BACK ON TRACK

With the Thanksgiving weekend here, I was hoping to actually get the instrument cluster back in the car but with traveling to my parents and helping the wife clean the house, just didn't get that far. The instrument cluster has been rewired and assembled though and all that is left is to rewire the power leads inside the car.

METERS ILLUMINATED 

D-SUB CONNECTOR ATTACHED

If I can get a warm evening or weekend, the interior wiring will be able to be completed and the instrument cluster can be installed and once this is completed, there is a little bid of interior work to do then think the focus will turn to eliminating the power headlights. There is an older Buick headlight assembly that will fit into the opening and then a Lexan cover is made to cover the opening and act as the lens. This will give the car a better look and eliminate the power headlight intermittent operation problem. 

Until next time,

Randy 

A DAY IN COURT

Well, not for me but my wife had to testify in a child custody court hearing and wanted me to pick her up as soon as she was finished. Her back still bothers her and she was worried that sitting on hard court benches all day would cause a real bad flair-up. As it turned out, I would not have needed to take the day off work, as the court session was over by eleven and she was home by noon. 

Not to worry, the day did not go wasted as I started early in the morning by taking some scrap metal to Hebron Scrap Metal Recycling, then headed to Lowe's to pick up some plugs and receptacles to make up adapter cords so the Fiero can be charged from  a 220 volt NEMA 14-50 receptacle or a 110 volt standard plug. I ended up making up adapter cords, one with a NEMA 6-20 receptacle and a NEMA 14-50 plug, another with a NEMA 6-20 receptacle and a standard 110 volt plug, and finally, one a 15 ft #10 SO cable with a NEMA 6-20 receptacle and plug. This should pretty much fix me up for charging at an RV park or at anywhere with a standard 110 volt outlet. After the cords were finished, I top charged the battery using 110 volts and it worked fine.

CHARGE ADAPTER CORDS

Last night the center console cover I had made to hide a crack in the console was attached again with contact cement and today was installed back in the car. Also the instrument panel back was installed and the radio and heater control cover plate was bolted back on. The interior looks pretty good now.

INTERIOR BACK TOGETHER

Then my focus turned to cleaning up the motor compartment, rear trunk, and front trunk where the batteries are mounted. After spraying the motor compartment areas that were not close to any electrical connections and painting the exposed areas in the trunk with satin black paint, everything was wiped down with Armor All and the same was done to the front trunk compartment. Overall it turned out pretty good.

REAR TRUNK

MOTOR COMPARTMENT

TRUNK LID

FRONT TRUNK COMPARTMENT

Then the lug nut covers were cleaned and reinstalled on the car, so that pretty much was the extent of the work that was done today. The Fiero EV is ready for it's first car show!

FIERO SIDE VIEW

Fiero Front VIEW

FIERO REAR VIEW

All of the preparation is done but there is still a problem with the ignition switch sticking and takes a little wiggling around to get it to turn. WD40 was sprayed in the key hole and it seems to have freed it up, so I will throw the can in the tool box when I go to the show, just in case it acts up again. Also I have mapped the shortest route to the car show using rural roads most of the way but still have a 50 mile round trip, so I am a bit worried about running out of juice on the way home. I have signed up for Chargepoint but have never tested the J1772 outlet. The adapter cords will allow me to charge at standard outlets, so I am going to go for it!

Thanks for visiting,

Randy

FIRST CHARGE WITH NEW MODULE INSTALLED

Last night when I got home from work and after mowing the lawn, the first charge was applied to the battery modules. The starting voltage was 107.7 and read the same on the front and rear battery module. I used the TCCH  PFC-3000 charger instead of the Zivan NG3 because I had installed an Anderson connector on the battery module and the PFC-3000 charger was set up to just plug into it.

The TCCH charger is set to stop charging at 137 volts but I also have the ABB ac contactor to disconnect the 220 volt ac input when the EPM-5740TB volt meter reaches 137 volts by opening it's auxiliary relay. This morning when I went out to check on the charge, the green light was illuminated on the charger and the meter read 138 volts. The EPM-5740TB reads a three volts low, so the modules were probably only charged to 135 volts. The JLD404 was showing 57 amp hours put into the modules, so that is probably about right.

Later in the afternoon I drove the car to the Marathon and back, probably about 8 miles total and the voltage after sitting for an hour was 129.4 volts with the voltmeter and the EPM-5740TB was reading 132. 2 volts. The amp hour meter was down to 47 amp hours.

Before I charge again, I will set the offset in the EPM-5740TB and will record the actual miles driven on the next drive but for now, am just trying to get a feel for everything. I want to do an interstate drive and find out if there is gong to be enough in the modules to get to work and back.

Until next post,

Randy

BUT WAIT...THERE'S MORE!

This has been a busy weekend, as I am getting ready to paint the bathroom and re-grout the tiles, so I needed to make as much progress as possible on getting the second module connected. July is almost history and EVCCON is only 8 weeks away. It seems like there is so much to do and so little time.

The module connections were installed, then the next project was to drill holes in the deck plate for the cables to be run through. There wasn't much room in front of the module but I was finally able to get into a position to center punch the locations and drill the holes with a hole saw.

BATTERY CONNECTIONS INSTALLED

HOLES DRILLED FOR CABLES

Earlier in the day a trip was made to ACE Hardware to pick up some flexible conduit and Liquid Tight Connectors to run the cable in.

3/4in x 25ft Ultratite Flexible Conduit

3/4 IN LIQUID TIGHT CONNECTOR

So the end to a busy weekend, that started with mowing the lawn on Friday, finishing some touch up painting around the new patio door and purchasing a car on EBAY, then working on the battery module. My work cloths still need dried and hung up but tomorrow back to work, so maybe I can get a little break and rest up a little!

Until next time,

Randy

THE EAGLE (BATTERY MODULE) HAS LANDED

  

LANDING MODULE

Ok, it's not bolted in but after working for the last month to enclose the front trunk and reconfigure the battery module, it is finally sitting on the deck plate! The connectors still need installed, the cable run through the deck plate, and a couple copper bus bars to connect the packs together and run to the new terminals but I feel I am on a roll. A couple of cable glands may need to be ordered but it shouldn't be long until some range testing can be done.

MODULE IN FRONT BAY

Enough for now as I am headed back out the the garage to continue working on connecting the module.

Thanks for stopping by,

Randy

FRONT BATTERY BOX

Over the last few weeks I have been collecting materials to start building the front battery box. Weight is an issue, so aluminum is the material of choice. It would be nice to have somewhere close by to purchase aluminum angle and sheet but as there were no vendors close by, turned to EBAY and ALRO Metals in Columbus, OH. The angle was actually purchased online but after a week, the order was still in review status, so I emailed the Columbus ALRO branch and arranged to pick it up in Columbus.

ALRO STEEL WEBSITE 

ALUMINUM ANGLE

Aluminum sheet was expensive at Alro Steel and only came in larger sheets, so I looked on EBAY and found some aluminum diamond plate from IRONLESS for a decent price and low shipping rate. It was ordered Sunday and was delivered to my door from Wisconsin on Wednesday before noon. Not too bad!

IRONLESS CATALOG

Now all that was needed were some self tapping fasteners to attach the angle to the side of the fender wells. EBAY again came through and I was able to find some 10-24 x 1/2 Torx Pan Head Self Tapping Machine Screw Zinc Coated Steel screws from  FABERSURPLUS.

TORX PANHEAD SCREWS FROM FABERSURPLUS

I was off work Wednesday to take my wife to the doctor, so started attaching the angle iron. The passenger side was open and the angle bolted in nicely. By the angle on this side was mounted and the vacuum pump was removed from the drivers side. 

PASSENGER SIDE ANGLE

The brake lines run down the side of the fender well on driver side, so had to be taken out of their mounting bracket and straitened, so they would run through a notch in the angle. By dark on Thursday, the angle was notched out and was attached on the front side.

DRIVER SIDE ANGLE

I was really excited to get home Friday to continue work on boxing in the front compartment but as Ohio weather would have it, started raining on the way home.

Thanks for visiting,

Randy

EVTV 2015 CATALOG

The Fiero GT EV was submitted to the EVTV Database, just in time to be included it the EVTV 2015 Catalog. Below is the electronic version, and although not quite complete, is a great resource to assist in converting an ICE engine car to magnetic drive.

I NEED A TRACTOR

Over the last several weeks, I have been tearing the garage apart in search of the battery connectors for the third Better Place Module and it finally dawned on me, did I ever remove the connectors from the plastic holder that was used to hold the connectors and the BMS connections on the module. I opened the carrier case that the Better Place Module was shipped in and sure enough, they were still in the plastic holder. I had taken the connectors off of a module when I first disassembled the pack but bottom balanced a different module to put in the rear of the car and used the connectors that were already removed. I am not sure why I thought I had a bag of connectors.

BATTERY CONNECTION HOLDER

BATTERY CONNECTORS

I had a friend once ask me if I wanted to buy a tractor. With a puzzled look, I asked him, why would I need a tractor and he replied; "To pull your head out of your Ass." Guess this isn't the first time I have found myself feeling a little stupid.

Last week the half cells were all drained down to 2.6 volts again and I have been watching the voltage come back up each day since then. This morning, the highest cell was back up to 2.911 so if it stays under 3 volts, I may try to charge each half cell back up to 3 volts. After a charge, the batteries stop drifting up and will drop in voltage if anything.

CURRENT HALF CELL VOLTAGE

The weather has turned cold in Ohio, so my next project will be getting the table in the front of the garage cleared off , broken down and stored out of the way. I really need to get the instrumentation and tablet connections completed, the center console back in and complete the interior. Then I can focus mounting the other two battery modules.

Until next time,

Randy