Motor Is Going In

Things are picking up! I arrived at the shop on Tuesday to reverse the strapping on one of the battery banks, and found Robert under the car adjusting the placement of the motor. He had brought a very stout A-frame motor hoist from his home shop and was leveling and easing the motor into place.

Here are some views from underneath:

The portion of the shaft that was intended for the pilot bearing has been cut off so the drive shaft splines go all the way to the motor shaft bolt, leaving an inch and a half of splines showing. This places the back of the motor about four inches from the firewall leaving room for the air-conditioning, heating, and vacuum lines to run behind. Robert will fabricate the adapter to mate the driveshaft torque tube with the rear face of the motor to hold the coupler in alignment.

 Robert found the "sweet spot" where everything was level and the motor could be moved fore and aft with a fingertip. He's adding two new crossmembers to support the motor/inverter/charger assembly. We lost the DC/DC Converter due to the length of the assembly, and will have to find another home for it.

With the forward crossmember tack welded in place, work began on the motor mounts.

The man is artist in metal!

Meanwhile, I pulled all the connectors from the passenger side bank of batteries to flip it end to end so the terminals face the inside. While I had the strapping off, I took the opportunity to raise the voltage on the cells affected by the "chain incident" to get them in line with the other cells.

I may need to do this couple more times, but it's closer now.