New Battery Pack for the MG

Much to report since my last update. I have officially "graduated" from physical therapy, so am spending more time working in the garage. I still tire easily and take frequent breaks, but I'm getting some things accomplished. The Bugeye is basically done save for some wiring and trouble shooting, but it's still in residence at Pro Automotive until I clear space in the garage for it. That means getting the MG sold and off to a new home. Here's the Facebook Marketplace listing.

There were a lot of inquiries initially, but it was clear that no one was prepared to take on the remaining project. A test drive would also help, so I'm finishing out the new battery pack installation. I ordered 44 brand new CALB180FI cells from Cycle Charge that happily came with bus bars and bolts. Battery prices have come down considerably, so I can add the costs to my asking price without breaking the bank. That would result in a 25.3kWh pack that should give a little over 100 miles of range. I also ordered a new charger and DC/DC converter from Thunderstruck Motors that were a better match for the new pack voltage.

Crate of 36 cells plus 8 additional

Crate nicely packaged

Twenty cells fit perfectly on the rear platform

New Charger and DC/DC Converter mounted to forward battery end cap.

Twenty one cells fit the forward platform with room for the end cap components. The three remaining cells mount under the forward control board.

The forward board has the NACS (Tesla) charge port, charge LED indicator, Thunderstruck Charge and BMS controllers, and the maintenance switch. The gap between the cells allows for the switch wiring. Yet to be placed are the 12 volt battery and a couple of relays. 

Jack Rickard always said that 80% of the effort in converting a car to an EV lies in planning the battery and component layout. The remaining 20% on this project will entail building the battery container boxes and the high voltage, BMS, and 12 volt wiring. Stay tuned as we finish this up.

Progress on Several Fronts

 Pleased to report that things are moving ahead on the car repair and my physical repair. I've retired both the walker and the cane, and am getting around pretty well without the assist devices. I'm still regaining balance and strength, but less awkward than before if a bit slow. Even better, after nine months of rehab my physical therapy team has reduced my visits to every other week. I need to keep up the home exercise and hope their evaluation holds. Now to lose the twenty pounds I picked up with steroid meds and sedentary lifestyle while healing.

That means I've been able to increase quality time in the garage. Robert brought over the finished rear battery box and the battery cells. We designed it to hold the four extra cells, bringing the total to 48, balanced 24 front, 24 rear. Wired the set with Jack Rickard approved flexible bus bars and Nordlock washers, all from EVTV Motor Verks.

Added the sensor wiring for the 

Thunderstruck BMS, then tidied up the arrangement with some zip ties so none of the wiring is touching terminals or bus bars.

Built up the electronics mount board for the charger, Master Control Unit, solid state relay with heat sink, rear pack fuse, hall effect current sensor, 2/0 Anderson connector, and BMS Satellite. The black box behind the BMS contains all the extra length sensor wires, neatly coiled and out of harm's way.

What remains is to finish out the control unit and relay connections in the car and add the Anderson Connector's mate which will also function as the service disconnect. Finally, have the whole rear battery box assembly returned to Pro Automotive and lifted into place in the rear boot.

So this saga promises to come to a conclusion as both the eBugeye and yours truly are rehabilitated and return to normal, whatever that is ... more to come!

New Page, New Chapter

 

My Porsche 924S EV has been on the road in one form or another since late 2015 and has served well as a daily driver and occasional show car. Since re-adding the eBugeye "Sunshine" to the fleet and later the Tesla Model 3, the Porsche has been relegated to shuttling between the garage and street parking, no longer the prime buzz around town ride it was. It hasn't helped that since my back injury, it has become very difficult for me to get in and out of the driver's seat.

After offering both the Porsche and the evTD for sale, the Porsche has found a new home with Ian Harris, whom I knew from EVCCON. I trust Ian's experience with EV's and know he will do a great job taking the PorschEV to the next level.

In the meantime, he can enjoy tinkering and updating the car, driving it often, and increasing his own skill set through re-engineering the stuff that I put together.

Ian made the road trip down from Cape Girardeau, Missouri with Mckinley (hope I spelled that right) and his friend Robert Dunn, who hosts the Aging Wheels Youtube channel.

All the best to Ian as he starts a new chapter for the PorschEV.

Hooray for NACS

When I got my Tesla home, the first thing I bought was a J1772 to Tesla charge Port adapter so I could charge from my existing charge stations in the garage. The wall unit was installed in 2011 to support my first Nissan Leaf and has since faithfully served the second Leaf, the eBugeye, the evTD, and the PorschEV. Not surprisingly, it worked perfectly with the Tesla.

While the eBugeye was in the shop for body repair I got to thinking about adding a charge port to the flip-up gas cap so it could be charged from an exterior port. Obviously this was not an original idea. My friends at Bugeyeguys.com showed one on one of their FrogE conversions (starts at about the 34 second mark). I asked Mr. Bugeyeguy himself if they could sell me one and he declined saying that there was too much fabrication involved.

Then I ran across the Electric Supercar Youtube channel and this episode on a Custom Vintage Charge Port. Still a lot of fabrication, cutting and drilling holes in the body, but the cool take away was that an Aston Martin flip-up gas cap has a large enough opening to allow for a J1772 port. I found this one on Amazon at a surprisingly reasonable price, so I ordered two. It took a while to arrive from the UK, but worth it!

Here's where the North American Charging Standard (NACS) comes into play: Now that Tesla has opened its Supercharger network to other EVs, nearly every other commercial EV manufacturer has endorsed the Tesla standard and will be building those charge ports into their vehicles. Here's the surprise I learned from EV West: the Tesla charge port has the same outputs as a J1772 including pilot and proximity connections and will work with J1772 charge controllers like my Thunderstruck units. While it will not support Tesla Superchargers, it will support Tesla destination (home) chargers as well as private and public J1772 level 2 chargers.

After a bit of trimming work with a Dremel tool, the NACS port fits the Aston Martin gas cap perfectly. Here's the bill of materials:

Aston Martin Vintage Gas Cap: Amazon

NACS Charging Socket: AliExpress

Fuel Neck Gasket: Bugeyeguys.com

Cantex PVC Elbow: Lowe's

2" ID Hose: O'Reilly Auto Parts

3" Hose Clamp: O'Reilly Auto Parts

The charging socket is trimmed to sit on the recessed ledge inside the gas cap. A  slice of the large end of the PVC pipe centers the socket in the fuel neck gasket and is secured to the gas cap with three supplied set screws. Finally the hose and clamp secure the assembly inside the rear deck of the car.

NACS charge port assembly

NACS to J1772 Adapter

Adapter fitted to NACS charge port

J1772 charge plug in place for a very tidy and elegant fitment

Postscript:

Robert mounted the new charge port on the car and it looks GREAT! Nice work, Mr Juarez. Robert writes: "The small details makes a ride unique and cool. Doesn’t matter if it’s an old school hotrod with a V8 or an old all electric conversion Austin Healey Bugeyed Sprite. The old gas tank port is the new place for the electric charge port !"

Battery Box Fabrication

 Robert Juarez posted this to Facebook:

"Meanwhile back at the day job almost have this Bug eyed Sprite battery box finished and ready to paint. This is what you have to do when there’s no trunk lid but you want to stuff a bunch of batteries in the back of your ride. Cut a big hole in the back floor and fabricate a box that will drop down from the bottom with all the batteries installed in it. I’ll have this little electric Sprite cruising around town not making a sound soon. Almost done Fred !"

Big hole in the boot floor also let Robert get inside to do some of the sheet metal work without crawling in from the cabin

Corners all trued up before welding

Parts cut and ready to assemble

Excellent fit for the batteries (note: trial fit, not correct battery orientation

Mounting brackets added

View from the underside

In place

Note the subtle curve in the
mounting bracket to conform
with the slope of the floor

Shoot on a coat of black pickup bed liner and it will disappear

Thanks Robert, really beautiful work!

Transformation

 The eBugeye "Sunshine" its looking good! Robert Juarez sent this photo of the finished rear bodywork and it's better than new.

Next step is fabricating the rear battery box, then rewiring everything. Here are some of the steps along the way:

In the Paint Booth

Robert Juarez of Pro Automotive reports that the body work and paint is all done - smooth and shiny again! Next step is to fabricate the new battery box that will lift into place in the boot floor. I'm adding four battery cells to bring it up to 48 cells total - balanced between 24 front and 24 rear. That gives us a nominal 15.4 kWh capacity which should be good for ~75 mile range. 

Of course there's plenty of detail reassembly yet to be done - lights, plate, filler cap, and all the internal electrical connections, but there is definitely light at the end of the tunnel. And with the shiny yellow paint I think we'll christen this little car Sunshine!

In other news, all the healing time and physical therapy is starting to pay off. I'm now getting around without assist devices, walker or cane. Still slow and a bit painful but nowhere near what it was.

Thankful to Robert for his great craftsmanship getting my little car back in shape. Also to Dr. Jim Fernandez and Sonja 

Wanninger of Austin Sports Medicine for the treatment and patient physical therapy program getting me back in shape. Sunshine and I should both be back on the road in time to enjoy springtime rides.