# Honda CR-Z to E-RZ



## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

Hi guys, I am new to this, sorry if this is in the wrong section but I just wanted to get some thoughts.

I'm 17 and have a huge interest in the future of EVs - in fact I intend to dedicate my life to it. I will be hopefully be attending a top university next year to study mechanical/automotive engineering.

Anyway, on to the point - Call me crazy, but I want to follow in the footsteps of Mate Rimac with his E-M3 and JB Straubel with his homemade EV Porsche. I own a Honda CR-Z (for those that don't know it is a parallel hybrid utilising Honda's IMA technology). As cool as the little gimmicky hybrid is, I want more. 

I'm thinking, mini Porsche 918  Keep the IMA system and regen braking, but add electric motor/s to power the rear wheels - and if that works, consider going full EV. A fairly ambitious project and hopefully i'll find some like-minded people in uni that would help me undertake it.

Right now though, I do not have the knowhow at all to do this. I thought i'd start small.
They have recently installed Tesla Superchargers right by my home; I would love to turn my HEV into a PHEV. It may seem pointless because the engine charges the battery but i'd love to be able to use the Superchargers hahaa. Also a larger battery would be pretty helpful because a couple of minutes of 'spirited' driving and you run out of electric assistance.
So, in an ideal world, unplug old battery, plug in a bigger battery that you can charge via a supercharger (as well as with the engine preferably); but I know it is not that simple.

Anyone done this before? Anyone going to call me stupid? I'd love to talk more about it and get the thoughts of those who are more experienced.


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## stealthhack (Aug 18, 2011)

I would prefer making the Hybrid more agressive on the road instead of removing the ICE.
In other words try to add Li-Ion or LiFePo4 small pack instead of NIMH cells in the trunk, and make the motor to take bigger portion of the required power in lower revs.
This car is awesome, don't destroy it, just tune the Hybrid portion of that car!


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

stealthhack said:


> I would prefer making the Hybrid more agressive on the road instead of removing the ICE.
> In other words try to add Li-Ion or LiFePo4 small pack instead of NIMH cells in the trunk, and make the motor to take bigger portion of the required power in lower revs.
> This car is awesome, don't destroy it, just tune the Hybrid portion of that car!


Thank you! I do love it, just wish it was MORE of a hybrid, I mean a 14hp motor is noticeable but not exactly 'aggressive' as you say. 

I believe a later model has a Li-Ion battery but I don't think it made too much of a difference. I'm not sure how much gain you can get from the stock IMA motor :/ 

I'm still adamant that an extra say 100kw of electric power to the rear wheels and the manual transmission is a recipe for a lot of fun. I guess the biggest challenge with that is fabricating a way to mount and connect the motors and also how the stock ecu would 'talk' to the controller of the motors.

Many people are focused on tuning the ICE - I just want to go against that completely haha.

So back to the idea of possible little project of a larger capacity battery - what, if anything, would be compatible and how hard would it be?


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## stealthhack (Aug 18, 2011)

Lloydcr12 said:


> Thank you! I do love it, just wish it was MORE of a hybrid, I mean a 14hp motor is noticeable but not exactly 'aggressive' as you say.
> 
> I believe a later model has a Li-Ion battery but I don't think it made too much of a difference. I'm not sure how much gain you can get from the stock IMA motor :/
> 
> ...


If you want to make a EV car, prepare 5 digit numbers(*$*) in your pocket for >100kW of power, and a lot of reverse engineering on the car.
The option for making CR-Z more responsive is to make the battery Li-ion, for example these cells are about 0,5kg each, you need 36 cells to make the car more responsive for longer periods of time, with lighter battery in the trunk. The biggest problem here will be to lie the ECU with the new battery(internal resistance make electronics go crazy) but not impossible.


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

stealthhack said:


> If you want to make a EV car, prepare 5 digit numbers(*$*) in your pocket for >100kW of power, and a lot of reverse engineering on the car.
> The option for making CR-Z more responsive is to make the battery Li-ion, for example these cells are about 0,5kg each, you need 36 cells to make the car more responsive for longer periods of time, with lighter battery in the trunk. The biggest problem here will be to lie the ECU with the new battery(internal resistance make electronics go crazy) but not impossible.


Guess i'd just look into it more if i were to really consider it. Just had this picture in my head of going to a breakers yard, pulling a a motor or two out of hybrid lexus or something (rx400h, 67hp motor) as well as knicking the battery out of it, getting a good deal, buying an off-the-shelf controller and whacking it all together. 

I look at the 918, new NSX and other performance series/parallel hybrids and think 'how hard can it be to copy that drivetrain'? I forget that these companies have multi-million dollar R&D budgets :/


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## Duncan (Dec 8, 2008)

Hi Lloyd
You can do it!
Assuming that you are willing to lose the back seat I would say that you can do that for a much lower budget (5,000 pounds - ish)

I would be thinking about getting hold of a crashed Nissan Leaf,
Install the motor/trans-axle of the leaf in the back of your Honda
The Leaf battery would have to be disassembled and rebuilt in smaller modules to fit anywhere where there was space 

Issues - 
Getting the Nissan controller to work in it's new home - either keep enough of the Nissan bits so it thinks it's still in the Leaf 
Or replace the control board with a new one
Both of these strategies are used by people on this forum

Integrating it with the Honda
You could keep the two completely separate - they don't need to talk to each other people used to build "Twini" mini's - a mini with an engine at each end 
Leyland even made a twini Moke which they tried to sell as a Jeep to the Canadian Army

Or you could throw away the dino burner and all of it's ancillary junk - exhausts, fuel tanks.....

One problem
Tesla Superchargers are for Tesla's - you may not be able to use them


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

Duncan said:


> Hi Lloyd
> You can do it!
> Assuming that you are willing to lose the back seat I would say that you can do that for a much lower budget (5,000 pounds - ish)


Thank you so much! The more I look into this project the more I want to do it, it excites me so much



Duncan said:


> I would be thinking about getting hold of a crashed Nissan Leaf,
> Install the motor/trans-axle of the leaf in the back of your Honda
> The Leaf battery would have to be disassembled and rebuilt in smaller modules to fit anywhere where there was space


This is what I was thinking, surely I could find motors and a battery from a crashed hybrid or EV and use those. Would be much cheaper than an off-the-shelf motor, controller and battery



Duncan said:


> You could keep the two completely separate - they don't need to talk to each other people used to build "Twini" mini's - a mini with an engine at each end
> Leyland even made a twini Moke which they tried to sell as a Jeep to the Canadian Army


Again, I was just thinking about this, why would them being separate be a problem? I was even thinking about keeping the stock battery too, I don't really want to mess with the stock IMA system and the regen braking unless I could get the regen braking to work with the new battery - is that possible?



Duncan said:


> Tesla Superchargers are for Tesla's - you may not be able to use them


You may be right - looking into it, even some teslas can't use them as supercharging was an optional extra! It says 'free electric vehicle charge point' above them so i just assumed it meant all EVs haha, there are still other public charge points around though right?


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

Duncan said:


> Hi Lloyd
> One problem
> Tesla Superchargers are for Tesla's - you may not be able to use them


Just found out there are non-tesla chargers right next to the tesla ones near me! You just pay as you go - not my tesla dream but it'll do hahaha


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## Duncan (Dec 8, 2008)

_I don't really want to mess with the stock IMA system_ 



Hi Lloyd
That statement worries me a bit - while I think you CAN do the sort of conversion you fancy and for a reasonable sum 

It is NOT going to be simple! - it will take a lot of "buggering about' to make the whole thing work
It will take a lot of work to make it FIT! in that small car
(which is why I recommend dumping the dino burner and all its ancillaries)



Nothing that ingenuity and hard work can't fix - but its not going to be easy


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

Duncan said:


> _
> 
> That statement worries me a bit - while I think you CAN do the sort of conversion you fancy and for a reasonable sum
> 
> _


_

I just sort of meant that the stock IMA system for recharging the battery is a great system and I didn't want to get rid of the integrated motor and still wanted to utilise the regenerative braking system that the car already has.

I'm completely serious about this project though, it would be so much fun to learn through university, and at first glance, I think I have the finances to do it.

Maybe one day i'll ditch the dino burner  make it a 4wd EV and get into torque vectoring and all that cool stuff! As much as I love the economic benefits of going all electric, power and fun is the goal here for me  I mean look at the Rimac Concept_One..._


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## miscrms (Sep 25, 2013)

In theory adding electric drive to the rear wheels to have an instant plugin hybrid sounds great. If you think of it as adding a second gas engine, plus ancillaries and another gas tank, but worse (in terms of weight and volume) you might start to get why this is harder than it sounds. Most EV conversions benefit hugely from removing all the ICE related gear to free up space and reduce weight. 

You could add a smaller/lighter hybrid motor perhaps more easily, but many of them are fully integrated into a package that makes them big/heavy for their power as electric motors go. There are a few electric RWD motors out there from production hybrids (lexus or the new RAV4 perhaps) used to make an "AWD" hybrid that might be promising. Decent power, pretty small/light, etc. But without a bigger battery you'll only be giving yourself a one time boost of maybe 60s or so worth of power, unless you can find a way to integrate it into the rest of the hybrid system and recharge in a way that doesn't kill efficiency. 

Adding a full EV system from a Leaf would be great for power and range, but now you are talking about adding ~750-1000 lbs of gear which aside from difficulty probably won't do a lot for your handling/performance.

Using the Leaf system or equivalent to replace the CRZ drive system completely should give a pretty nice bump in performance and range over the heavier / higher CdA stock Leaf. I'd love to see someone try a dual Leaf AWD setup on a small platform like this! That would probably be a real kick in the pants  

Rob


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

miscrms said:


> In theory adding electric drive to the rear wheels to have an instant plugin hybrid sounds great. If you think of it as adding a second gas engine, plus ancillaries and another gas tank, but worse (in terms of weight and volume) you might start to get why this is harder than it sounds. Most EV conversions benefit hugely from removing all the ICE related gear to free up space and reduce weight.
> 
> You could add a smaller/lighter hybrid motor perhaps more easily, but many of them are fully integrated into a package that makes them big/heavy for their power as electric motors go. There are a few electric RWD motors out there from production hybrids (lexus or the new RAV4 perhaps) used to make an "AWD" hybrid that might be promising. Decent power, pretty small/light, etc. But without a bigger battery you'll only be giving yourself a one time boost of maybe 60s or so worth of power, unless you can find a way to integrate it into the rest of the hybrid system and recharge in a way that doesn't kill efficiency.
> 
> ...


Thanks for your reply! Well the leaf powertrain is 80kw (108hp). The CR-Z is 1198kg and has 123hp, a power to weight ratio of 102hp/metric ton. So with a quick calculation, the whole new system would need to weigh less than 1042kg (2300lbs) to be somewhat beneficial to performance. Upon quick research, the leaf battery and charger/inverter/motor assembly weigh a total of 423kg (932lbs)

New power to weight ratio would be 143hp/metric ton. Looking at that you think is it even worth it with how much it'll destroy the handling of the car.

The deeper I go into this the more naive and ignorant I realise I am. I feel like I need to meet an electrical engineer, a software engineer and be studying mechanical engineering myself to be able to do this  

The reason I wouldn't want to go full EV (yet) is because I'm only 17, it's an expensive car (for me) and also my daily car that I need to keep on the road. I'd need to get to a stage where it could run electric only as a hybrid and then rip out the ICE when i'm comfortable with how the electric part is working.

Off topic: 
In case you guys didn't know, the CR-Z is being discontinued for next year  maybe if honda did what i'm trying to do in the first place it would've been more of a hit hahaa. (Guess that's what the new NSX is, just A LOT more expensive)


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## minispeed (Jun 30, 2013)

Since you want power and performance over anything else I'd suggest you go with a DC system. Since this is your only car I would suggest starting on a second beater car. It may be more cost effective in the long run and will let you keep the crz on the road.

Adding rwd to a fwd car will involve making a custom rear sub frame and probably having to move/customize things like the exhaust, fuel tank and IMS battery.

By going the route of a second car you can build a working EV system with components that can easily be moved into another car once you get everything sorted out.

Honda's are known for being easy to swap other Honda motors into due to a lot of parts sharing similar drive shafts. You could easily start with a D or B series older ICE Honda and when the time comes the only fabrication you would have to do to move it to the crz would be making new mounts and adapting the shifter and drive shafts.

I did a quick search and the only engine swap crz I could find was a K20. I don't know of an existing motor adapter for an ev motor to a K20 but they are available for D and B series at canev.com. You can also make your own, and you can probably do it with the stock crz motor although that would mean lots of time off the road. Another option is to buy a second crz tranny and mount up the motor first, get a controller and pack pre wired and running outside of the car so when it comes to actually putting it in the car you could probably do it in a solid weekend of hard work, maybe less with help.


Unless you plan to be really fast above 80mph think torque more than kW or hp. An 80kW motor with 200ftlbs like the leaf would be mighty fun driving around town and very capable on the highway. The leaf rating is also said to be continuous. There's someone building an inverter for it that I think said it should be able to handle peak of 200kW.


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

minispeed said:


> Since you want power and performance over anything else I'd suggest you go with a DC system. Since this is your only car I would suggest starting on a second beater car. It may be more cost effective in the long run and will let you keep the crz on the road.
> 
> Adding rwd to a fwd car will involve making a custom rear sub frame and probably having to move/customize things like the exhaust, fuel tank and IMS battery.
> 
> ...


I did think about that, I was thinking of abandoning the cr-z idea completely and buying an old mx-5 - literally about $1000 here in the uk - declaring it off the road and converting that! 

But I just loved the original ethos of the cr-z being probably the world's first fun hybrid and wanted to take it further. I began to slightly dissect my car and you're right, getting drive to the rear wheels is not going to be simple at all.

That's a good idea though, I never thought of a sort of 'trail run' so that when it comes to the real thing there's less time off the road and I vaguely know what I'm doing.

So much to consider  wow I want to do this so badly. Feels like there's a million barriers to break through though - mechanically, mentally, legally and financially


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

Can anyone enlighten me on 'compatibility'?

Scavenging for parts from crashed EVs/HEVs seems like a much more cost effective option, but how hard - if even possible - is it to make different components work together?  For instance, a motor or two from a leaf, a battery from another manufacturer... etc. I feel like it could never work, and fundamentally I still don't understand how controllers control it all. 
But off the shelf components are sooo expensive  

Keeping it simple, all I really want is 1 or 2, cheap but powerful motors that mimick's what the ECU tells the stock motor on the engine to do. What battery capacity would be sufficient for these new motors but also work with the stock motor? The stock battery is rated at 5.75Ah, that's minisule isn't it.  Not particularly bothered if the battery runs out after one or two 0-60 launches. (well, that's is the bare minimum of what I want to get out of this project)


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## minispeed (Jun 30, 2013)

Have you driven a miata? Oh my god the miata.... so nice. I miss mine. I sold it for $1300 because it had a leaking gas tank and the subframe bolts looked like they may break if you dropped the frame to fix it. The perfect ev project before i even knew i wanted to do one. I miss the way that car drives. If you are thinking of doing the miata do it! I've only test driven the crz but it was no where near the car the miata is. It's just so pure and light and handles so well. There's a decent size trunk for batteries but if you also have the crz range isn't as much an issue.

Out of a 91 skyline gtr, miata, alfa spider, 02 mini cooper s, motor bikes and all the non sporty cars i have had I miss the miata the most. I like the crz and have thought about it as an ev but it isnt in the same league. It's a honda fit with a sporty body.

You should look into used forklift motors on this site and paul and sabrinas diy motor controller. 144v 500 amps 72kW for around $1000 is pretty cheap if you're willing to learn about it. That should move a miata well. You can also upgrade in stages from there. First a warp or kostov motor or a used adc9 if you can find one then a more powerfull controller and you can double those numbers when you save up £ with minimal time off the road.


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## Duncan (Dec 8, 2008)

Hi Lloyd
Mixing and matching modern car parts is no longer easy
Even parts from the same manufacturer and model may take the hump and refuse to cooperate with each other
Not just EV parts some of my pals have been unable to get different gearboxes to work in the "wrong" car

You can
Go DC - cheap cheerful and powerful
But a bit primitive - not a good match for your Honda bits
Great in a Miata!

Use all of the parts from something like a leaf

Use the expensive power electronics from some modern cars and substitute a new "brain board" on top 

Buy "new" AC power bits - expensive and a bit wimpy

That does not include batteries - second hand batteries from a Volt or Leaf are by far your best bet
But you may not be able to get the BMS working


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

minispeed said:


> Have you driven a miata? Oh my god the miata.... so nice. I miss mine. I sold it for $1300 because it had a leaking gas tank and the subframe bolts looked like they may break if you dropped the frame to fix it. The perfect ev project before i even knew i wanted to do one. I miss the way that car drives. If you are thinking of doing the miata do it! I've only test driven the crz but it was no where near the car the miata is. It's just so pure and light and handles so well. There's a decent size trunk for batteries but if you also have the crz range isn't as much an issue.
> 
> Out of a 91 skyline gtr, miata, alfa spider, 02 mini cooper s, motor bikes and all the non sporty cars i have had I miss the miata the most. I like the crz and have thought about it as an ev but it isnt in the same league. It's a honda fit with a sporty body.
> 
> You should look into used forklift motors on this site and paul and sabrinas diy motor controller. 144v 500 amps 72kW for around $1000 is pretty cheap if you're willing to learn about it. That should move a miata well. You can also upgrade in stages from there. First a warp or kostov motor or a used adc9 if you can find one then a more powerfull controller and you can double those numbers when you save up £ with minimal time off the road.


I have never driven one, but I would own one if it wasn't for the insanely high insurance here in the UK (No idea how I got insured on the CR-Z). Tempting me with the miata build  The only problem is space, barely enough room for 1 of my cars on the drive haha.

I do get that the CR-Z is pretty flawed and a bit of a gimmick, and thats why i really wanted to improve it and make it great - maybe one day. Who knows what is to come from all this speculation.


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

Duncan said:


> Hi Lloyd
> Mixing and matching modern car parts is no longer easy
> Even parts from the same manufacturer and model may take the hump and refuse to cooperate with each other
> Not just EV parts some of my pals have been unable to get different gearboxes to work in the "wrong" car
> ...


Thanks! I get that electronics really isn't just off-the-shelf plug-and-play, doing something so niche as converting a car's powertrain is never going to be simple. But I guess that's what I love about it; people are still caught up on making they're cars fast with forced induction - what is this 1890? I want electrons!


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## miscrms (Sep 25, 2013)

It's not quite plug and play simple, but there is a certain amount of component re-use experimentation going on. Batteries from a Leaf or Volt are quite popular bang/$ wise, and in some situations you can even retain the BMS. I believe the Chevy chargers have also been reverse engineered to work pretty well stand alone. There are several promising inverter/controller builds going on that should have the ability to auto-tune to many OEM motors, such as Leaf, Lexus or even Tesla.

As Duncan mentioned another strategy is to try and use enough parts from one OEM car to make it still work as originally intended in another platform. There are several folks trying this with wrecked gen 1 and 1.5 Leafs.

Rob


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

miscrms said:


> It's not quite plug and play simple, but there is a certain amount of component re-use experimentation going on. Batteries from a Leaf or Volt are quite popular bang/$ wise, and in some situations you can even retain the BMS. I believe the Chevy chargers have also been reverse engineered to work pretty well stand alone. There are several promising inverter/controller builds going on that should have the ability to auto-tune to many OEM motors, such as Leaf, Lexus or even Tesla.
> 
> As Duncan mentioned another strategy is to try and use enough parts from one OEM car to make it still work as originally intended in another platform. There are several folks trying this with wrecked gen 1 and 1.5 Leafs.
> 
> Rob


Yeah that makes sense! The leaf just seems like a good base powertrain to work with. By the way, how is your Saab build coming along? Before I made this thread I was following your build and didn't even realise that it was you replying hahaa

Its ever tempting how cheap miatas and classic minis with blown engines are. 

My dino burner CR-Z had a slight problem the other day, 16 miles from home and it decided to drop every last drop of oil because some idiot who serviced it before I had the car didn't tighten the sump plug properly. Not fun, wouldn't have had that problem with an EV  

But where I fixed it was actually in my nan's garage where it's empty, fairly big and has a pit for working under cars (which I didn't know). May be possible to start a little project car with a leaf powertrain in there.

Ideal projects: 
Start with a classic mini and just do the simplest leaf transplant I can.

Once i'm happy and had some fun with that - buy a miata.
Take the leaf powertrain out of the mini and use it in the miata and sell on the engineless mini. Try and make the RWD + 80kw motor combination fun; maybe at this point consider modifying the leaf powertrain so I can control it how I want.

Finally, when I have technically had experience with two EV builds, use the leaf powertrain once again in my CR-Z where i'll have more experience and a better gauge for how much I can modify the leaf powertrain

I like that plan.


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## Duncan (Dec 8, 2008)

Which end of the min are you going to put it in?

This is my old mini with two liter Lancia twin cam


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

Duncan said:


> Which end of the min are you going to put it in?
> 
> This is my old mini with two liter Lancia twin cam


OMG! That must've been insane!  Always loved minis, and Lancias for that matter, can't imagine what putting the two together would be like 

Was going to keep it simple and say motor in the front and obviously keep drive to the front wheels then battery in the back (although the battery is huge, not sure how that'd work, may have to reconfigure the battery to make it fit).


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## miscrms (Sep 25, 2013)

I think that sounds like a great plan. A complete Leaf re-use has its own complexities, but its mostly just keeping really organized and keeping track of which wires go where along with the mechanical act of marrying powertrain to vehicle. Starting with a FWD vehicle should make life much easier, as you should be able to just use the motor, reduction gear and transaxle as is. If the mini has enough hood height, using the integrated motor/inverter stack from a 2013+ should be even easier than the separate components of the 2012 I'm using. Going to RWD down the road should be doable, but a bit more complicated. To get regen may require some tricky mods to the brakes and/or steering, so I'm leaving that out at least to start with.

Another potential upgrade path is eventually swapping out the Leaf inverter for a DIY kit tuned to the leaf motor. The US DOE testing found that the Leaf motor's 80kW rating is continuous rather than peak. Peak rating could be 2X or more on power and torque for short bursts. The Leaf batteries have also been demonstrated to be capable of supplying 2-3X the stock current with reasonable voltage sag. 

All in all I think its a kit with a lot of potential, and could be pretty impressive in a vehicle considerably smaller and lighter than the stock Leaf. Even with the stock inverter its probably going to be a challenge to keep traction during acceleration in a small FWD.

My project has sadly been stalled for some time, but I'm probably getting laid off in a few weeks so that may change 

Rob


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

miscrms said:


> I think that sounds like a great plan. A complete Leaf re-use has its own complexities, but its mostly just keeping really organized and keeping track of which wires go where along with the mechanical act of marrying powertrain to vehicle. Starting with a FWD vehicle should make life much easier, as you should be able to just use the motor, reduction gear and transaxle as is. If the mini has enough hood height, using the integrated motor/inverter stack from a 2013+ should be even easier than the separate components of the 2012 I'm using.


Yeah I thought that gradually progressing skill level would be good for me!



miscrms said:


> Another potential upgrade path is eventually swapping out the Leaf inverter for a DIY kit tuned to the leaf motor. The US DOE testing found that the Leaf motor's 80kW rating is continuous rather than peak. Peak rating could be 2X or more on power and torque for short bursts.


Your telling me you could push 350 lbs/ft peak?! Holy crap. That would be a hell of a lot of fun in a car that size.

And that's good news about your build! I'll keep an eye on your thread!


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## miscrms (Sep 25, 2013)

We don't know yet exactly what a Leaf motor is capable of, but peak is usually significantly higher than continuous rating. As I understand the limit is usually thermal. At its max continuous rating, the cooling system is still in steady state and maintaining the motor within safe temperature limits essentially for ever. For peak, the motor is generating more heat than the cooling system can pull out, and it will eventually overheat. The higher the power the more quickly this will happen.

For example, looking at the HPEVS AC51 curves, fan cooled continuous is shown as ~40ftlbs / 45hp continuous, vs. ~145ftlbs / 88hp peak for short duration. Concrete numbers on the Tesla motors are harder to find, but from what I can tell the 285kW rated motor is a 10 second peak number. Continuous may be as low as 52kW.

I'm really excited for someone to find the limits of the Leaf Motor. At stock power its far from shabby, but operated to peak it could be quite a sleeper 

Some related links:
Inverter already demonstrated with a Leaf Motor at 60kW (200V system, 300A limit). Final version should be capable of 200kW.
http://www.diyelectriccar.com/forum...er-nissan-leaf-motor-vehicle-test-171442.html

A universal controller that might be able to take over for the Leaf inverter controller and drive it harder. Or maybe two sets of the stock power devices/caps in parallel? 
http://www.diyelectriccar.com/forums/showthread.php/any-ac-motor-any-inverter-umc-152234.html

I need to read through this in more detail, but I believe this guy has modified a stock inverter with a custom controller to push a Leaf motor to 120-160kW so far.
https://endless-sphere.com/forums/viewtopic.php?f=30&t=35387&start=2575

Testing showing Leaf motor operating for 1hr @85kW (Slide 12):
http://energy.gov/sites/prod/files/2014/03/f13/ape006_burress_2013_o.pdf

Rob


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## miscrms (Sep 25, 2013)

I'd recommend starting stock though, it's just fun to think about what might be possible down the road. In both your Mini and my Sonett I suspect even stock torque will often exceed the traction limit, so more power won't help much. When you get to the RWD Miata it might be something to think about. Hopefully more info will be available by then.

Rob


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

miscrms said:


> We don't know yet exactly what a Leaf motor is capable of, but peak is usually significantly higher than continuous rating. As I understand the limit is usually thermal. At its max continuous rating, the cooling system is still in steady state and maintaining the motor within safe temperature limits essentially for ever. For peak, the motor is generating more heat than the cooling system can pull out, and it will eventually overheat. The higher the power the more quickly this will happen.


Yeah I get that, but how long are you really going to need to peak power for when you get to 60 in 4.5ish seconds (Tesla p85)  It is possible to improve cooling systems though right?



miscrms said:


> I'm really excited for someone to find the limits of the Leaf Motor. At stock power its far from shabby, but operated to peak it could be quite a sleeper


Hell yeah! I love the idea of smoking anything and everything at the lights while being silent  especially with the satisfaction of building it yourself.



miscrms said:


> Some related links:
> Inverter already demonstrated with a Leaf Motor at 60kW (200V system, 300A limit). Final version should be capable of 200kW.
> http://www.diyelectriccar.com/forum...er-nissan-leaf-motor-vehicle-test-171442.html
> 
> ...


Thanks so much for all the links! I really appreciate all of you guys' advice  Wow I've always viewed the leaf as boring and never really took much notice of it; that motor has so much potential though, it will be interesting in future to see how far it can be pushed haha.


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

miscrms said:


> I'd recommend starting stock though, it's just fun to think about what might be possible down the road. In both your Mini and my Sonett I suspect even stock torque will often exceed the traction limit, so more power won't help much. When you get to the RWD Miata it might be something to think about. Hopefully more info will be available by then.
> 
> Rob


Yeah as a beginner project I think stock is fine, have a lot to learn before I move on to modifying the powertrain. Having said that, the mini project will not be easy at all. 

I know your not in the UK but how easy is it to register your car/ how hazy is the legality side of converting to an EV? If it's a ball ache to get it on road then I probably wouldn't even bother. Theres a track not too far from where I live, have to be 19 to be a driver though - guess that gives me 2 years to build it


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## Murderjetz (Oct 6, 2013)

Hi Lloyd,

I know this is a fairly old thread by now, but I find the idea of this project really interesting. 

I wanted to say that, if your university has a Formula SAE Electric team, joining (and being heavily involved throughout your studies) is by far the best way of learning about electric cars. Hell, even just learning engineering itself in general. It might be different in the UK, but generally universities do a terrible job of teaching you actual real world engineering work. 
If you're unfamiliar, SAE hosts a series of design competitions for engineering students. I'm not sure if there is a competition in the UK, but there are a few around Europe, and some teams travel from around the world to attend different competitions.

I'm soon to be graduating with a degree in computer engineering, and have been heavily involved with my university's SAE team, so I can personally attest to the benefits of it.

You seem to be pretty set on mechanical engineering, although if you're keen on tinkering with batteries and control systems, you may want to seriously consider electrical or computer engineering instead. Although that's not to say that you couldn't be enrolled in mechanical engineering while also learning electrical stuff on your own, or vice versa. That sort of decision might depend on the specific structure of the programs at your university, and which one best suits your needs/interests.


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## Lloydcr12 (Aug 22, 2016)

Murderjetz said:


> Hi Lloyd,
> 
> I know this is a fairly old thread by now, but I find the idea of this project really interesting.
> 
> ...


It's cool, I'm still here and interested in the concept hahaa  Thanks for your reply! Yeah I did think about doing electrical but I think I prefer mechanical all in all. I like the idea of combining them, the mechatronics modules in university look really interesting. Since making this thread i got an offer to study Mechanical Engineering at Imperial College London which is pretty cool. I need pretty crazy grades to get in but I'm determined  They seem to have some awesome projects there and it's an amazing place for engineering in general. Hopefully start there in October and see where it goes from there. I have no idea if i'll have the opportunity to undertake such an ambitious project being in the centre of London though.


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## Reno (Jun 4, 2021)

Heyy there! Any news about your project?


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## Alollini (Aug 6, 2021)

When I was tuning the jackson racing compressor, once the ECU bugged on the highway and turned off injectors and ignition. The car was able to maintain 50 kmh for about 4 or 5 km time to find an exit. BEV !! It was able to do 50kmh from zero too, and the gear i was in did not seem to matter. That day we managed to find an exit, then park, then wait, then start again (without ICE again) then roll up to a gas station. Then I did fill up and the ICE started. I had an EV for something like 4 to 6 km. The battery was then on the last square.

This "performance" was while carrying full 2 people and a very very full trunk. But ALSO the combustion engine was a lot of dead rotational mass, this was probably a lot of drag.

I have a second MF6 engine because I have a spare complete powertrain (with LEA, clutch and the manual gearbox etc.) My question is as follows :

By deleting the ICE and bolting a second MF6 electric motor, there may be a way to get a city car enough for my dayly commute. I don't need peak speed, as it is mostly city.

However there are battery and controller problems, the NIMH will have to go and I would have to add LiFePO4 or Li-Ion

Is there a way to keep the controller of the car ? Because that day the ignition was cut and the car was completely working as an EV, regenerating, turning, accelerating (slooow but working) it was silent, the battery went down fast but the thing was *working*.

I think the MF6 is an AC motor ? is that right ?

Can the controller drive 2 ?

Are there some CATL batteries that could fit ?


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## brian_ (Feb 7, 2017)

Alollini said:


> I think the MF6 is an AC motor ? is that right ?
> 
> Can the controller drive 2 ?


Yes, this is a 6-pole 3-phase synchronous AC motor.

While it is theoretically possible for one controller/inverter to drive two synchronous motors wired in parallel if they are on the same shaft and mounted accurately in phase, it's not normally done. It's unlikely that the stock Honda controller can deliver sufficient current to effectively drive two of the same motors for which it is designed, and it probably wouldn't be tuned to do that properly even if it had the capacity.


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## Alollini (Aug 6, 2021)

brian_ said:


> Yes, this is a 6-pole 3-phase synchronous AC motor.
> 
> While it is theoretically possible for one controller/inverter to drive two synchronous motors wired in parallel if they are on the same shaft and mounted accurately in phase, it's not normally done. It's unlikely that the stock Honda controller can deliver sufficient current to effectively drive two of the same motors for which it is designed, and it probably wouldn't be tuned to do that properly even if it had the capacity.


Thank you, yes this is obvious. I have tried yesterday to put ALL INJECTORS STOP with my honda HDS ... I was able to do a little back and forth with the car and went outside of the garage, but the car did not want to climb an incline.

Stock battery when new was theorical 840 WH but useful only 360WH (but it is far from new now) so I drained the IMA battery in several hundred meters only plus a lot of back and fors manoeuvering.

However the ICE engine was making a close to normal noise, like an air compressor.

Interesting, but I think only one IMA engine would not be enough to make the car move acceptably even for slow city driving.

So as it is needed to have 2 IMA motors, we will need more batteries, and a controller capable of regen and to drive the two motors, that is 13kw + 13km = 26 kw output and 10+10= 20 kw regen.

I have looked at data the NiMH battery is 84 cells of 1.2V nominal but the car consider 105V to be 0% and 116V to be 100% SOC but when charging I have seen volatge up to 124.5V (say 125V to be safe) so that would be LiFePO4
35-S cells
A good car has at least one hour max power battery so we need 26KWH so 35 x 260 AH cells that would make 200 KG. Even removing engine and fuel tank, the car will be slightly heavier. Probably around $ 8000 in new batteries alone.

And I don't know where to start on controllers, charger, etc. It's probably not worth it.

Has someone done that ?


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## brian_ (Feb 7, 2017)

Alollini said:


> I have tried yesterday to put ALL INJECTORS STOP with my honda HDS ... I was able to do a little back and forth with the car and went outside of the garage, but the car did not want to climb an incline.
> ...
> However the ICE engine was making a close to normal noise, like an air compressor.
> 
> Interesting, but I think only one IMA engine would not be enough to make the car move acceptably even for slow city driving.


The Honda IMA design is a P1 hybrid, which means that the electric motor/generator is on the engine output shaft, with no clutch between the motor and the engine. That means that it is generally unsuitable for driving with the engine not running - the "air compressor" noise is the engine being turned and pumping air, which takes far too much power to be acceptable for an electric-only driving mode, with any amount of electric motor power. In fourth generation (2006+ Civic Hybrid, etc) IMA vehicles the engine is equipped with cylinder deactivation (by disconnecting the engine's valves so they all stay closed) which eliminates the pumping effect to reduce drag, but the engine still turns.
Honda's new hybrid mechanism, 3-stage VTEC is used to suspend all cylinders
_(article is in Japanese - I used Google's translation to English)_

IMA means "Integrated Motor *Assist*", and in the basic form it is only suitable for assisting the engine, not replacing it at any time. The fourth generation (2006+ Civic Hybrid, etc) and later IMA can run on the electric motor alone, in limited conditions; high engine speed would not work well, and even at low engine speed electric-only mode is not efficient compared to other hybrid designs. This later electric-only mode is apparently usable at low speed, with the cylinder deactivation in effect and with the larger IMA motor of the later systems.


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## Alollini (Aug 6, 2021)

Yes, it was just an experiment, a thought experiment, because we need to turn the vacuum pump to have the brakes assist working. Because doing my experiment I depleted IMA and then the brake pedal became very hard. I think it would need an electrical pump. If I physically remove the engine, it will not create that huge drag. I wonder if 13KW can make the car move (yes, it can) , what would bethe max speed, etc. Where can I sart my research ? How to calculate drag of the air and drag of the wheels on the ground, and drag of the gearbox ?


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## brian_ (Feb 7, 2017)

Alollini said:


> Yes, it was just an experiment, a thought experiment, because we need to turn the vacuum pump to have the brakes assist working. Because doing my experiment I depleted IMA and then the brake pedal became very hard. I think it would need an electrical pump...


If the brakes are vacuum-assisted, then the engine would need to turn... with the throttle closed, which would be a huge amount of drag; that could be replaced by a vacuum pump, although they can be annoying. If the brakes are electrically assisted (unlikely in the first Insight, but possible for later variants) there's no problem. Some people replace the vacuum-boosted master cylinder with an electrically-assisted master cylinder (usually the Bosch iBooster) in their conversions.


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## Electric Land Cruiser (Dec 30, 2020)

I just bought one of these cars to replace my EP3 that was totaled. I really love this little car. I got a 2011 6-speed in bright red. Already I am kicking myself for not getting one of these sooner.

Been looking around and a guy named Peter Perkins in the UK is modifying the IMA running LTO cells and over 200 volts! He has taken the IMA assist from a measly 10kw to 30kw! He thinks more is possible up to maybe 40kw. That is really amazing, going from 14hp assist to 40hp! Talk about VTEC YO! I am also encouraged by your report, @Alollini that your CR-Z was able to drive as a BEV for a short distance without a fuss. I'm thinking maybe with a larger lithium battery and plug-in charging it could be turned into more of a Volt style plug-in hybrid. Since it already features stop-start technology possibly that could be an avenue to "turn off" the ICE without the car throwing a fit.

As if I didn't have enough projects. This one can wait but I'm following it closely.









Converting my Nimh CRZ to Lithium (Cells &amp...


I'm a long time member/admin on the Insight Central forum and have worked on lots of the Honda IMA cars developing gadgets and doing Lithium conversions. I've just bought a nice CRZ for myself and intend converting it to Lithium, upping the IMA power output and developing manual IMA control and...




www.crzforum.com


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## Electric Land Cruiser (Dec 30, 2020)

Also since the engine has some sort of VTEC (adjustable camshaft) maybe it could be overwritten to move to a state where there is very low dynamic compression or very high compression which puts almost as much "push" back into the pistons as it takes to "squish." Read about some OEMs doing that.


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## Electric Land Cruiser (Dec 30, 2020)

This car is so much fun!










The different hybrid assist modes are really cool. Can't wait til it has more battery. It's easy to use up the full 840Wh before you even get to 100 MPH! It kind of reminds me of a turbo with how the assist comes in.


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