Thursday, 15 April 2010

Selling some EV related stuff

I have had a clean out and have an emergency disconnect switch and DC bus dynamic braking resistor for sale on ebay.

I am also selling some PA gear if you check my other listings.

Sunday, 21 February 2010

More progress on the encoder

the small wire and crimp lug (soldered) is to prevent the encoder spinning.
The wire is coat hanger wire so is quite firm.

Next thing to do is to draw the cable through the conduit and connect to the VFD. That will be on Tuesday all going well.



Rotor Machining

Here is a photo of the rotor in the lathe.

The shaft end was turned down to just under 12mm. I had to keep the dead centre well oiled during the process. Also had to stop a couple of times to stop it getting too hot and affecting the bearing on the shaft.

As there was significant weight on the centre, it would be best to support the bearing.

Saturday, 20 February 2010

Motor disassembly

The Electrolux, (my electric Hilux / Tacoma pickup) has been on the road for almost a year. It has had a couple of problems but overall very successful in showing that industrial equipment is suitable for an electric conversion.

I removed and disassembled the motor this morning for 2 reasons.

1. I will fit a shaft encoder. This will give me better starting torque which has always been a problem. Hopefully it will also prevent exceeding pull-out torque as well. The encoder I used is the from PCA. It has 800 pulses per revolution . The part number is INHG-12HS-33AM / 0800

The reason I chose this one is because it is IP65, can be fitted on the fan end of the shaft after turning the shaft down to 12mm and will not be in the way of the electric fan.

2. To see if I can rewire the phases in parallel in order to convert the motor to 415v star configuration. Unfortunately the wiring is all gooped up with a hard substance making it imposable to locate and hack into the wires. Perhaps it will be rewound sometime.

Here are some pictures of the phase configuration.
There are 36 slots






Sunday, 24 January 2010

Youtube Disco

http://www.youtube.com/disco Create music video playlists within Youtube.

Disco Turns YouTube Into Your Own Personal Music Library

Saturday, 26 December 2009

Electrolux Update

Long time no post.

After traveling around the world in November for work, Christmas has now been and gone.

4 weeks ago I found the tops of the contactors (relays) that connect the 48 volt battery blocks together were loose. Since then the electrolux has run almost perfectly. I am not sure a bouncing contactor could cause the "Earth Fault" but this is the only thing I have found wrong.

the pre-charge contactor in the VFD is sometimes not closing properly, but that causes an under voltage alert.

So all in all things are going well. Fingers crossed.

I have now traveled over 1100 km and am wearing the EV grin as I see the petrol prices steadily increasing.

Monday, 16 November 2009

I'm go'in on a bear hunt... and Friday the 13th.

I have been traveling for work this month and am currently in the US, in NJ. I took a Sunday drive today to the High Point State Park and the Delaware Water Gap. When I was driving through some beautiful autumnal bush I saw a guy stopped taking photos of a bear. Never having seen a bear in the wild, I had to stop and take a pic.


Also, I stopped for a snack at Blairstown Diner. Its claim to fame is that it was one of the locations for Friday the 13th. Here is a shot of the Diner and the 'Canyonero'







Wednesday, 21 October 2009

Blue Toung Lizard

This Blue tongue wandered past my office door today. Its nice to see some wildlife around.


Ive got some good news and some bad news

Bad news first. The ute is dieing with the 'Earth Fault' on the controller pretty much daily this week. After running faultlessly for over a week.

The good news is that I may be isolating the problem to a connector in the drive.

Time will tell.

Sunday, 18 October 2009

A New Look At An Old Design The Prehistoric Alignment Of World Wonders

This is fascinating reading! at least for those that enjoy geography, math & history.

Ancient civilizations were way smarter than we give them credit for!

I wonder how this fits with biblical timelines and history. Presumably post Noah (2400BC) / Tower of Babel (2300BC)

"Great circles are straight lines that go all the way around the center of the earth. The equator is a great circle. Meridians of longitude that cross over the north and south poles are also great circles. For every location on a great circle, it's antipodal location is also on the circle. Other than the equator itself, any great circle crosses the equator at two antipodal locations, 180° apart. Other than the equator and meridians of longitude that run due north and south, any great circle reaches it's maximum latitudes at two locations that are 90° of longitude east and west of the two locations where the great circle crosses the equator.

Easter Island, Nazca, Ollantaytambo, Paratoari, Tassili n'Ajjer and Giza are all aligned on a single great circle. Additional ancient sites that are located within one tenth of one degree of this great circle include Petra; Perseopolis; Khajuraho; Pyay, Sukothai and Anatom Island.

Near Ollantaytambo, Machupicchu and Cuzco are within one quarter of a degree. The Oracle at Siwa in the western Egyptian desert is within one quarter of a degree. In the Indus Valley, Mohenjo Daro and Ganweriwala are within one quarter of a degree. The ancient Sumerian city of Ur and Angkor temples in Cambodia and Thailand are within one degree of the great circle. The Angkor temple at Preah Vihear is within one quarter of a degree."