Electric Car

Brakes: Positioning the Vacuum Pump

November 11, 2008

This has been sitting around in the garage for some time now begging to be installed. When we rushed to prepare for the EV demo, the brakes weren’t finished – they were hard-pressed to slow down one could say. As most cars have vacuum pumps for power-assisted breaking, it’s a must-have for my car too, [...]

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Battery Management and the Not-So Fat Controller

November 11, 2008

It’s finally arrived after a long, long wait for this thing in which the supplier admitted in a text message to me that he accidentally ‘blew it up’ when trialling it in his Mazda sports car (when I should have had it in my hot little hands by then). Oops, but that’s okay – the [...]

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Hey, What’s the Problem, Jackass? Gas Prices Have Chilled!

November 5, 2008

Funny how some humans have such short term cerebral attributes. Maybe it’s because we’re all so busy worrying about today (nothing new there). Yes the price of gas has gone down and yes the global economic downturn is responsible. Hmmm…, conundrum, which came first; the oily chicken or the oily egg?

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Time To Get The Accessories Sorted and Install Safety Breaker

October 30, 2008

For accessories, a DC to DC converter (such as the Curtis 1410) is used to buck down the 144v (actually higher on peak charge) from the Thunderskys to an isolated 12-14 volt source for accessories such as lights, radios, airhoon, ahem I mean horn etc (which an alternator would otherwise handle in a gas car). [...]

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[Video] Electric Starion at the AEVA Electric Car Show

October 23, 2008

Now Drivable – but early days yet… The Electric Starion is now at a drivable state and we take her for a spin at the annual electric car show in Sydney.

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Engine Battery Layout Update

September 30, 2008

This has been somewhat of an issue as we have to fit in other components. The battery arrangement may now look like this, simply so as to fit the required batteries in the available space….

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Battery Delivery Delay, Rear Battery Tank Construction Progresses

August 15, 2008

They Charged Me for Batteries, So Where Are They? The shipping container has arrived in the country, but apparently (and not surprisingly) other people have similar orders, so distribution across this large ‘continent’ will take a bit of time (the Olympics had already added some delays). When they arrive I’ll add to the next video [...]

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Electric Motor & Gearbox Now Mounted

August 4, 2008

Repositioned Mounts for My EV Motor The following images show the finished mounting location for the motor and gearbox – with the engine bay mounts finally aligned. The mounting supports had to be broken and re-welded for correct positioning. In the side-on image above, you can see the adapter plate aligns perfectly on the gearbox. [...]

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Battery Tank Reinforcement

July 30, 2008

We have commenced assembling the ribbing for the battery tank. Nathan will weld this soon, while I’ll get some more welding training! :-P The clamps came from Super Cheap Auto in Sydney. Very handy!

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Rear Battery Tank Welded

July 23, 2008

Partly Completed Now the welding is partly completed for the battery compartment and positioned under the cut-out as shown below. As you can see, the mounting lip is yet to be done and welded to the hatch area floor. The tank should sit at the same drop-depth as the original gas tank, as shown in [...]

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Tire Well Removed, Ready for Battery Tank

July 21, 2008

Holy Hatch! Gas tank removed at last! Nathan’s now cut out the tire well for the battery compartment. It’s quite large. You can see from the image how the wheel arches affect available space. The beauty with the Starion is that there is a more room to play with for housing batteries, a charger unit [...]

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Manual or Automatic?

July 15, 2008

A conversion can be done for either a manual or automatic transmission though manual is preferred for efficiency reasons (I’ll get to automatic in a moment). In many manual EV conversions, the clutch pedal is removed rendering the car a semi-automatic; due to the high torque characteristics of the motor – I could drive around [...]

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