# [EVDL] Dissapointment



## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

I can't comment on the electrical aspects but have you checked the brakes and
bearings?

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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Its early in the morning, But if my math is right, your using about
650Wh/mile. I would think you would be under 300 with that vehicle. Like
what was said above, I would check the brakes and bearings, Something must
be dragging.

-Adam



> salty9 <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> > I can't comment on the electrical aspects but have you checked the brakes
> > and
> ...


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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Yes and thanks but I did replaced all of the calipers, brakes, bearings,
bushings, ball joints and I did have a dragging brake at one time but it
was corrected.



> salty9 <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> > I can't comment on the electrical aspects but have you checked the brakes
> > and
> ...


----------



## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Hi Joe,

Don't be dishearted. I sounds as tho there is something very much 
amiss with your drive train.

The 1231c is rated at 500A and with a 120V pack you have a (very) 
nominal 80hp of power. This is only a bit less than the standard 5l 
Tech IV I4 ICE version (90HP).

In 1st or 2nd gear you should have perfectly adequate if not good 
acceleration. The Fiero is not an especially big or heavy vehicle - 
1200kg I gather and although it probably weighs a good 200kg more with 
your lead in it instead of the ICE bits, it should still 'work'. (More 
accurately... Batteries = 10 x 40kg = 400 + 60 (motor) + 20 (curtis 
+ rest) - 160 (engine) - 100 (rest of ICE bits - exhaust, full cooling 
system, full fuel tank) +1200 = 1420 or 220kg heavier).
I would be looking at the Curtis to see if it is set up correctly, do 
you have full travel of the pot box etc. How many amps does the 
PakTrakr say you are pulling and is that battery amps or motor amps?

I have only used my PakTrakr with Li cells and which, IMHO it is not 
well-suited. I would be inclined to drive round and round the block 
(so you can limp home if necessary) till you get a low volts reading 
on the first of your batteries for a better max range estimate. I 
suspect 30 miles is a more likely max range. But to be honest I would 
really need to know a bit more about your layout to offer any more help.

Have you fully charged all your batteries and checked their levels 
etc? Is it really cold with you at the moment and no battery 
heaters? There must be some clue as to why you have such poor 
performance.

Regards, Martin Winlow
Herts, UK
http://www.evalbum.com/2092
www.winlow.co.uk




> Joe Arello wrote:
> 
> > Well after a couple of years rebuilding and converting a Fiero, I
> > cant say
> ...


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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Alright then, What are using for battery and motor current when
your cruising?

-Adam



> Joe Arello <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> > Yes and thanks but I did replaced all of the calipers, brakes, bearings,
> > bushings, ball joints and I did have a dragging brake at one time but it
> ...


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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

> Joe Arello wrote:
> 
> > The batteries are new and from Sams. I know they may not last more then a
> > year or two but I did not want to invest alot as I go through my learning
> ...


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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

I am not sure about the transmission. I had Wayne with EV Blue make the
motor adapter for the Fiero but when he hooked it up and tried it out he
indicated that the trasmission was making a substantial amount of noise.
The car had over 150K miles on it and as I started the restoration I
noticed drug paraphernalia under the carpets so I was not supprised that
the transmission was bad since the whole car was treated pretty rough.

Anyway Wayne called a local salvage yard and got another 4 speed but the
shift pattern was different then the original. I dont know if it came out
of another Fiero or was on another GM car. But the reverse is opposite that
of the original shift pattern. And I am not sure of the pattern of the
other gears. My Fiero was an 1986 and I dont know if GM used different 4
speeds in other model years that had different shift patters.

I do know that it seems that I only use one gear which is the one that gets
me going. Shifting to the others does not seem to make a difference and I
cant start out in any of the. I do not have the tachometer connected to the
motor to be able to give me any information.

Besides the paktrakr I do have a volt meter and amp meter. I basically
followed the wiring diagrams in the Curtis manual. When starting out the
amp meter shows about 100 amps. I have only been circling around
the neighborhood which has some hills and the amp meter reads between 100
and 300 amps while driving this rout. I have only driven a total of about
50 miles sticking to this route which about one mile in distance so I do
not have a good handle on the cursing amps.

I have been charging the batteries and checking the fluid levels and I must
assume the batteries are becoming fully charged since the paktrakr
indicates a [email protected] SOC. But as I drive away and travel about three blocks it
reads [email protected] And although it is starting to get colder now the weather
has been in the 70s during these runs.
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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

> Joe Arello wrote:
> 
> > I do know that it seems that I only use one gear which is the one that gets
> > me going. Shifting to the others does not seem to make a difference and I
> ...


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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

As a rule, you should be able to easily push the car, in gear, by leaning 
against it. If you can't, something is dragging. Could be a bearing that's 
too tight; could be improperly aligned wheels. 

>From the sounds of your transmission problem, another possibility or 
contributor is that you may be stuck in a high gear. For best range when 
driving, you want to pick a gear where the controller is out of current 
limit at the speed you are driving. This means holding it in lower gears 
rather than upshifting, the opposite of the way you drive an ICE for 
economy. 

Have toe (wheel alignment) set to zero. 

Jack up the car and spin the wheels by hand. They should turn easily.

Find out what's up with that transmission.

All that said, it's possible that you're at least partly a victim of battery 
choice.

>From the description it sounds like your batteries are 12v marine, right? 
For example, a Trojan SCS225 is rated 57 minutes at 75 amps - call it 75 amp 
hours at real-world EV currents. For a 120v pack this is 9000 Wh. At 300 
Wh/mi, a not unreasonable value for a an unoptimized conversion, that's 30 
miles to 100% DOD. At 65%DOD you'd have 19.5 miles - not much more than 
what you report at that DOD. 

At higher current, maybe the result of a fair bit of heavy acceleration or a 
trans stuck in 3rd, 4th, or 5th, the capacity will fall still further. Do 
you know who made those batteries for Sam's Cluib? Name brand flooded marine 
batteries from Trojan or USBMC already are challenged in road EV use. Cheap 
off-brands often have worse Peukert exponents, and will suffer even more 
from high currents. 

Going to 144v might help, but if you're like most of us, I suspect you'd use 
the extra oomph on brisker acceleration rather than for more range. I'd 
look into fitting either 8v golf car batteries or 12v AGM batteries instead.

Either one will be a better choice for high currents. You'll obviously need 
more batteries for 120v with the 8v modules (that's a good thing). 

The AGMs could potentially be more of a direct replacement for what you have 
now, and will do better than them at high currents. However, AGMs tend to 
make for a fairly high cost per mile of operation.

Maybe others will have some further thoughs.

David Roden - Akron, Ohio, USA
EVDL Administrator

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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

The batteries should be just fine for acceleration but not distance. I used
GC2 6 Volt Sams Club batteries for my first electric conversion. The 64 Ghia
at 96 volts with the heavy lead batteries would get up to 80 mph. It jumped
to freeway speeds just fine. Not super fast but plenty fast to jump into
freeway traffic. I always used all 4 gears. I also use a clutch. At 120
volts there should be plenty of poop to scoot along with traffic even with
the anemic curtis controller and the cold lead batteries. Be sure your
charged full on all your batteries and be sure you have no dragging brakes
or wheels and that you have full tires. All your components should freely
turn with little effort. Your gear ratio may be a problem with the wrong
transmission in the car. Tranny may be junk. Be sure your getting full sweep
of the PB-6 which is what I assume you are using. If you don't you will be
only using partial throttle and that could be your issue. When I used a non
adjustable controller I had to be sure I was getting full sweep. When I was
not the performance was flat. Once fixed the performance picked up quite
nicely. With my current controller I can adjust the controller to any sweep
I have set and the controller will know to use that for my full sweep. So
for your curtis you need to make sure your using the full sweep of the pot. 

That is where I would focus right now. 

Pete 

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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Thanks again for the suggestions. I do know that the car is in bad need of
a 4 wheel alignment since I basically tore it down to the frame. The wheels
do sequel a bit especially in turns but I had not expected it to affect
range but I will get that done.

As far as the batteries they are as I mentioned from Sams and have an
Everready badge. So much for "They keep going and going". They are 12 volt
and deep cycle rated at 125 ah. I weighed one and it was about 60 lb so the
total weight is about 600 pounds. I know someone posted that I needed about
800 pounds for the range I expected. When these everready crap out I will
look into a better battery.

I did rebuild the all of the calipers and replaced all wheel bearings
and originally experienced dragging on the front wheels. I then purchased
two calipers that were factory rebuilt and that cured the problem. I do not
think that any of the wheels are dragging now.

Orignially I was going to go to a 144 volt pack but chose not to since I
was trying to keep the weight down. And as you mentioned I just wanted the
extra voltage for initially acceleration.

I have not posted to the evalbum yet and will do so in the next week or so.
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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Hello Joe,

You now know your base line data of your EV build and what must be done to 
improve it. I did the same thing with my first conversion back in 80's 
where I left every stock which was a automatic TH-350 transmission which had 
a 1st gear ratio of 2.75:1 and a differential ratio of 2.78:1 ratio which 
leaves a overall gear ratio of 2.75 x 2.78 = 7.645:1 which is not good for 
the weight of my EV.

Calculation of MPH with RPM and Known Gear ratios:

MPH in 1st gear overall ratio at 6000 rpm becomes:

Mph = (rpm x tire circumference)/(ratio x 1056)

This came out to be about 66 mph in 1st gear which is became too high speed 
in that gear, but it did keep the battery ampere down to 180 amps and the 
range was about 20 miles at 50% SOC.

The automatic was change to a manual where the 1st gear was a 3.5:1 ratio 
and the 2nd was at 2.5:1 ratio. I found by increasing the gear ratios, the 
battery ampere change from 180 to about 120 amps driving at the same speed 
and the range become 30 miles.

Later after I worn out my rear axils cause by the wheel ball bearings riding 
right on the axil it self, I change it out with a Mark and Williams axle and 
bearing kit which has inner and outer bearing races. According to M&W, the 
axils and bearings of a vehicle should be rated for twice the weight that is 
on each wheel. Acceleration will double the weight or is call thrust 
weight.

At the same time, I increase the differential gear to a 5.57:1 gear ratio 
which is the largest one I can get into the housing. Now the 1st gear ratio 
times the differential gear becomes a overall gear ratio of 19.495:1. The 
battery ampere becomes 50 amps on level and 75 amps up a hill. The range is 
about 40 miles.

So you see, that you can get improvement on a gear ratio set that keeps your 
motor rpm closer to the sweet spot. Noting that you have a WarP 9 motor 
which has a sweet spot at about 3300 rpm which is the point where the 
maximum torque and hp is at. Type in electric motor sweet spot in your 
search engine and it will explain it in lot more detail.

You want to be in a gear that you can be close to the sweet spot of the 
motor. My WarP-11 has a sweet spot of about 1800 rpm, so I will start out 
in 1st gear until I reach 1800 rpm and then shift to 2nd gear and take it up 
to 1800 rpm before I shift again and so on keeping the battery ampere 
between 50 to 75 amps.

Another thing to watch out for, is tire deflection. The amount of tire 
deflection is the difference of distance between the surface of the tire 
threads to the wheel rim. Lets say, this distance is 5 inches on a tire 
while it is off grade or off the vehicle. You then air it up to the maximum 
psi that is listed on the side of the tire while it is off grade.

Measure the face of the tire to the rim of the wheel and record that data. 
Lets say, this reads 5 inches. Next, lower the vehicle so the tires are on 
grade and again read this length. Lets say, it reads 4.5 inches. The tire 
has a deflection of 0.5 inches or 10 percent of the sidewall length. 
According to my tire person, this is too much deflection, it is best to get 
it to 5 to 7 percent for a standard tire which is not a LRR Low Resistance 
Riding tire.

A LRR tire side wall will have more deflection than a standard, but not the 
face of the tire, which is built very stiff. The side wall allows more 
deflection, which does not effect the thread face of the tire.

Testing the resistance of the drive train of a EV:

Place the EV on a level smooth grade with the transmission in 1st gear. 
Screw in a bolt into the end of the motor pilot bearing and attach a Inch 
Pound (in.lb) torque wrench to this bolt. Turn the motor shaft clock wise 
(CW) with the torque wrench and record the amount of torque it takes to move 
the EV in that gear. Proceed to the next gear and test again.

A vary good torque rating to move a EV is 8 in.lbs or less in the lowest 
gear ratio. If you cannot attain this reading, then there is some 
adjustment to the EV that can improve by gear ratios, tire types, 
maintaining the correct drive line angle and insertion clearances into the 
transmission and transmission pilot shaft clearances into the motor coupler 
and brake pad clearances.

Note it is common in some brake systems, when you have a disk or drum 
recondition, that the installer will install a oversize pad to make up the 
distance that the disk or drum is reduce. Sometimes pad is too tight and it 
will drag for a while until it is worn down some.

I had my rears brakes down, and the pads where tight at first. It will take 
a while for the pads to break in. Do a lot of breaking by pressing on the 
brakes while backing up for some distance.

Roland






----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Joe Arello" <[email protected]>
To: "Electric Vehicle Discussion List" <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, November 05, 2011 4:27 AM
Subject: [EVDL] Dissapointment


> Well after a couple of years rebuilding and converting a Fiero, I cant say
> my first experiences with driving it are that good. I had hoped that it
> would have gone further before recharging and in reviewing other post I
> would have thought that 40 miles between charges would have been expected.
> However after traveling only 14 miles the packtract reads out 35% SOC. I
> assume that the packtract is an accurate SOC meter but it looks like from
> the post most people are using other units.
>
> Also the car seems to have poor acceleration. So poor I am afraid to try
> and pull it out into traffic. This may be due to the 120 pack voltage and
> maybe stepping up to 144 volts may help I don't know.
>
> The batteries are new and from Sams. I know they may not last more then a
> year or two but I did not want to invest alot as I go through my learning
> curve. But I would have thought that they would have given me better
> service. They are deep cycle and are rated at 120ah.
>
> All of the components are new and include a warp 9 motor connected to a
> manual transmission. The controller is a Curtis 1231C and the charger is a
> Elcon PCF 2500.
>
> Any thoughts?
>
> Thanks
>
> JoeA
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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Hi Roland,

Thank you for your comments and suggestions. It appears I have several
things to check into. I guess I needed something to do this winter.
Most likely a good think since I will spend less time at the watering hole.
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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Just a heads up, apparently aligning a Fiero properly is no easy task and
beyond the ability of many alignment shops, as I'm finding out myself. If
you have squealing tires on cornering you probably have things way off, or
under inflated tires. I run mine around 40 psi, and I get around 250
whs/mile in mixed driving, with hills, though I do have regen which helps.




> JoeA wrote:
> >
> > Thanks again for the suggestions. I do know that the car is in bad need of
> > a 4 wheel alignment since I basically tore it down to the frame. The
> ...


----------



## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Hi Joe,

I would recommend jacking up each wheel and trying to turn it by hand. That
will tell you a lot about the state of the brakes and bearings. You should
be able to get at least 2-3 rotations on the tire after giving it a good
push.

I have a vehicle (www.evalbum.com/2778) that is pretty comparable to yours
in size (Honda del Sol). It is 144V instead of 120, but that should only
make a 20% difference in performance. Also, my batteries and controller
only support 300A and you should be able to get 500A, making up the
difference.

I get 250 Wh/mile on a combination city / highway commute. I would expect
your car to get about the same.

You should be able to easily notice the difference in acceleration from the
different gears. With 300A draw, I get very good acceleration in 2nd and OK
in 3rd. I can't keep the tires on the ground if I accelerate aggressively
in 1st. I get very doggy acceleration from 4th. It sounds to me like
something strange is going on with your transmission.

It sounds like you need to do some more tweaking and adjusting and then you
will have it running like you expect.

Mike


> -----Original Message-----
> From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On
> Behalf Of Joe Arello
> Sent: Saturday, November 05, 2011 8:09 AM
> To: Electric Vehicle Discussion List
> Subject: Re: [EVDL] Dissapointment
> 
> Thanks again for the suggestions. I do know that the car is in bad need of
a 4
> wheel alignment since I basically tore it down to the frame. The wheels do
> sequel a bit especially in turns but I had not expected it to affect range
but I
> will get that done.
> 
> As far as the batteries they are as I mentioned from Sams and have an
> Everready badge. So much for "They keep going and going". They are 12
volt
> and deep cycle rated at 125 ah. I weighed one and it was about 60 lb so
the
> total weight is about 600 pounds. I know someone posted that I needed
> about
> 800 pounds for the range I expected. When these everready crap out I will
> look into a better battery.
> 
> I did rebuild the all of the calipers and replaced all wheel bearings and
> originally experienced dragging on the front wheels. I then purchased two
> calipers that were factory rebuilt and that cured the problem. I do not
think
> that any of the wheels are dragging now.
> 
> Orignially I was going to go to a 144 volt pack but chose not to since I
was
> trying to keep the weight down. And as you mentioned I just wanted the
> extra voltage for initially acceleration.
> 
> I have not posted to the evalbum yet and will do so in the next week or
so.
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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

> Joe Arello <[email protected]> wrote:
> 
> > I assume that the packtract is an accurate SOC meter but it looks like
> > from
> ...


----------



## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

This may be a bit obscure, but if your motor was originally set up with advanced brush timing for another vehicle, they may be retarded for the direction your motor is turning in your vehicle. That would lead to poor performance and excessive power use.

Just another thing to check in the list of possibilities...

Tom Keenan

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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Is it possible the tranny is only going into 3rd and 4th gears (or possibly=
even 5th and 6th), despite your trying to get into 1st and 2nd? I had that=
happen with a car I removed the tranny from once, the shifter needed adjus=
tment. You could lift the wheels and see how many times the motor spins for=
every revolution of the rear wheels (being sure to spin both in the same d=
irection, you might need an assistant, or you could turn the motor by hand =
and watch the drive wheels). Here's a little chart of roughly how many moto=
r revolutions you should see per revolution of the drive wheels:

1st: 12 to 1
2nd: 9 to 1
3rd: 6 to 1
4th: 4 to 1
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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Fieros are known for the cable shifter breaking. Look at the shifter mechan=
ism on the tranny while you have someone try to shift the car. You can prob=
ably manually push the tranny into a gear at the tranny end (be very carefu=
l taking off, you might have just put it into reverse, or first for the fir=
st time and it'll take off very fast).



________________________________
From: Joe Arello <[email protected]>
To: Electric Vehicle Discussion List <[email protected]>
Sent: Saturday, November 5, 2011 6:35 AM
Subject: Re: [EVDL] Dissapointment

I am not sure about the transmission. I had Wayne with EV Blue make the
motor adapter for the Fiero but when he hooked it up and tried it out he
indicated that the trasmission was making a substantial amount of noise.
The car had over 150K miles on it and as I started the restoration I
noticed drug paraphernalia under the carpets so I was not supprised that
the transmission was bad since the whole car was treated pretty rough.

Anyway Wayne called a local salvage yard and got another 4 speed but the
shift pattern was different then the original. I dont know if it came out
of another Fiero or was on another GM car. But the reverse is opposite that
of the original shift pattern. And I am not sure of the pattern of the
other gears. My Fiero was an 1986 and I dont know if GM used different 4
speeds in other model years that had different shift patters.

I do know that it seems that I only use one gear which is the one that gets
me going. Shifting to the others does not seem to make a difference and I
cant start out in any of the. I do not have the tachometer connected to the
motor to be able to give me any information. ...
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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Note that it is relatively easy to verify the toe-in
of your vehicle, especially if the front and rear
track width are the same: park the vehicle with the
front wheels pointing exactly straight, then look from
the back of the vehicle if the sidewall of the front 
wheels are both exactly in line with the sidewall of 
the rear (and vice versa to check alignment in the back).
You can also put a straight piece of wood along the two
wheels you want to check and measure very accurately the 
distance between them at the front and the back side of 
the wheel.
Note that this does not give you the solutions for cornering
and chamber and such, but usually toe-in (or out) is one of
the first drag issues.
As Lee suggested, if you place your car on a level spot and
you can push it forward and backward more than a few feet
by using only your fingers (not your whole hand) then the
drag will not be your problem.
With perfect alignment, high tire pressure, no brake drag
you should be able to move your vehicle easily. If it goes only
a foot and then pushes back, actually rides back when you
release it, then you can be certain that your alignment is off.

However, it may be that your alignment is perfectly allright.
I have heard mixed experiences with Paktrakrs, in some cars
they appear to get so confused from high voltage spikes from
the controller that they do not read right. Your voltmeter
is probably your best friend at this moment, until you can
install an Ah meter to show you how much you actually take
from your batteries.
As suggested before, your Marine style batteries are labeled
somewhat deceptively, although they can occasionally be
cycled deeply, they will die in about 100 cycles so if you
take them to 50% DOD on a typical trip (which should be
around 15-20 miles in your case) then you can expect them to
last for about a year's worth of commuting every weekday.

That still makes a useful EV, my daily commute used to be
10 miles each way and by the time I had murdered my batteries
I needed to charge at work to make it home again, but it did
give me good experience and I got very used to driving with a
specific range limit, I still used the EV for the majority of
all my driving!

Cor van de Water
Chief Scientist
Proxim Wireless Corporation http://www.proxim.com
Email: [email protected] Private: http://www.cvandewater.com
Skype: cor_van_de_water XoIP: +31877841130
Tel: +1 408 383 7626 Tel: +91 (040)23117400 x203 

-----Original Message-----
From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On
Behalf Of Joe Arello
Sent: Sunday, November 06, 2011 2:35 AM
To: Electric Vehicle Discussion List
Subject: Re: [EVDL] Dissapointment

Hi Roland,

Thank you for your comments and suggestions. It appears I have several
things to check into. I guess I needed something to do this winter.
Most likely a good think since I will spend less time at the watering
hole.
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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

> Joe Arello wrote:
> 
> > Well after a couple of years rebuilding and converting a Fiero, I
> > cant say
> ...


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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

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> So, once all that is checked and correct, no matter what is going on 
> in the transmission, when you floor the accelerator (and if you are 
> measuring battery amps) you should get nigh on 500A on the PT. 
> Someone please correct me if I am wrong! I am not familiar with the 
> 1231C but it may have a setting for limiting current below its max 
> 500A so check for that too. 

I am not sure this is correct. I have a Curtis 1231C and when I floor it
in first gear I typically get 400+ MOTOR AMPS, but only 200+ BATTERY
AMPS. (My motor amps guage is a 0-400 Amp analog gauge, and it pegs, so
it could very well be getting 500+ amps.)

My belief is that at slow speeds the motor amps will always be greater
than the battery amps, and at higher speeds the battery amps may
approach the motor amps (if the PWM is basically 100% ON).

I have never seen the battery amps go up to 500....I believe the Curtis
is limiting the motor amps at 500, not the battery amps.




> Obviously if there is an adjustment 
> available and it is adjusted to only 100A you will not see stellar 
> acceleration.

The Curtis does have 2-3 small adjustment screws on it that you can
modify various settings, but if you are seeing large amp draws (or just
large voltage sags when accelerating) it is likely that the controller
is pulling enough current.

Jay
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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

Yep, you may be right but either way, it is important that Joe knows 
what he is reading. I'm sure someone else will let us know! MW




> Jay Summet wrote:
> 
> > -----BEGIN PGP SIGNED MESSAGE-----
> > Hash: SHA1
> ...


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## EVDL List (Jul 27, 2007)

> Jay Summet wrote:
> >> I have a Curtis 1231C and when I floor it in first gear I typically
> >> get 400+ MOTOR AMPS, but only 200+ BATTERY AMPS. My belief is that
> >> at slow speeds the motor amps will always be greater than the
> ...


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