Adventures in EV Land

I've consolidated this project blog with my evTD and eBugeye pages so there is one point of reference for all of the family EV's, including the commercial ones, from now on. The old pages will stay for reference, but new activity for everything will be posted to:

Adventures in EV Land

Thanks for your interest!

Berthing Arrangements

Now that the new Leaf has come home, it was pretty clear the time had come to rearrange the garage for best utilization. The Porsche EV project is nearing the phase-out stage where it doesn't need a full side of the garage any more. A threatening weather forecast with the possibility of two inch hail pushed the garage to the top of the priority list.

There had to be a way to get all three EVs in this one space and I tried more than a few things that were either unworkable or marginally dangerous until this bit of out-of-box thinking struck. What says the cars must park straight? If the evTD is angled into the nook at the front of the garage, the Porsche and Leaf can be slightly splayed to the outside and Voila! Room to spare!

Of course there needed to be some serious rearranging of the crud that tends to accumulate in a garage just so you can do things like open the door after you park. After three EV conversion projects there are scraps and odds and ends that need to be either stored away or pitched, likewise with a twenty year accumulation of Flute teaching material (mostly untouched for the last ten years) and antique computer projects. That's on the todo list for another day, but right now I'm pleased to see the three safely under cover.

All three are within easy reach of the charging station and there's walk space in between the cars, so I can get to the workbench and outside trash bins without rearranging the fleet. This has me thinking of fresh paint and garage decorations, maybe even that cool flecked epoxy floor finish. So when the day comes to sell the homestead, we can legitimately advertise the three car garage.

Seriously, This is Getting Old

Yes, another fried contactor, this time the rear mid-pack unit. It's clear that there is something fundamentally wrong with the precharge setup, and I've changed the circuit scheme three times and still welding contactors shut. One thing that hasn't changed is the precharge resistor. Even though it's been replaced once, the 500 ohm 100 watt unit I've been using may be mis-sized for my 400 volt pack. I still have the precharge resistor and relay that came with the battery pack, and surely it must be a match. Only problem is that I welded those contactors on my first precharge mishap. 

Fortunately, the Panasonic contactors used in the Better Place pack can be found from time to time on eBay, and I picked up a couple from a Canadian seller at a very reasonable price. I like the packaging on the Better Place contactor/precharge module and since I designed the mount for it in the first place, it went back on pretty easily.

 I took the opportunity to ground the shielding on the inverter cables and revise the wiring to the time-delay control relay. This setup certainly looks cleaner than the former one, and all of the terminals and connections are safely contained inside the plastic housing.

We'll test this in the neighborhood for a bit before we go too far afield, but I'm hopeful that this will solve the precharge challenges. There is lots more I want to do, but this needs to be stable and reliable before moving on.

Tidying Up a Bit

I like to keep things neat and organized, but to a certain extent, things got out of hand with this build. For one thing, it's rather more complex than the last two projects with Siemens AC power and the supporting DMOC inverter and GEVCU controller. The electric air conditioning compressor and its plumbing are a challenge yet to be addressed. The OEM charger and DC/DC converter also have their own controllers, leading to an upcoming consolidation project. Then there is the spaghetti monster in the wiring box.

To disguise that mess, a cover was constructed with 1/4" plywood skin over a 5/8" marine plywood core that was clearanced to allow for the height of the wiring bundles coming from the harness. A little black spray paint makes it disappear, and it's secured with a velcro strap. Not only does it clean up the appearance, it also protects the wiring and terminal blocks from accidental shorts. The GEVCU has been relocated  to the top of the DMOC, held in place by two inch wide industrial strength velcro. I had to unplug the connector to add a terminating resistor, and simply didn't have enough room or leverage to plug it back in where it was previously installed on the back of the DMOC. There's a surprising amount of hood clearance, so it works well and certainly is more accessible.

Here's the view from the other side:

I'm not entirely happy with the GEVCU cable, but it's a dark color and could be worse. 

On the other side, I plan to enclose the contactor and precharge circuits as well now that I think I have that sorted out. With Spring in the air here in Texas, I think it will be time soon to have the air conditioning system charged and get that working before the summer heat sets in.

More Precharge Challenges

The precharge circuitry on the Porsche has been a challenge since day one. I'm appreciating more and more the well integrated design of the Soliton1 controller in my evTD. I never had to even think about precharge on that because it was built in. Sorry they've left the EV scene.

You may recall that the first time I powered up the Porsche, I fried the contactors. Then I did it again. Third time is the charm, you say? Well, after 200+ miles I came close to another wholesale contactor replacement. This time, after a jaunt up the MOPAC (that's a highway here in Austin, so named because it parallels the Missouri Pacific railway line), I parked it and came back a few minutes later to run an errand, turned the key to see only 6 volts register for the pack! That just can't be, so I spot checked some battery cells - all fine - then  pulled the contactors yet again to find they worked ok after cycling them a time or two, but the precharge resistor was dead - no reading on the multimeter in the ohm setting. So once again, even though it was in the circuit, no precharge was taking place. The contactors likely would have welded closed if I had put them through one more startup sequence.

I had wired the precharge resistor using this diagram from the GEVCU manual:

So my guess is that I either had a defective resistor, or it didn't like being in the circuit full time. After receiving a replacement resistor, I reworked the arrangement adding the yellow high voltage precharge relay to energize the resistor only on precharge and keep it out of play at all other times.

After a quick spin around the block, things seem to be back to normal. We'll give it a more extended test run tomorrow.

Baby Needs New Shoes

Checking out from Pro Automotive after the drive shaft repair, Keith noted that the rear tires were showing sidewall cracks and he sure would hate to see a blowout and the trail of sparks when the battery boxes drag the car to a halt. As usual, Keith is right, so we paid a visit to the tire store over the weekend for new shoes. Turns out all four tires were the same age (2009 vintage) and the fronts would be showing signs of dry rot soon enough, so I had all four replaced.

The replacements are the same model 195/65 r15 Falken tires that came off. That size seems to be a bit odd and not available from every manufacturer, also  sadly unavailable in low rolling resistance tires. Due diligence on Google turns up that Falken, although it sounds vaguely Scandinavian, is the performance brand for Sumitomo Tire company, and pretty well rated on the review sites. I don't know how many miles may have been on the old set, but they showed very little wear for seven year old tires.

I was pleased with the way Discount Tire handled the whole affair. They let me drive the car into the service bay so I wouldn't have to explain the startup process. They used hand tools for removal and installation rather than pneumatic impact guns, then hand torqued the lugs. They wire brushed the studs and wheel mount areas and even asked where I wanted the balance tape mounted.

It's probably psychological, but the car seems even smoother, so between the new drive shaft and new shoes, we're making progress toward a more civilized ride.

Getting the (half) Shaft

Happy New Year!

I haven't updated this blog for a while, been waiting for resolution on a mechanical issue that reared its ugly head just before Christmas.

The Porsche had been running GREAT! I had put two hundred miles on it and was using it as my daily driver, running errands around town and buzzing down the highway for appointments downtown. Bit by bit, we were fixing some of the rattles and clunks that always seem to go along with a custom build. As my confidence grew, I figured the time was right to get the wife on board and share the EV grin with her. We drove it out to meet a friend for dinner at our local Applebee's, enjoying the time together and the conversation. As we left the restaurant and turned onto the frontage road, it sounded like a coffee can full of rocks and there was no power going to the rear wheels. The trip home was on the back of a flatbed wrecker with the wife having one of those "I told you so" looks on her face. The tow truck deposited the Porsche in my garage (these guys are good!) and there it sat until the Christmas and New Years activities subsided, all the decorations were put away, and all the leftovers consumed.

I was fearing the worst, as I tend to do, thinking the likely culprit was the weld on the motor to driveshaft coupler. Finally last week I pulled the inspection plate off the top of the coupler housing (no small feat) and was relieved to see that the coupler looked perfect. That was a huge happiness because I really didn't want to disconnect everything and pull the motor out and then re-engineer the coupler. So the next line of thought and a good bit of Googling led to the suspicion that the driveshaft to transaxle coupler may have worked loose or stripped its splines. That was only slightly less distasteful in that the transaxle would have to be pulled to make that replacement.


This morning I had the car towed over to Pro Automotive to have the experts put it on the lift and work their magic. Bob just called and told me the right hand axle shaft had failed. I'm delighted! Not only can the motor and transaxle stay where they are, it's really a pretty straightforward repair.

We've ordered a replacement that is a bit pricey, but is an OEM quality German manufactured part as opposed to the "remanufactured" ones that I had sourced when we did the conversion. In this case I fear that "remanufactured" is an industry term for "cleaned the gunk off a used one and sprayed on some Rustoleum".

A recurring theme among the community of EV conversion guys is the frequent breakage of something in the driveline after the conversion is complete. You may recall that I had a transaxle graunch in the evTD, and the same sort of thing has happened with alarming frequency to other EV conversions. No drag racing this time, but with the strong regenerative braking on the Porsche, it's no surprise that there's more stress on the driveline than its thirty year old parts can handle.

I'm anxious to get the car back in service and already have some plans for improvement. Stay tuned ...

UPDATE Friday, January 15, 2016

Bob called to let me know the Porsche was done and ready to be picked up. They shipped the part overnight from somewhere in Illinois and Robert had it installed by 10:00am! Probably couldn't have gotten one from a warehouse in Dallas any quicker. The car runs great and feels smoother than before. It's good to have it back on the road.

A Pinch of This, A Dash of That

The Porsche's been home for going on three weeks now, and I'm getting accustomed to driving it. It's been a bit disconcerting to be out on the road with no instrumentation, though; no clue about the voltage, current consumption, temperatures, or state of charge. Only the speedometer from the classic gauge panel functioned, and rather poorly at that.

Pretty as the they are, the old gauges need to be replaced with something a bit more in keeping with electrifying nature of the car. I chose an Andromeda EVIC (Electric Vehicle Interface Controller) display that is custom designed for the GEVCU controller at the heart of my electric drive. This single display panel covers all of the useful driver information, save for speed.

The speedometer should be at least generally compatible with the digital nature of the EVIC, so an Intellitronix Digital GPS unit in a complementary blue hue was chosen. This speedo also has performance tracking and will measure 0-60, quarter mile, and top speed, along with a trip and cumulative odometer. Add turn signal, high beam, and precharge indicator lights and we have a full complement of function for the replacement dashboard.

To build the new dashboard, we start with ... a board! A scrap of 1/4" plywood will do nicely. I dug out my trusty 40 year old jig saw, got a new blade for it, and proceeded to ruin two blanks before I got to this point. I did cheat and got a 3 1/4" hole saw for the speedometer. Since the speedo needs a 3 3/8" opening, I also picked up a rotary rasp for my drill. New power tools will always warm my heart.

So here's a trial fit with most of the bits in place:

And here's the final fitting after many coats of flat black from a rattle can:

Yet another terminal board was needed to manage all of the connections. The large black box is the GPS controller for the speedometer. The relay turns on the brake lights under regenerative braking. That was actually the first thing I did on this dashboard project because with the aggressive regen produced by the Siemens motor, you can literally drive with only the power pedal. I don't want drivers behind me crawling up my tailpipe (sorry, no tailpipe) when I stop without signaling. The terminal board was installed under the dash in the space vacated by the gas engine Electronic Control Module.

The unit looks pretty nice when in place, but getting it there was a multi-day effort and wiring everything took hours of laying on my back with my feet in the air and squeezing my hands into very tight places with sharp edges.

All of it was worth the effort, because the effect is really quite stunning.

Now I need to figure out what's up with the Ah reading, but the rest of the info looks like it's accurate. I was a bit concerned about daytime visibility, but it appears to be a non-issue today in bright sunlight, and even is readable with sunglasses on - all good. Took the opportunity to remount the steering wheel in a more straight ahead position so I don't feel like I'm driving crabwise down the road. This has been a satisfying refinement of the car, next item will be to dampen the sound on the power brake vacuum pump.

On the Road Again

Bob called yesterday to let me know the Porsche was ready to be picked up. Pro Automotive had delivered on everything I asked of them and much more!

In front of the shop with my Leaf in the background

Here's the team that made it all possible: on the left are Colton, Bob, and Keith, three generations of a wonderful family business, with Robert on the right. Many thanks, Guys!

Master Craftsman Robert Juarez in front of his creation. Robert did all the fabrication, body, and paint work. He's taken a very personal interest in both of my EV projects and has been a source of great ideas and practical applications.

PorschEV arrives at home after the short jaunt up Highway 620 and down Anderson Mill Road. The car drives great!

The PorschEV takes its place alongside its sister ship, the evTD, both products of the care and craftsmanship of Pro Automotive.









And I can't overlook the role played by Jack Rickard and EVTV. The EVTV Store was the source for nearly all of the major components inside the PorchEV, and it is Jack's vision, persistence, and the programming skills of the team he's assembled that are making OEM quality parts available for custom conversions like the PorschEV.

A project like this is never finished, and there is still much to refine, but this can now be done in small chunks while the car is in service. Not The End ...

Details and More Details

Went over to Pro Automotive this morning to do some under-hood work in preparation for the air conditioner bring-up. Found Robert hard at work on the rubber window channels and waist seals.

The old ones were hardened and brittle to the point they crumbled when they should have flexed. The new rubber is supple and dark and should seal the windows and prevent rattling. A bit of a struggle to install, but Robert figured out how to bend and guide the new parts into the two separate channels in the window frame.

My job this morning was to move the power brake vacuum pump valve out of the way. It was directly over and blocking access to one of the air conditioner fill valves.

Also on today's work list is finishing the high voltage wiring for the electric ac compressor so we can test it after it gets its freon charge.

With the terminal connections done, all that remains is to run some orange accordion loom over the wiring so we're consistent in identifying high voltage cable runs for emergency response personnel. Hope we never need it!

I Love it When a Plan Comes Together

Only one picture today, but it's beyond exciting!

After two years of gathering parts, planning, head scratching, thinking and rethinking, and trial and error, Robert sends me this and says that the hood closed with plenty of clearance.

I can't get over how beautiful the front end looks!

I'm heading over to Pro Automotive tomorrow morning to finish the wiring for the air conditioning compressor. Now I'm anxious to have a look. There are still many details to take care of, but I think by the end of the week we'll be able to declare victory!

Trial Fit

Quick update: One fender and the nose panel are loosely in place, checking for fit.

The paint and finish on the front is gorgeous! The rest of the car looks faded and dusty now, but Robert thinks it should polish out nicely.

Still concerned about hood clearance on the front of the inverter, but the fender line is about an inch higher than the reference point on the inner fender wells, so we could just make it.

Robert has finished the headlamp covers and is working on the nose panel.

You can't see it, but one air conditioner hose is connected to the compressor and the other is out for fabrication and should be here early next week. Things are happening fast now, I'm very pleased with the progress!

Back to the Shop!

You'll recall that there were several contactor casualties from the precharge drama, along with some mysterious memory loss in the charger and DC/DC controllers. First the precharge situation: after frying the second set of contactors, I wired a couple of indicator lights to check the GEVCU precharge function and noted that they BOTH came on momentarily when the system was powered up, then followed the precharge sequence. That momentary inrush of current was all it took to weld the contactors closed. I also noticed during that momentary start-up period that the cooling fan spun just a bit.

At EVCCON, I checked with Collin Kidder who wrote much of the GEVCU code, and he said he had heard of this from several other guys and that it seemed that in the split second it took for the processor to boot up, the mosfets that were supposed to connect to ground under program control, all connected by themselves. Not good.


Nick Smith suggested taking the GEVCU out of the equation by using a time-delay relay to control the precharge sequence. I found this on Amazon that seemed to fill the bill, and picked up two more contactors from the EVTV store. All mounted to a panel, it looks like this:

The contactor on the left closes at startup connecting the negative side of the pack to the inverter. The gold colored precharge resistor then restricts the current flow from the positive side to allow the capacitors to come up to pack voltage at a lower current. The time delay relay closes after roughly five seconds and connects the positive contactor allowing full current flow. An indicator light is wired to the normally closed terminal of the relay so there is a visual cue on the dashboard while the precharge is taking place. All of this works very well and has kept the contactors healthy.

In the controller situation, Jack Rickard had reloaded the flash memory on my DC/DC controller and re-enabled the WiFi function on my GEVCU while we were at EVCCON. I reinstalled the DC/DC when I got home and BLAM! lost the memory again. Jack asked me to return the controller along with the Volt APM. He found that the plug was bad, and built a whole new controller. Thanks Jack - great customer service!


The DC/DC controller came in a new style enclosure that included tabs that made it so much easier to mount.

While all that was going on, I noticed that the charge controller kept losing its settings. So here we have wiped out the flash memory on the DC/DC controller twice, the EEPROM on the charge controller any number of times, and the WiFi function on the GEVCU. What's the common denominator? The USB cable! I broke out a new USB cable, one with gold contacts and perhaps a little better quality, and everything works just fine now. Moral of that story, don't overlook level 1 diagnostics; Is it plugged in? Is the cable good?

Took son Freddy and daughter-in-law Tiffany for a ride around the block and I'm becoming more and more pleased with the way this car drives. I was wrapping up some of the detail work, installing the hood release cable, running wiring for the dashboard, and generally tidying up the motor compartment when Bob called from Pro Automotive to let me know that they had a relatively slow week ahead and this would be a perfect time to get the car in for reassembly of the front bodywork. Called for a flatbed and now the PorschEV is in for finishing.

After a full year of work, this project is coming to completion. There is plenty of tweaking and tuning ahead, but the end is in sight.

The EVCCON that wasn't ... or WAS IT?

After announcing the cancellation of EVCCON 2015, Jack Rickard noted with some bemusement that it just didn't want to be cancelled. He left the door open by offering his shop for an open house to whomever might care to visit, and it looks like pretty much all of us did. I had a hotel room and rental car all lined up, so I figured, "for a couple of days, why not?". And since the Porsche wasn't going to make it, I'd be traveling light anyway. Others like Michael Brown and Nick Smith were in the middle of global tours, coming from Thailand and New Zealand respectively. They were going to be there regardless. Speakers like John Hardy from the UK offered to do their thing anywhere there was a laptop and a projector, so Jack set up the showroom/studio of his shop classroom style and EVCCON 2015 took on a life of its own.

Once again Michael Brown did a superb job of live blogging the proceedings, so I'll direct you to his site again for the synopsis:

Day -1: http://porsche914e.blogspot.com/20…/…/evccon-2015-day-1.html

Day 0: http://porsche914e.blogspot.com/20…/…/evccon-2015-day-0.html

Day 1: http://porsche914e.blogspot.com/…/09/evccon-2015-day-1_30.h…

Day 2: http://porsche914e.blogspot.com/20…/…/evccon-2015-day-2.html

Day 3: http://porsche914e.blogspot.com/20…/…/evccon-2015-day-3.html

Day 4: http://porsche914e.blogspot.com/20…/…/evccon-2015-day-4.html

The session room was comfortably full and the information exchange with speakers and other attendees was more than worth the trip. 

Jack's direction for EVTV is all about making OEM components accessible to DIY guys like me, so that was the focus of the presentations and most of the break time chatter in the shop. A highlight of my last afternoon was the demonstration of a working Tesla drive train.

And there were cars - here's a sample:

All had been to EVCCON before, but it was good to see them again. Most had some detail improvements, and that's what makes these things fun. I'm disappointed that my Porsche wasn't ready in time because it really models the new direction, being fit almost entirely with OEM components. I brought along some problematic components that needed attention, and Jack was more than kind to give me his time to reload software and reconfigure settings. More on that in a future post.

In the previous four years of EVCCONs, the Thursday night barbecue at the Rickard estate had rained out. Not so for the EVCCON That Wasn't. Beautiful autumn weather and a spectacular setting overlooking the Mississippi river were on tap this year.

Many of the EV conversions made the short trip from the EVTV shop, and looked perfectly at home in front of the garage where the early shows were shot.

Of course Jill's Tesla looks right at home, because it is.

On a cool October evening, the fire pit was a welcome gathering spot. I said my farewells after the dinner because I was heading back to Austin in the morning, but EVCCON 2015 continued on without me. I hope we have not seen the last of these events, because all of us work in relative isolation and hunger for the opportunity to hang out with others who share our passion.