February 2016 – Electric Vehicle Conversion

Batteries… Get the LEAF!

Posted on February 24, 2016

Now that I’ve come up with the truck idea I’ve gone back to the drawing board about the batteries. This is coming together so fast that I will be driving an EV by summer. I need batteries… fast and cheap. Went back to my support group and asked. Why not a leaf? There are lots of wrecked ones, and they can be had cheap!

Open up Google and here we go. There are a lot of people doing this. Looking at some forums, I stumbled on this: http://media3.ev-tv.me/news031414-1280.mp4 (Leaf portion starts @ 1:24:08). They test the batteries, and show you the good and the bad. Seems like the perfect fit for a daily driver to me! Now to find one.

On to http://www.autobidmaster.com/, type in Nissan Leaf and find one close. Be sure to read the rules here and a few people’s experiences and you’ll be good (although at the point of writing this I have no experience yet!)

Then the gold mine… http://insideevs.com/putting-nissan-leaf-battery-modules-chevrolet-s-10-truck-video/ This guy Jay, lays out everything I need to do to this S10 to get it running on leaf batteries. WOW! I’ll do it slightly differently, but this is a great place to start.

One hiccup is that I doubt the leaf will give me enough range on it’s own. The S10 I have coming is setup to run at 156 Volts. I can get the leave to 128 volts, 144 volts and 160 volts with setting them up in 16 volt packs as Jay does. I’ll have to make some decisions. I’d like to get 100 miles out of the leaf as I’ll need some extra for the AC, but that means I need 60 cells. That’s 1 and 1/3 of a leaf (more than 1). How to sell this one to the wife. My plan of attack currently, is set it up so that I can add the extra 2 16 volt packs, and just start with 1 set of leaf cells. See what I can get for range, and plan from there.

With this, I’ve discovered that I need to be able to access level 2 chargers on the road. Back to the research. I found out that from the Leaf I’m buying I can just take the J1772 connection port and hook it up. The S10 though has a 2008 PFC-30 Charger so it won’t talk to the EVSE… Damn. Alas, I found the AVC2. This little baby tell the EVSE when the car is ready and let the juice flow! Woohoo! Future problem solved! I can get around with a leaf pack, even if I can’t quite get my 85 km day on one charge. Guess I’ll have to stop for coffee that day 🙂

Onwards!

S10? Huh

Posted on February 24, 2016

I’ve been going back and forth with a few different people about my conversion. I’ve been pricing things out and with the US Dollar being so strong (and the Canadian Dollar being so crappy), everything has gone up in price dramatically.

One of the people who has helped me a lot suggested I pick up an old conversion. I could then take the parts and put them into this car. What a great idea! I started looking. I checked into http://www.evtradinpost.com/, http://www.evfinder.com/classifieds.htm and many forums. Through one of those I found an S10 that was converted by someone I trust, and it has everything I need! Only short batteries. Well… It was a bit more than I wanted to spend but after going back and forth we settled on a price. I go and pick it up on Friday March 4th 2016. So excited and so scared. This is coming together.

What I’ve had to sell the wife on is how to do this. I’ve decided that I’ll get the truck and get it working, more to come on the batteries soon, sell my car (which will pay off the truck purchase) and then pay off the batteries with my fuel savings. Good plan. Problem, there is no AC in the truck and I work in a suit. Crap. Guess I’ll be motivated to get the vitara done.

Headliner… So GROSS!!!

Posted on February 20, 2016

The headliner has been a huge battle. I’ve looked at everything online on how to clean these headliners and what not to do. I’ve tried Folex, Borax (and vinegar), and oxy clean. Although the car smells better, it is still stained.

I decided to do exactly what everyone says not to do… use a carpet cleaner. I filled it up as you would to clean a carpet and started soaking the roof in 2 foot square spaces and cleaning it out. They say not to soak it, but I had nothing to lose. If this didn’t work I was going to go and get a new one (at a significant cost and pain). To my shock… it cleaned it… really well. Oddly enough it didn’t do as much damage as the scrubbing with the previously mentioned microfiber clothes and cleaners. After I just threw the dehumidifier back in, and let her go. A few days later… no delamination and it looks and smells night and day better. I’ll need to do it once more to get a couple more stubborn stains, but I feel so much better now. The car is really coming along.

The interior colours now are the next problem. The exterior will be a burnt orange, and black. I’d like to match the colours on the interior, and I’ll keep the light headliner and darker grey carpets. The seats will be black but maybe have a burnt orange highlight. I need to get these seats figured out next before I can start prepping the interiour for paint… Onwards.