Paul & Sabrina's Cheap EV Conversion

[MPaulHolmes]

It's so nice having experts ready to answer my every question! I love it!!! ya! I type a question, go outside for 5 minutes, come back in, and BAM! The answer! uh huh, ya, uh huh uh huh ya!

[MPaulHolmes]

dremd, don't tell anyone, but my wife went out and got a Sears card, since she really wants to get the car running. So, the best choice given the gross vehicle weight limits, seems to be twelve 12v 80amp*hr deep cycle batteries from Sears. Plus, they have an 18 month warranty on them. Even better news is the EVDL administrator thought that the batteries would last a little over a year, which is less than 18 months! hahaha! However, I think the EVDL people are a little higher budget and higher power demands than I'm going to use. For example, he said, "well, to run 40 kWatts, ..."

40 kWatts???!!! hahaha, I'm planning on like 5 kWatts normally, by featherfooting it. At least I hope.

[MPaulHolmes]

Wow! I'm actually at my parents' house with the car outside, but I don't have the dang camera. I'm an idiot.

Is it really bad to be like 100 pounds over the Gross Vehicle weight???

[bennelson]

By that, do you mean you drove there with the car under its OWN POWER!?!?!

Aren't you supposed to tell everyone first before the ride and make it really dramatic!?!?

[MPaulHolmes]

Whoooooaa Nellie! It's always parked outside over there. That's where I work on it. I just meant that I wish I had the camera to show the current progress. hehe. But, the front brake parts (ya they were bad too) will be here this week. The back brakes work perfectly. So, if we go get the 12 sears deep cycle batteries this week, then we might get a test run in maybe 1.5 weeks, like by a week from this wednesday, if everything goes perfectly, which it never does.

[bennelson]

I am SO glad you are doing this project right now.

It really helps me keep going to have somebody to "compete" against.

We will have to hold a Rally at some point once both cars are complete! Get the Forkenswift there too!

[MPaulHolmes]

Originally Posted by bennelson

We will have to hold a Rally at some point once both cars are complete! Get the Forkenswift there too!

Oh man, that would be awesome! I have an idea! Let's have a virtual drag race once everything is working. Find a straight stretch of road with no little kids playing in it. Then figure out what about 100 meters is (or whatever distance seems good). Then we floor it, timing our trips. Then, somehow we could put it into a single video where the timer is showing at the top of the screen, and we could be talking smack to each other (even though the other person wouldn't really be there). We'll have to give Darin a REALLY big head start! hahaha!

[MPaulHolmes]

I was doing some reading about Absorbed Glass Mat batteries, and was very impressed. The Sears A.G.M. batteries have a Peukert (vomit) value of 1.09, which is very low. Their internal resistance is VERY small, so there is basically no limit on discharge and recharge rates. They can put out like 2000 amps for 7 seconds. Maintenance free. No liquid to add. Leak proof too. Also, they don't vent Hydrogen (or at least VERY little). They are also immune to freezing damage. They can be recharged in like 20-30 minutes too, if there was such a charger!

After going over the GVW of the car and the weight of various setups using 12 batteries, and after determining that the range would be about 13 or 14 miles at in-town speeds to 50% DoD, with only 6 of the biggest AGM batteries (and they could handle the high discharge rates without a buddy!), we decided to buy 6 of them yesterday. They are 75 pounds each, and our Kia Spectra looks like a low rider.

Also bought a proper throttle, since I don't need it to be 3 wire anymore. Got an extra fuse, and 12 lugs, since the homemade lugs out of copper pipe are maybe OK, but those dang batteries are expensive, and I don't want to screw up any thing.

[metromizer]

I just starting looking at this thread... if you need any help figuring out the VW stuff, ask away. I have boatloads of experience with the old aircooleds

[MPaulHolmes]

What is that little cable in the picture? I broke it. Is that really bad?

Here's also the picture of the batteries. The black battery is for the electrical system, which I know nothing about, by the way. Can everything just be run off of the battery? Lights and everything?