# Newbie considering an ev conversion



## dtbaker (Jan 5, 2008)

mechsman said:


> ...The car I am considering converting is a citreon saxo/peugeot 106 (same thing underneath).
> 
> My basic requirements are motorway speed capable (70mph+) for short periods (10-15 min at a time), although I would like to keep up with traffic on 60mph roads as well. I would like to get 50 miles from a charge if possible.
> 
> ...


for highway speed and a 50 mile range you will absolutely need at least 120v, and be better off with 144v system. for 50 miles you will need about 144v of 130ah capacity prismatic Lithium cells at a minimum..... FORGET LEAD.

You will also need a 9" DC motor rated for 170v from ADC, Netgain, or Kostov, and a controller capable of at least 400amps for decent accel with fluid cooling for extended highway speed. You will be happier with a controller capable of 600amps or more (like the Soliton Jr, Zilla, or Raptor) if you can afford it.





mechsman said:


> 2. Am I correct in assuming that a series DC motor about 8 or 9 inch in diameter (assuming it has a chunky enough commutator and brush area) would be right for this application?
> 
> 3. Motor wise am I better off looking for a 48V motor from a forklift or try for a higher voltage one? I have a potential lead on both a 48v and an 80v motor that are ex forklift drive motors. What sort of price should I be expecting to pay for an ex forklift motor?
> 
> 4. I have potential lead on an almost completed (all parts present) open ReVolt controller that has been built with a 1000A power stage. The guy said it cost him £350 in parts + his time. Is this a reasonable deal?


you will be happier with a motor build for higher voltages as I listed above. Personally I think the extra expense for a commercially built controller like Zilla or Soliton is well worth avoiding the headaches of a DIY controller unless you are an EE just dying to do it.


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## ga2500ev (Apr 20, 2008)

mechsman said:


> Hi all,
> 
> Newbie on here (and to ev's in general). I am considering converting one of my cars to electric and I have been reading up on the sort of stuff i need. The car I am considering converting is a citreon saxo/peugeot 106 (same thing underneath).
> 
> ...


Before we get started the real question is where are you on the cost/effort curve? Most EV tasks are pretty simple if you have the funds for them. OTOH if it's a cost conscience build, then the effort required goes up quite a bit. So how difficult it takes to get it done really depends on the budget.



> So, questions then:
> 1. Am I being realistic in expecting to be able to get 70mph and 50 miles from 96V of lead or will I need to go higher voltage to get reasonable performance?


Lead is a no go in this type application. Both in terms of weight and power dropoff due to the Peukert effect (in short the faster you draw power, the less capacity you have available) it is unlikely that you'll get the effective range and speed you require with lead.



> 2. Am I correct in assuming that a series DC motor about 8 or 9 inch in diameter (assuming it has a chunky enough commutator and brush area) would be right for this application?


Depends on the gross vehicle weight. Typically a 9 inch motor can drive all but the most heaft sedans.



> 3. Motor wise am I better off looking for a 48V motor from a forklift or try for a higher voltage one? I have a potential lead on both a 48v and an 80v motor that are ex forklift drive motors. What sort of price should I be expecting to pay for an ex forklift motor?


With motors RPMs are directly related to volts. So the higher voltage motor is always a better bet considering the speeds you desire.

Since the motors are used, prices are all over the place. Several years ago I picked up an Advanced DC FB4001A 80V 8 inch motor from an airport transport vehicle for $600 USD. Your mileage may vary.



> 4. I have potential lead on an almost completed (all parts present) open ReVolt controller that has been built with a 1000A power stage. The guy said it cost him £350 in parts + his time. Is this a reasonable deal?


[/quote]

You may want to ask Paul how much a completely built one will cost you. That will give you a comparison point. Here is their site 

My honest suggestion is that you may want to put together a test platform before going full bore. Buy the target motor. However, test with a low voltage controller and a handful of lead batteries (i.e. 48V). This will facilitate you getting your platform straight and to gain an understanding of your true needs in terms of controller and battery.

Good luck on your project.

ga2500ev


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## mechsman (Dec 4, 2013)

Thanks for all the replies so far guys, it's all useful. Some more details then.



ga2500ev said:


> Before we get started the real question is where are you on the cost/effort curve? Most EV tasks are pretty simple if you have the funds for them. OTOH if it's a cost conscience build, then the effort required goes up quite a bit. So how difficult it takes to get it done really depends on the budget.
> 
> *Budget wise, I'm looking to spend as little as I can realistically. I don't mind putting in the hours in order to reduce the cost if it's something I can do realistically. As I say, I'm reasonably good with taking cars apart and putting them back together so stuff like making motor adaptor plates etc I could do myself. *
> 
> ...


You may want to ask Paul how much a completely built one will cost you. That will give you a comparison point. Here is their site 

*Cheers for the link. Looks like a complete kit comes out at ~$600 + shipping or £367 + shipping. Then I'd have to build it which is fine. *

My honest suggestion is that you may want to put together a test platform before going full bore. Buy the target motor. However, test with a low voltage controller and a handful of lead batteries (i.e. 48V). This will facilitate you getting your platform straight and to gain an understanding of your true needs in terms of controller and battery.

*My thought was to do it in stages by buying an old forklift and putting the whole electrical drive system into the car in standard form, including the hulk sized motor. That will allow me to use the vehicle at "around town" speeds and then upgrade the controller and battery pack when I've got it all debugged. I appreciate that I'd be massively under-utilising the motor but I'd rather have a hulk motor and not have to change it later than have a pee wee sized motor that won't hack it when i get a controller that can stuff 1000+Amps down it's throat. Does this sound like a reasonable way of doing it?*

Good luck on your project.
*Cheers* 
ga2500ev[/QUOTE]


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## mechsman (Dec 4, 2013)

Gents (and ladies), what do you think to a motor with the following specs on the data plate:
48V, amps 288, rating 60 mins, 11kw, dc motor bs1727, type ser ip20, two terminals (labeled A and S). It also has two small 2 blade connection sockets. One of them is labeled "Therm" so I guess that's fairly obvious, the other is unlabeled so........ no idea. Any thoughts?

The motor is ex forklift and dimensions are listed as: 36 x 25cm and weighs ~60kg. It also has a female splined shaft  (and the guy doesn't have the matching male bit unfortunately). 

From what I've read on here so far, this motor looks to be in the right ball park. 

Alternatively the same guy has an ex club car motor as well. That one is a 4 terminal type (S1, S2, A1, A2). Rated at 3.5hp and 48V with dimensions of 34 x 13cm and weight of ~20kg. 

Guessing the bigger one would be better though?

I also have a lead on a kit consisting of the following:
1x Seimens 1PV5135-4WS14-Z drive motor (water cooled, new unused)
1x Mitsubushi Heavy Industries CKA 411A001 Heater
1x Mitsubushi Heavy Industries AM64-19D623-AB A/C electric compressor
1x PPT Hartha 7.10360.48.0 Coolant pump for connect van conversion
1x AZD DMOC-645LC Rohns Traction system assembly (new unused, looks like the water cooled version)
1x BorgWarner drivetrain systems 8.28:1 gearbox (new unused)

Having looked into the above bits, is this kit the deal I think it is? or will it be a nightmare to get it all talking to each other and working properly? What sort of battery pack voltage would I need to get that sort of kit up and working?


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## tylerwatts (Feb 9, 2012)

That's a good kit for the right price. Azure went bust so there are a few of these about so find a good price to pay for it. Evtv was selling them. Won't be cheap! 
Also, talking to the controller and programming it is going to be the challenge but fortunately a number of clever guys on the forum have also picked these up so should have the software buttoned up soon and expect would be willing to help you out. 
What car are you looking to use? 850kg is small and that's alot of motor! It'll be quick. The battery will need to be reasonable too so might cost alot, in price and/or time.


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## mechsman (Dec 4, 2013)

Yeah, I read up as much as I could find on it. The manual looked a little intimidating in that it needed a special serial connection and you were adjusting parameters in the root shell. The kit went for just under £1400 in the end so it looked a reasonable buy for someone. 

What do you think to the 11kW dc motor that I listed the spec for? The car I am looking at is a Citroen saxo, and there was a factory electric conversion of those which used a 6.7kW seperately excited motor. Performance was apparently on a par with the 1.1 petrol version, so pretty modest. The C1 electric (saxo's successor) uses a 30kW motor and achieves (on paper at least) the same performance figures as the saxo (my haven't we moved on it the last 18 years!). Either way, I figured that an 11kw lump is right in the ball Park, especially if I can crank it up on the voltage.


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## tylerwatts (Feb 9, 2012)

Yes that forklift motor sounds good. Bit heavy but that is one trade off of a forklift motor. The key when looking for these motors is current capacity. Your one is 288A which at 144V would mean about 40kw continuous power which is alot. Plenty. It also means with only modest cooling your 1min bursts of power should be rather high. Way more than any Saxo ever had! You Wil need to advance the timing however. Plenty instructions in the forklift motor sticky thread for that and it is relatively simple to do. 

The Saxo is a great little car for conversion. Light and nimble. Space for batteries is going to be challenging and with that motor it'll probably weigh a bit more than stock but still less than a ton. I expect you will need to either fill the boot, use the space under the rear seat or carefully spread the batteries between the engine bay, fuel tank area and spare wheel well under the boot. But 144V is not too much. Depends how much range you want to how much capacity you need and resultantly how much current you can draw from the cells. 

Got any pics of the car and space for the batteries? What type of use do you want the car for?


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## mechsman (Dec 4, 2013)

Yup, although that Amp capacity is at 48V for 60 minutes, so as I understand it that's not a continuous rating? Having said that, it should have big enough brushes to suck down a fair few amps at higher voltage. Just a bit of a shame about the female shaft.

I was planning on stuffing the batteries under the rear seat (in place of the fuel tank), under the bonnet, and if I still need more space I could pinch the space taken up by the spare wheel (under the boot floor). The boot floor is totally flat so I could fairly easily put a drop box in there.

Pictures wise, nope, but it's a boggo standard flat arch mk1 Saxo, so there should be plenty of engine bay/boot floor underside pictures kicking around on the net if that helps.

Use wise it's mainly for short run commuting and running into town. The town run involves a short burst (10-15 minutes) on the motorway, hence the 70mph requirement. I'd be happy with 40 miles worth of range, any more is a bonus. I was considering building a pusher trailer for longer range use as well but that's a future project.


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## tylerwatts (Feb 9, 2012)

I'd be against the pusher trailer personally. Build a suitable EV for long range use. You shouldn't need more than 100ah cells at 144V for that range so a fairly small pack. Sounds like the batteries should fit easily. 

A 60min rating is standard for electric components. That is plenty. That would be 60min at 288A which that car should never need. The thing with the ratings is current through a cable generates a proportional amount of heat due to the internal resistance but increasing the voltage to a degree means you can have more power running through the motor by using the same amps and higher voltage. P=VxA. To a point this is reasonably true. So that motor will be strong, and you'll not need more than twice that current for good acceleration in the little Saxo.


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## mechsman (Dec 4, 2013)

When I say a pusher trailer I mean the front end of another saxo with it's engine and an auto box (and locked steering rack) and driving it via a remote connection. I would be using it to provide the motive power via the trailer's wheels rather than using it as a genny trailer. It would be for long ranges than the car could get to on batteries alone. Also, if I get regen working I could gently recharge the pack when driving along with the pusher as well. 

Funny you should mention 100Ah, that's around the number I got when I plugged the range, voltage, and a rough Wh/mile number into a couple of calculators.

Re the 60 min rating, ah righto, I wasn't aware that's how they were rated so thanks. Cheers for the quick primer on voltage vs amps for power. As I say, the factory electric version used a 6.7kW motor and performance wasn't exactly spritely (about equivilant to a 45 bhp petrol engine). I figure an 11kW motor ought to be chunky enough to match the current performance of the 75bhp 1.4 engine that's living in there at the moment. Just gotta hope that I get the motor now.


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## mechsman (Dec 4, 2013)

Well I ended up missing out on that motor . I got outbid by £5 with 3 seconds to go! 

Anyway, I have found a potential set of second hand thundersky 200Ah cells. They are at least 4 years old but the seller reckons they would hold 170-180Ah, which is plenty for my purposes. What would be a good price to pay (per cell) for these? The seller currently has them at between £50 and £85 a cell, is this reasonable?


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## tylerwatts (Feb 9, 2012)

Woah! Be careful. You'll need guidance from some experienced members but I would say it is dependant on the sag of the cells under load. And how quickly that capacity is going to deteriorate. They might be fine. They might not. 

Also you will be suffering an unnecessary weight penalty that you need to weigh up in your judgement to whether they are worth it.

What was that motor going for? Try asking breakers direct what they have in stock as if you get in before they have the hassle of advertising etc they'll often take a lower price for a quick sale, and you can look round an choose a good motor also. 

May I point you to Ripperton's Mira build in which he is now using a Kelly PMAC motor that was good value and would suit your build well also. Check it out.


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## mechsman (Dec 4, 2013)

Yeah, I wondered about the sag under load characteristics over time on these sort of cells, that's why I asked 

Weight wise, I don't mid carrying a little extra for more range. I figure even 170Ah will get me around 75miles ish.

The motor went for £155 in the end. If i could find some relatively local places that might have the sort of bits I'm after I would 9I'm based in Bristol in the U.K.). Trouble is, the only way I seem to be able to find motors is ebay or emailing the local forklift service yards. Any ideas where else to look?

That sounds interesting, do you have a link?


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## tylerwatts (Feb 9, 2012)

It is in this section of the forum, called Mira... something. Obvious when you see it. I don't see links on my tapatalk phone app unfortunately. 

This is the motor though. http://kellycontroller.com/kl-9000m-72v9kw-bldc-motor-p-1289.html
Ripperton says Kelly have tested it in a car with 52kw peak output which is plenty and will give good torque also so ideal for you. Bolt it to the trans and use 2nd and 3rd gears and you'll be away. I don't think the Kelly controllers can, but you could good without the clutch if the motor is set to match rpm of the gear being selected, otherwise just keep the clutch for simplicity sake. 

I'd be asking the forklift service companies. Not sure who would have them otherwise. Unless you ask your local scrap yards to let you know if anything comes in but again the service guys usually snap them up for parts.


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## mechsman (Dec 4, 2013)

Well, it's a while since I've posted on here. I'm still keeping this idea on the back burner. I currently have a lead on a complete motor + controller from a 1970's bedford oem van conversion.

From what I can find on the net, the setup ran a 36x6v lead acid pack for a nominal 216v Dc. The motor is a sepex type and sucks down 40kW continuous (~50hp I think). The controller (I think) is a Lucas Chloride mark 4/4a thyristor based type, and it does regen! Apparently the gauge on the dash read +/-250 Amps, so it was certainly capable of some serious power generation. Apparently the regen had to be turned off in the wet due to it locking the rear axle on throttle lift off!

Would this setup be suitable to run using a lithium pack?


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## tylerwatts (Feb 9, 2012)

Sounds like a powerful/torquey setup! Battery should not affect the drive system so yes, as long as you maintain similar parameters, ie voltage and current capabilities it will be fine. Effectively the battery system can be separate apart from the 2 cables transferring power to the controller therefore you can build them separately and they'll work well together. Lithium should give great performance given the amount of current the controller seems to use, and 40kw continuous sounds excellent, about 52bhp, and I imagine a mountain of torque! Be aware that motor may weight alot, so check up on this. You might want a larger car to build this in given the weight and power levels and amount of battery you will want. A 306 size family hatch would be better, depending on what you would want to drive all the time and enjoy owning.


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## mechsman (Dec 4, 2013)

Yeah it looks like it would be a rocket in a lightweight car like a saxo. The motor approx measurements (so i'm told) are about 2 feet long by 12 inches diameter ish. The original van was a sherpa sized thing which retained a 1 tonne payload (by using heavy duty long wheelbase bits on a swb van) with the lead pack weighing somewhere close to the 1 tonne mark! 

With regards running the setup on lithium, would using the controllers original regen setup be ok? It was designed to regen into a lead acid pack so I'm not sure if this will play with the lithiums ok?

What are the thyrister controllers like in terms of efficiency? Would I be better junking it and looking for a sep-ex controller? Also, I'm assuming that the 3 pin plug on top of the controller was to plug in a mains charger, so I'm guessing that the charging setup in the controller wouldn't be any good for lithiums?


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## tylerwatts (Feb 9, 2012)

Not sure on the thyrister design, but if it works build the car and upgrade later. The built in charger won't be any good. I would imagine the regen would be ok though, but I'm no expert so check with others who know better on the forum. 

That is a big motor, and likely heavy. Bare that in mind when choosing the donor car. Are you deciding whether to get the motor then? How soon might it come? I'm keen to see it.


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## skooler (Mar 26, 2011)

Good conversion candidate i very nearly converted a corsa b which is similar size and weight.

I'm in worcester (60miles north) and have a business in ev conversions, component supply etc. Your welcome to pop into the workshop for a chat and a look at some of the cars/stuff.

Check the classifieds section on here.... I might have the parts you need 

Cheers,

Mike


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