April 13, 2008 by Rob.

My friend send me an update with a subject of “Good for the environment, bad for society” and I’ve been tracking the debate on making electric cars (& hybrids) noisier for a while.

I’m neutral on this issue: it think is a shame to create noise pollution, but agree that there is a real safety issue to be addressed. By design, my Curtis controller already makes that whine at low throttle, so don’t expect to hear anything more from the RAVolt.

I’m not sure why the hearing EVs poster choose to show off the cool Subaru R1e, but I’m including it too.

Update 4/14: Upon reflection, I question the accuracy of the video showing blind people tripping over a Prius after walking past an SUV.   The issue is not the Prius’ lack of sound, but the immense amount of distracting noise created by the ICE in the other car.  I’m frequently amazed at other cars’ sonic volume when I’m driving the RAVolt.  <dream>In an all EV city t the noise level be at safe levels and the roar of ICEs would not drown out all other sound.</dream>

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December 19, 2007 by Rob.

I took advantage of the warm weather to spend some quality time with the RAVolt.  Clearly the RAVolt was feeling neglected because we had a bit of a Christine moment.

On the way home from getting my trilunar haircut, the brakes turned to bricks.  That’s normal when the vacuum pump is not working: normal maybe, but definitely unwelcome.  The brakes still “work” as long as there is no one in front of you and you’re going up hill.  I pulled over quickly and discovered a loose wire.  Luckily, I was just cruising the neighborhood.

Lessons learned:

1. Avoid force the wrong age wire into a screw terminal
2. Include routine “pull test” for wire fitting.

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November 26, 2007 by Rob.

I had a scary ride home in the rain, cold, and dark over the weekend.  My auxiliary battery was so weak that my DC-DC charger cut out.  That left me with very dim headlights, minimal wipers, and no defroster.  I jumper cabled in one of the traction batteries and recovered, but it was not very fun to be playing with the cables in the rain.

It turns out that the 10 amp fuse between my auxiliary charger and the auxiliary battery blew out a while back.  When the fuse is blown, the battery vent fans run off the auxiliary battery instead of the charger and eventually drain it during charging.  Unfortunately, I discovered it was the fuse only after replacing the charger.  What a waste of 2 hours on a Sunday!

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October 24, 2007 by Rob.

It’s no surprise that sulfuric acid is nasty, corrosive stuff; however, it’s disappointing that so much of it is spraying out of my batteries and onto the RAVolt’s sensitive skin.  I was not expecting to see this for a while, but I’d rather see it so I can fix it. Visible corrosion on a replaceable non-structural component is about as good as bad news can get.

The solution is to replace the el cheapo (that’s Latin for inexpensive) caps that come with the Trojans with some high grade Water Miser battery caps. These caps have premium organic lotus-scented bath beads that trap the escaping battery acid in a luxurious spa experience convincing them to remain within the confines of their downtown mixed-use condo. That reduces both my watering frequency and the RAVolt’s corrosion risk.

How much to treat my batteries to this lavishness? Just $22.50 per battery or $260 for the whole pack. But who can really put a price on inner peace?

Note: Special thanks to Erik w/ AustinEV for the tip. He’s using these caps and highly recommends them.

Posted in Safety, Daily Use, Improvements, Pictures, AustinEV | No Comments »

September 8, 2007 by Rob.

I finally had a chance to wire a high pedal bypass switch.  This switch overrides the high pedal relay for my positive contactor.  Now I can flip the switch while I’m on a hill and keep power flowing to the controller.  When the switch is off the relay works just like before.  I’m only expecting to use this occasionally.

I realize this is not as safe because the controller will stay energized if the key is turned, but it keep me from rolling back on hills.  It was getting stressful playing games with the parking brake when rushing to get through hilly lights on Bee Cave and on 360.

My next mini-project: installing a real charger for the auxiliary battery instead of the wimpy 15 volt Radio Shack supply I had been using.

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September 4, 2007 by Rob.

Sometimes I get stuck in an ICE rut even when I live in an EV world.   Picture the RAVolt stranded in a parking lot because my auxiliary battery died.  Luckily, I’ve packed jumper cables so I can start the EV with the cables.  Thinking with my ICE hat on, I ask the guy next to me for a jump.  He’s pretty amused to provide a jump to an EV and happily opens up his hood.  I connect up the cables and the RAVolt “starts” like a champ; however, it dies when I disconnect the cables because the auxiliary is too dead to run my vacuum pump.   Oh No!  I’m stranded - better call Laura and get a ride home.

Finally, I realize that I can give myself the friggin’ jump from any of my traction batteries!  20 seconds later I’m ready to drive again.  Before I go, I ask the guy who game me the jump why he didn’t say anything.  He just shrugged and said “yeah, it seemed strange, but I figured you knew what you were doing.”

After thinking on it a while, I realize that I’ve gotten so used to seeing the traction (main) battery pack as a single unit that it’s hard to treat it like a chain of 12 batteries.  Even when I describe it as 5 in the front and 7 in the back, I’d been thinking of it as one part.  What an unexpected lesson in the dangers of pattern thinking!

Posted in Safety, Daily Use, Storyline | 1 Comment »

July 24, 2007 by Rob.

One of EVAmerica’s design recommendations is to use a relay on the pot box that open whenever the driver gets off the gas.  This is a safety feature because the relay turns off the positive contactor which kills power to the controller.  The safety feature is supposed to provide an emergency kill for the motor & controller if the driver lets go of the gas.  Apparently, on risk with DC systems is that a controller failure results in a short sending 100% of the traction voltage to the motor.  The effect would be the same as a stuck gas pedal and could be dangerous.  Sounds great in theory.

Unfortunately, this feature fights with the controller’s hardwired high pedal lockout (HPL) safety feature.  HPL ensures that controller does not go from 0 to 100% instantly if the driver has pressed on the gas when they turn the ignition key.  Imagine that I’m in a rush and I step on the gas and then turn the key.  There is no cranking start up like an ICE: the EV can launch like a rocket from it’s parking place.  To prevent this the controller will not start if the pedal input is too high.  Wow, another great safety feature!

Now, imagine that I’m stopped on a light at a hill.  The light changes and I step on the gas pedal fast to keep from rolling backwards.  The pedal relay activates the contactor which powers up the controller which then reads the pot box and starts the motor turning.  Most of the time the car follows this script and the controller’s solid state electronics start *nearly* instantly while the two mechanical relays appear to click instantly; however, I’m pressing the gas pedal down pretty fast on a hill.  In that case, the delays are enough that the pedal is too high when the controller wakes up so it goes into HPL mode.  The car is effectively dead and rolling backwards!

Without known the cause, I’ve been using the hand brake for hill starts.  It also happens while moving if I want to accelerate quickly.  Once I put all the pieces together it was easier to avoid, but still annoying and unsafe.  I’m considering alternatives for fixing the problem including eliminating the relay on the positive contactor, adding an override switch, or using the clutch position as an override.  I can’t disable the HPL feature of the Curtis.  I’m open to suggestions - just comment to this post.

Posted in Safety, Improvements, Conversion, Planning | 1 Comment »