My Breaker Broke :-(

My Airpax breaker, the main breaker switch, now has a busted switch-arm (I’ll save you the painful images). Just a few test throws under tension, the supposedly strong Bakelite switch arm shattered. The Airpax breaker is expensive, and we’ll have to see if it’s still under warranty as I paid for this some time ago. Considering the breaker is there for safety, it’s a pretty serious failure.

I suspect the cable linked to it and the pivot bend may not have been aligned on quite the same axis and hence some side-ways pulling met with plastic stress thus causing the break. Anyway, another delay. One would assume that such a switch should be strong enough to handle a quick throw.

Blinkin' good

BMS LEDs Now A’flashin’

When I first received the BMS modules, I noticed that Ross Blade hadn’t included charge status LEDs. I bought a bunch and soldered some on but my error at the time was to solder them on the wrong way around, i.e. instead of shutting off when the battery reached peak-defined charge, they stayed on while discharging. The polarity on the modules was not indicated; I had guessed the correct positive end, though Nathan was convinced otherwise at the time (men are always right, right?) so I soldered them the other way.

Fine? Well no, but in a sense, yes…

Delays, Delays, Delays

I must apologize for all these delays! Being a small outfit, the Echo has taken up considerable time but it looks very good now and will be delivered to the client soon. The BMS has been upgraded and looks pretty neat with the cosmic blue charge active LEDs added.

My health has been a bit of an Achilles Heel, along with work pressures and the usual stuff, but I am patient and all good things come to those who are patient. People are begging to see my car now and I much prefer to take things slowly so we can get it right, first time around without extra work fixing a bad mistake.

On other matters, my PC died, the HDD died and what’s worse, the backup HDD died! Sheesh, ah well, ‘them’s the brakes’ as they say, (and at least that part of the car is complete – although I’ve discovered we may not need the additional vacuum tank, the master cylinder has plenty of vacuum!). So it’s off to the local computer markets to get myself some new parts and build up something faster.

Time – sheesh, wish I had more.

Meanwhile, Nathan drove the Echo down the road to get the air-con re-gas done and the car drives like a treat, no pull of heavy batteries and the weight only comes in around only 175kg above the original tar (people-less) weight! The zippy 8 inch motor has plenty of grunt and so far uphill climbs have been a breeze, even without Curtis water cooling (the Curtis just has a thick aluminum block bolted underneath, and sandwiched with silicon paste). A strange above-earth potential voltage issue was solved by un-grounding, i.e. isolating the Curtis with shielded spacers. Normally one would bolt the Curtis to some bulkhead on the car for heat-sinking. The slight capacitance could have interfered with the Echo’s computer so we took no chances. The Echo also has the Zero Start water boiler (shown in a previous video) and this is way-better than the small electric element implanted in my heater unit (and a lot less work, i.e., the dash did not have to come out).

Anyway, enough prattling from me, back to work. Photos in the next post.

Echo and the Funny Men

While my car waits for some final parts, the Echo conversion is progressing well and we hope to have it drivable very soon. There’s an EV show coming up and the Echo will be perfect for it, taking pride of place amongst the smaller vehicles and some funny guys riding funny go-carts etc – yet demonstrating what can be done with the new generation of lithium phosphates. Small cars will be a big feature, with lots of folks contending for the ‘smaller is better’ stakes – hah-hah.

Like the Getz, the Echo is reasonably easy to convert (and a lot easier to work with than the angular confines of my Starion) and if such things were mass-produced as EVs to start with, the price would be a lot lower than a converted car (in fact comparable to a gas equivalent).

Shaping Up Nicely

While my car still has a few issues to resolve, the engine bay itself is now looking prrrretty good. The Perspex has been cut to the right size and this will support the Curtis and water-cooling pump. The Curtis now has heatsink compound applied to it and the cooling block and sandwiched together – and with the batteries seen through the Perspex underneath, the whole thing looks pretty neat. The rest of the BMS modules will be installed soon.

Curtis and cooler on 8mm thick Perspex sheet.

The batteries underneath show the Blade BMS modules connected with their comms fly-leads which is wired back to the Blade BMS Puppet Master box. The conformal coating will protect the BMS modules from dust, grit, corrosion etc.

BMS fly leads connected.

Relay Box & Coolant Reservoir

The relay and fuse box is now mounted for the main components; the ancillary relay and fuse box will be done soon when we can find a suitable place for mounting. The coolant bottle will need to be fixed relatively level and this may be tricky due to lack of room and sloping firewalls. Shouldn’t be too hard, so long as the position of the bottle ensures good flow.

My the Year Has Flown Faster than a Tesla

This year has been a real learning curve for all of us; what we wanted to complete in under three months has blown out somewhat, primarily due to supply issues (we won’t say any names here but a regular name pops up for *anything* that goes wrong (even if he’s not to blame -hah-hah)).

Here’s my engine bay now; and the rest of the BMS conformal coating will be completed soon.

Engine bay showing a tasty assortment of Xmas nuts and bolts.

The long pack of batteries will be clamped down in the middle using a 3mm shaft to stop the brace from bowing. The 3mm threaded shaft fits snugly between the Thunderskys. The relay/fuse box is now installed; next, the minor accessories relay box to do.

Busy Little Elves

We’ve been pretty busy this year, while securing plenty of interest from others wanting to convert their cars. Both Nathan and Linda have put in some hard hours with the business and advice, individual car specs, experimentation by all of us and just paperwork can be time consuming. Consequently it makes us all busy.