Batteries

I jumped on the CALB SE 100ah cells that EVTV had to offer for $100 each. I ordered 27 to give me a total of 62 cells for my VW. The cells arrived the other day and I went this afternoon and picked them up. The straps and bolts and washers arrived today on my door step. What perfect timing. Now it is raining again. Arrrrrrg. Anyway I found I needed a pin for my brake pedal assembly to hold the master cylinder plunger in place. I found a used one because that is the only way to get them anymore. So if you have an older VW, don't loose yours if you do any upgrades and need to remove your pedal assembly.  So I hope to have the vehicle running in the next couple days. Now that I pretty much have it all together. Not finalized for position but I hope to move it just around the property for now.

Pete :)

Live Broadcasting

I have done a few tests and one official broadcast to date. I have my new Macbook Pro 15" Retina Display and fully outfitted with SSD and Ram. It is fast and processes video quite well. I have a small Blackmagic box for taking HDMI video out of my Sony A7r and puts it into my computer where I use Wirecast to broadcast out to YouTube or Google Hangouts. I like YouTube better but it works fine enough with Google Hangouts. I tried a few other programs for broadcasting and did not like them as well as Wirecast. The Blackmagic Mini Recorder makes my video feed look like a web cam that is connected to the computer. Since it is full HD the quality is superb. My computer and internet access allow for full HD upload with out any hiccups. There is however a delay so once your up and running you don't want to watch your video via the internet. Watch your computer via Wirecast. You can have the web open so you can answer questions. Hangouts is OK but there is an audio delay to the video so if your taking your video is delayed but the audio is nearly live. Anyway I like live but will try to include pre-recorded video as well. My intention is to use live feed more with my other business than this electric car stuff. So if anyone wants to do live broadcasting you can for a pretty decent price. If your camera or camcorder outputs clean HDMI video and you have a good mic on your computer and you use Wirecast you can use Wirecast and a computer microphone and the video will match up. Then output if you have decent high speed internet. I have the business class comcast internet. I have a killer fast connection.

So I have another 27 CALB SE 100ah cells on the way. I will have a total of 62 cells so I have a couple extra. I will then have enough to put together my AC charging setup. The DC one will still be viable as well.

I re-adjusted the drivers door so it now opens smoothly and closes smoothly. Over the years it has lost its adjustment and was not opening properly. Now it does once again.

I was unable to get the Better Place Pack but that was just fine. I am still a fan of the LiFePO4 cell because of the extra long life they provide. They provide excellent power as well as life.

I do hope that those that purchase those packs get good life from them for the price. They should be best for the higher voltage systems out there. I'd stick with LiFePO4 cells for the lower voltage systems. I am going to be using a nominal 192 volts but it will still be considered low voltage. I will limit my motor voltage to 156 or even 144 and my battery amps to 500. I will set my motor amperage to 900. I don't plan on doing much hot rodding but I will be doing lots of cruising. Should be on the road right quick.

I am going to be doing a test for EPC. This is the controller that many poo poo'd. I had told him two years ago that I'd test one for him. He finally took me up on my offer but it is more checking to see if the controller is working properly or not. A customer was having trouble with it cutting out and he wanted a 3rd party to check it for him. I offered. It is good for 72 volts up to 300 volts and up to 1000 amps. Its large and heavy. I will get to have a look inside and will be taking pictures and will be posting my results on line and to him. I won't worry about ruining anything. I will have safety cutoff setup. I will use this with 120 volts before I put in the new cells.

I will be doing another live event on thursday evening. Hopefully not too late.

Pete :)

Live Video Streaming

Well, Ive been hammering out some serious testing for doing some live video streaming. On a budget it is going to be a tough call. I found a couple services that may work but there are problems. I have a fast enough internet connection to do streaming video and do good streaming video. Its something I have wanted to do for the past year. So far I can stream via my iPhone from make.tv and it does pretty good except the video can be choppy. I have turned down the quality and not gotten any better. I used my own wireless here at home so my phone would have no issues. Not. The others including make.tv have audio sync problems and very high delay rates. That totally sucks. I also get audio feed back that sounds like crap. At this point I think I am going to stay with video and then just post video to watch. Live could be cool. The costs are high for services if its a hobby like mine would be. The free services are slow, filled with ad content and have little in the way of features. Features cost a crap load of money. Like $99 per month. Ouch. Some even in the $399 and $999 per month. Seriously? Really? Best have some serious equipment and money coming in do pay that per month. Out of my league. Still looking for hardware to allow me to do some quality streaming. My Sony Camera will do some killer HD output so that equipment will be fine. Just need a good reliable hdmi decoder that will work on my computers. Prefer to do this mobile. Arrrrg. Google Hangouts is OK but still need a way to have it recognize the camera. Computers don't have HDMI in. Only HDMI out. So an encoder is required but will the encoder allow the program like Google Hangouts recognize the decoder as a video source. I have a nice usb out video camera that does pretty good output but does not do audio. The audio I can supply won't sync up. So that setup is useless. For a web cam it would be OK.

Does anyone have any great ideas on how to setup a solid quality video stream for some weekly video fun with building and talking EV's?

Pete :)

E Käfer Project

My VW Käfer Roadster Project is about to get on the road. Once on the road we will be doing video and other projects with the car. I am going to make it a fair weather rally vehicle for loads of fun around our little town. Setting up a different way to do the DC charging tonight. Should be a much better way.

Pete :)

Bites

Been mucking around some more with the DC charging. The firmware is not fully functional but the reason is because there was little interest in DC charging with the controller. The good news is however that the new updated AC charging scheme is actually usable with DC charging as long as you setup the transformer sensing circuit. That however requires you to have an AC source as well as a DC source. Its not as elegant as I'd like but have put in my piece to Synkromotive to see if they can do a similar sensing scheme but use DC instead of AC. If that is the case it will open the DC charging for anyone with a Synkromotive controller and allow you if you want to use AC as well. I like the DC route because it can provide very high input currents for super fast charging if you have the proper DC source. My external inductor works great. The problem with the current DC firmware is not the DC charging portion but switching back to drive mode is one single setup. I want no complex setups or setups that require more than one switch to make work. It should be able to be setup without having to use your computer to switch from drive to charge and back and should not require a computer to determine if your charging from AC or DC. So its my hope that this will all come together soon.

If you have the ability to charge from DC it would open up using old golf cart chargers and welders and even directly from solar panels or banks of batteries if you have an off grid array. If you happen to be at an RV site you can just plug into AC but you'd have to have on board a transformer to step down 110 or 220 to an acceptable level for charging your pack.

I think its a perfect move to super fast charging from a multitude of sources all in one package. No expensive chargers that are limited to one pack voltage.

It is my hope that there will be a true interest when we prove it is quite a viable thing. One controller and little else.

Can any one say controller/charger in one? Who else can do this? I can also charge from 24 volts to a max of 192. Who else can do that? None.

More on charging

I found an issue that needs addressed. The inductor is not in the most ideal place. I will move it to a better connection point. I also found out that the Synkromotive controller does not like the contactors with the economizer on the contactor. It has a hard time telling if its a viable connection. Best are the contactors without the economizers. I have three Curtis Albright Mag blow out contactors. I don't like them as they are bulky. So I modified one of my Kilovac contactors by removing the economizer. I don't mind because these were purchased for only $5 each. I got a total of 4 for $20 bucks. What a steal. I got them at a VW show from a guy selling off electric city bus parts for ev conversions. Cheap. I got the contactors. Sweet deal. So after some more testing tomorrow with the inductors in a better position and the modified contactors I hope to rectify an issue. I can make it work as I want but I want it to all work as it should. Digging issues out is not always an easy thing to do. The position change should be a big deal. May just fix the problem.

Charging

Well, Ive been testing and testing and more testing with the welder as my DC source for charging with my Synkromotive. A new firmware version is in the works and should be a major improvement. I have installed my external inductors in series with my motors field windings. The change in frequency makes the motor field windings buzz or hummm with the controller in charge mode and charging. Using my clamp multimeter to check amperage I was getting a solid 24 amps into my pack.  Since the welder I am using for my DC source is old it also does not provide a clean DC output. The controller does a pretty good job of cleaning things up. It bucks that low voltage through the inductors and field windings to the pack voltage needed to charge the pack. The welder provides about 75 volts and up to 150 amps of output. This is an ideal voltage and since the welder is connected to 220 volts that 60amp circuit becomes 120 amps on the 110 side of things. So with that much current available I can pump in some pretty good currents. I set my current on the controller to 75 amps but that is not what goes into the pack. I am going to do some more tomorrow and set my current level at 150 amps to see how well it will handle that power. The benefit of this controller being a charger allows you to save space, weight, and gives you the ability to charge no matter what your pack voltage happens to be. There is no bulky heavy equipment and there is no need for that. I am going to be mounting the inductors on the car but the weight is minimal. It is actually not required to have an external inductor. One of my upcoming tests will be with Solar Panels directly. I'll wire up a bunch of panels and set them out and connect up the power to the car so I can charge directly. Not from batteries. But straight from the panels. Should be smoother but would take a whole lot longer. My inductors are from some old medical equipment that was discarded and I swept it up. I have some excellent quality 1/0 cables too. They are marked as ground but if covered could be used for anything. The quality is just too good to be thrown away. The inductor is a dual wire 5.5uh inductor. I have two. I have them in parallel then connected to the motor field windings. These make the field windings hum. Power goes into these before entering the field windings. The three contactors below are the main, charge and forward contactors. Also seen are two shunts for amp meters for both the motor and battery amp checking. The controller will do this for me so these are moot unless you want a mechanical gauge. I like the gauge. You can also see my throttle connected to the board. This board is fully a demonstration board for the purposes of testing and moving if needed. I can take out a couple cables and then just pop out the whole assembly. Makes for an easy way to check that your connections are correct before committing to a final installation. It is also great for demonstrating different things. Like a dual external inductor. I can connect up different ones and compare output. So my log functions are working so I can do some quick checks and log them and label them and then compare the graphs. It shows what happens if you use this or that. These are not huge inductors but they do work. My hand is in the photo to give a good indication as to the size of them both. So until tomorrow.