus bar acted like a big soldering iron and melted the tinning on the pcb, so you just keep it squashed until the solder sets.

[emeded]

I just want to thank Paul and all others that contributed to this thread in building this amazing open source controller. I always wanted to convert one of my older cars into electric, but always was put away with the big motor/controller/charger/battery prices. Now using this open source controller, it is possible to get a motor and controller for less then what we would have to pay for the controller only!
I also have one question. Did anybody try this controller with the Kostov 9" motor? I assume there should not be a problem as this is series wound motor as well. (Could not post the link to the motor, as I do not have enough posts).

Keep up the good work. As soon as I get into building my controller, or at least getting all parts necessary, I will help as much as I can.

Thanks

emeded

[mora]

Originally Posted by emeded

Did anybody try this controller with the Kostov 9" motor? I assume there should not be a problem as this is series wound motor as well. (Could not post the link to the motor, as I do not have enough posts).

Hey, I have 9" Kostov but it is still in its wooden box, hehe. I still need coupler back from the machinist. I also use P&S's controller. Any DC/series Kostov should be fine with this controller. I suppose those will also perform pretty well as most of their motor test data goes over 500A at 144V.

[emeded]

Originally Posted by mora

Hey, I have 9" Kostov but it is still in its wooden box, hehe. I still need coupler back from the machinist. I also use P&S's controller. Any DC/series Kostov should be fine with this controller. I suppose those will also perform pretty well as most of their motor test data goes over 500A at 144V.

Great to know. Thanks. Please post your experiences with the motor/controller setup once you get it going.

Thanks

[emeded]

While I was shopping for the control board parts at Digi-Key web page, I run into two parts that they do not carry anymore.
However they suggest substitution (for one of them), but I wanted to verify with you guys first to see if this is adequate enough to handle what they supposed to. For the second part they do not even offer substitution, so I am not sure what to use here.
Unfortunately, I am unable to post the links, but here are the part numbers and they substitutions. After we verify, I can update the links on the wiki page.

Original Part=Substitution Suggestion
HIN202CP-ND=HIN202CPZ-ND

Following part does not even have substitution suggestion:
P6KE20A-TP

And part STTH2R02QRL will be possibly discontinued, as it contains following warning:
Limited quantity available, not recommended for new design.



Erni

[MPaulHolmes]

Digi-Key - 497-5765-1-ND (Manufacturer - STTH3R02QRL)

Digi-Key - P6KE20ADICT-ND (Manufacturer - P6KE20A-T)

http://www.mouser.com/ProductDetail/...LAGTpxcqmuc%3d

By the way, if anyone has found that their serial communications isn't working, it may be because of using 0.1uF caps with a MAX232 chip. It was just pointed out to me by a friend that I had been misreading the max232 datasheet. The max232 datasheet says 1uF caps are required, whereas you can use 0.1uF caps with the max202. But I had sent 0.1uF caps with a max232. I'll order some 1uF and figure out who to send them to. It should be pretty easy to add them to the top of the board without having to desolder the 0.1uF caps.

[emeded]

By the way, if anyone has found that their serial communications isn't working, it may be because of using 0.1uF caps with a MAX232 chip. It was just pointed out to me by a friend that I had been misreading the max232 datasheet. The max232 datasheet says 1uF caps are required, whereas you can use 0.1uF caps with the max202. But I had sent 0.1uF caps with a max232. I'll order some 1uF and figure out who to send them to. It should be pretty easy to add them to the top of the board without having to desolder the 0.1uF caps.

Thanks Paul!
I will update wiki part list with the new parts.
For the capacitors, are we talking about C2-C19 caps (K104K15X7RF5TH5)?
Do you have a specific part for the substitution?

Thanks

Erni

[emeded]

Ok, I have updated control board part list with the new parts:

RS232 Transceiver
Ultra fast rectifier diode.200V 3A DO-15
Transient Voltage Suppressor, 20V

[Flatmann100]

emeded, I just swapped out my Advance motor for a Mars Electric ME1002 10" and the controller works great with the bigger motor. I spun the tires going out the garage yesterday!