[DRIVING] Peugeot 406 coupe Pininfarina with Leaf motor and Ampera inverter [FINISHED]

[Isaac96]

Maybe you can trace back the wiring for the other beeper? Then just put your own in.

-Isaac

[arber333]

I already installed beeper in the drivers door. It chimes annoyingly if you open the door. This should do for now. Later on i will find one 12V contact supply wire that will work only when key is turned. I believe windows are powered only if you insert the key. I will steal one wire there.

Further list of demands:
13. There is a demand to declare battery box content in battery cell configuration and in kW. I made stickers on the cover.
14. Maximal voltage is derived from that parameters. I surprised them when i declared lower maximal voltage they expected. I explained them i will not charge more than 4.05V per cell and that ammounts to 389Vdc. They expected 4.2V per cell.
15. Also they demand battery box has a vent on the lowest part to vent gas that may form inside box. I used 2x regular 8mm tire vents and simply bolted them from the inside out.
16. Also all removable battery box covers, battery boxes, DCDC, Charger, inverter and motor that is not welded in need to be connected to car chassis by 6mm2 discharge cable. I used braided copper cable shield from some cables that i took apart for signals. In any case you need good connection between motor - inverter- chassis because of signal immunity!
17. You need to weigh an empty car when conversion is complete. I did it at a scrap yard where they can also issue you some official receipt. Mine is now 1.450Kg whereas with old gas guzzler it was 1.650kg! Quite an improvement over all hydraulic ATX and large 3,0L V6 engine.
18. We derived max speed from motor max declared RPM divided by final drive ratio. I think it is 158km/h which is still respectable i think.

If i remember from my Mazda, our TUV was not as thorough in 2013.

[arber333]

In other news i found out what was bothering my Pug drivetrain. It was not only a bearing support.
The left inside CV joint has a halfh siezed bearing. In by itself i couldnt determine that since the wheels had so little resistance when lifted up. It was only when my friend an i tried to rotate both wheels simultaneously we noticed the LH side was grabbing the differential. I noticed a slight tick in the CV joint when turning outside of allignment. I guess this was something that was declaring itself before failure.
I will need to take that CV apart, inspect the bearings and the outer surface. Maybe it will be enough to just replace the one bearing. If not i will need to change the whole Leaf CV bucket.

[arber333]

Now we are very close to making Pug road legal!
I have applied to Slovenian DMV office and my application got accepted. I also passed another visual inspection and test drive . As the TUV wasnt enough... Now i am waiting for the system to release my car as EV so my insurance agent can make me a modified policy. I hope to be roadworthy and driving by next week. YAY!

Then comes the chademo equipment!

[johu]

So you will get it road legal with TÜV and Slovenian authority interworking?

Did you ever have to drive to Munich again?

[arber333]

So you will get it road legal with TÜV and Slovenian authority interworking?

Did you ever have to drive to Munich again?

I took it there once. They gave me 5 findings that i had to resolve. The most serious fault they considered insufficient driver sound alert. They allowed me to send them video and photo evidence of rectified findings. I had it solved in a day or so anyhow. Then they sent me the TUV and surprisingly a technical inspection receipt. You know the brakes and lights...
Both certificates are recognised in Slovenia. They still had to do a visual inspection and i gave them my technical report again. But now they are content.

After the smoke clears and my car is legit i will go on the offensive. I will try to get option to make individual HV EV conversion legal in Slovenia. There seems to be some exceptions to the UN ECE R100 R2 EMC/EMI rules at least in some EU regulative i found that EU member states are allowed to install their own rules regarding those EV vehicles. It seems that only applies within the national borders. Also that is also true for insurance of such a vehicle. But still...

[arber333]

I got Slovenian homologation certificate today! Now i can go and register the car.
Still first i need to pass technical inspection like all ols cars .

Of course i couldnt resist and took the car out some. I went to one EVSE located close by. Hm... failure or partial success? When i have a simple EVSE at home and it works on my charger interface, i just couldnt make the charge there. My interface kept jumping to ON/OFF charge, I guess it couldnt sense the pilot CP signal correctly. Will test some more.

[arber333]

Shit! Shit! Shit! I managet to deform my Ampera cells. DOH!

I experimented with Lebowski inverter start settings and transition from sensored to sensorless. Also i expanded the acceleration limiter. I managed to get the car rolling directly from start to some 20km/h and then IT PULLED! BMS showed i pulled some 450A and i was grinning all the way. I repeated this session a couple of times. When i came back and inspected the battery i was apalled! On every module the endmost cell was a bit bulged and module surface was hot to touch. I let them cool down and then connected them to charge slowly at 8A. Well they went up to 4V per cell OK.
I guess i would have to have liquid cooling setup. System is certainly capable of more power still.

I am not sure if the deformation caused some damage or not. I will have to test at low end of SOC.

[arber333]

Well, remember when i said i had siezed LH CV joint tripod bearings? Well that was not true. Rather i made a dumb mistake when copying the length and forgot to pull out on the tripod so it would be extended like in its natural position. Instead i just copied it in the innermost position with wheels down. Naturaly you all know right triangle? Well i forgot the hypotenuse is allways longet than cathetes. All in all i didnt listen at my geometry class!
So my CV axle was pushing at the lip of the tripod casing everytime it came around. In 10000km i wouldnt have an axle...

So i went and cut my LH CV axle again. This time i made many measurements and tried to assemble the joint without grease and rubber. I needed to take off 20mm of the axle! I went to a machine shop with a lathe and they cut the shaft and beveled the edges so it would be easier to weld. Then additionaly they made a pin to fit on the inside of hollow shaft. Next they drilled 2 8mm holes in each shaft section at 90deg and assembled everything. I went to the car with everything and tried one more time. The shaft spun clear. Sadly i hadnt had my phone handy so no pics of the process .
Then i ask my friend with huge MIG/MAG welder to weld the shaft for me. He filled the beveled circumference and the 4 holes. Then i liberaly sprayed the shaft with zink spray. Now hopefully everything would carry 200kW if needed!

I went for the test ride and everything works, car is silk smooth on the road and i am surprised how good the wheels are tracking. Now what is left is to go for wheel aligment, just in case i made some errors when assembling the front bridge.

[arber333]

Again for some improvement!
Last time i went on the highway and drove some 40km to a friend and charged there. Remember i have my temp gauge wired with some parallel resistance to create higher temp. That way dry temp sensor alarm wouldnt get me at start. When i leaned over and touched the coolant hose leading to radiator i was shocked! It was hot. Luckily it was not hot enough to fault the inverter.
Now i am playing with cooling fans controls. I see the logic behind a two fan start. First they start slow and then relays click! Now fans start to run at full speed which is quite loud.
I also found out that i can trigger start behaviour with the 4th contact on pressostat. If i give it 12V it will start fans and if i pull it they will stop.

Now in practical terms i have 3x relays between fans. I experimented with taking them offline and figured which relay was for which function. In the end i cut positive control wires to two relays and now with a single pressostat wire i can start both fans at 1/2 speed. Though full speed is not available anymore i think i will be good with half rpm. It is much quieter and lower 12V consumption.

[johu]

Can you see any temperature reading, inverter or motor?
Even on a day like yesterday (35°C peak) the motor only got warm. And remember I have just a tiny radiator, I drove Autobahn with steep inclines (Kasseler Berge) and sometimes I drove 150 km/h. Only then could I see the temperature rise to 70°C.
So if you get that much heat on a 40 km drive, maybe something is not parametrized right. Unless you drove 40km steep uphill

[arber333]

So if you get that much heat on a 40 km drive, maybe something is not parametrized right. Unless you drove 40km steep uphill

Yes exactly, I actually drove 30km on highway at 120kmh and then 10km at slower speed steep uphill. It seems like this was the factor with heat buildup. I am content now everything will work and I have positive control.

Like i said i had to adapt temp sensor with another 470R resistor in parallel so now it shows 75deg when i start "engine". Anything less and BSM would throw an error and assume temp sensor is dry. That also means system is calibrated to a different critical temperature than before. I think it is closer to actual 90deg while before it was 130deg which is fine for inverter and even better for motor magnets.
https://leafdriveblog.wordpress.com/202 ... al-errors/

I will have to relocate battery from Mazda to try any long distance drive... we ll see how it goes then...

[jalovick]

Ha, damn sync motors
Polo is also a bit light on the nose and starts misbehaving at higher speeds or when it's wet. I have artificially jacked up the back with harder springs and spacers but that just hides the symptom.

Yes you should load it down and I'll have to load down Touran as well.

As cheesy as it sounds, adding a front spoiler will improve stability at speed. I used to own a Suzuki Cappuccino, and adding a larger front bumper/spoiler made all the difference at over 100 Kph.

Jamie

[arber333]

As cheesy as it sounds, adding a front spoiler will improve stability at speed. I used to own a Suzuki Cappuccino, and adding a larger front bumper/spoiler made all the difference at over 100 Kph.

Jamie

True, i went from 60 - 40 gas version to 50 - 50 with LiFePo and back to 60 - 40 with LiPos in my mazda and stability was not an issue per se. I needed to put some 20mm shims over rear coils to keep it in line... because of the front lights!!! Go figure.

Here with 406 it seems i have again 50 -50 distribution and nose is slightly going up. For now i dont see any stability issues. I really need battery weight up front because engine + ATX combo weighed more than 300kg together. Now Leaf gen 1 motor with gearbox and shafts weighs cca 100kg and i put about 150kg of batteries in the front box. I am waiting now on Jag battery... Ups... spoiler alert!

I am also thinking of attaching a front rubber curtain from front lip down to road level. This should block the air from entering underside. Ampera has this feature and i guess it improves its handling and Cd.
Also once i put all chargers in i will cover the underside with 2mm alu panels for smooth surface and protection for equipment underside.

[jalovick]

I am also thinking of attaching a front rubber curtain from front lip down to road level. This should block the air from entering underside. Ampera has this feature and i guess it improves its handling and Cd.

Just a few centimetres makes quite a difference. I think on the Cappuccino was 3 or 4 cm, but it made a big difference.

Another thing to look at is adjusting the front suspension setup. A good suspension workshop can adjust the suspension setup to meet the new balance, if it's not possible to keep the same weight balance.

Adding an underfloor cover should help the aero, but it's important to make sure it's stable.

Jamie

[arber333]

Damn! I will just let slip the dogs of mechanical engineering... Some engineer i am .
My negligence caught up with me. If you remember from the motor mounting post i made a rather flimsy rear mount and convinced myself that torque will only pass through it in one direction. Well DOH! Torque passes through it from two sides...sometimes more than one reversals in a second! This really stressed the 12mm bolt which was fixed only from one side. And last weekend it broke just as i was trying to setup the motor parameters.
Of course motor was jumping at less than ideal settings and caused additional stress in the single mounting point. This sheared the bolt clean off.

I went back to the drawing board and this time i decided to make a propper fork mount with a box fixture. I welded the box on my first try and it seemed it would work.

But i noticed the rear edge of the box leans over to the HPAS body! That is unacceptable and prone to damage. So i decided to cut the box from the plate and reweld it at an angle, so that rear box part would clear the HPAS body behind the motor. There will be a lot of welding involved!!!

[arber333]

Well i have done some more driving and i noticed a disturbing thing. When inverter started PWM at car driveoff and sometimes when it stopped my speedo went crays and turned almost to full speed 240kh/h. It was really annoying, but nothing more, untill i noticed the speedo really governs the odometer. I thought this was counted by signal from ABS sensors! Lazy engineers went the easy route obviously .

Now if i dont want to have the signal raising my Km driven i will have to shield the cables that go to my junction box. No problem, i have 4 core LiYCY shielded cable and i really need only 3 cores from axle sensor to the box. Then there is a 4 core from the box towards speedo dial. I am not sure where the pulses come in. I will probably need to take everything apart

Here is a strange thing though. RPM indicator surprisingly does not bounce even with the fact it takes and process the same signal as speedo. So i could assume arduino signal is good and errors show on the original wires after arduino interface.
Maybe i should just build a low pass filter for blanking signals over 200Hz.

[arber333]

Finally i made enough of the BMS boards that i can comfortably go and slaughter those Jaguar modules.

I cut them down to 2P blocks for 120Ah.
First i remove the plastic cover and BMS connection. Then i mark cuts that will make the 2P blocks. Some of them can be used 2P2S since they were
meant to connect to the other side of the module.

I then separated individual cells and drilled 5mm holes in their tabs. I connected cells in groups of 2P8S with a tab for + and - side.

Today I have made enough cells to fit into the front box. Hurrah! And when i calculated their number i got 10 groupd of 8 cells which i will use in modules of 16 cells as BMS supports that. And behold, all 80 cells will fit the front box! I guess rear box will holt only 2P16S + 2P8S which is 86Vdc

[arber333]

I made more of the BMS cables for my Minifit connectors. I think they are great. Very compact and firm attachment to the board.
I crimped terminals and inserted the wires by their numbers so that there would be no doubt on how to assemble them on the battery side.

After some more work on the battery packs i was looking at how to assemble and connect them in my pack. Orientation of the packs is vital to ease of assembly. I learned with Mazda that i need to put modules together so that assembly/disassembly is safe even using metal tools.
I was sitting in front of the battery thinking how to do that in constrained space of the battery box, when it dawned on me! Battery terminals are oriented to bolt cables from the top. If i would make them accept copper rails from the sides, i could make the connections more managable... straight rails. Also since i will be stacking two modules one over the other i need to pay attention to clearance between two modules. But terminal is just under the top/bottom of the modules leaving no space for the head of the connecting bolt. Just using the bolt on existing terminals would create possibility bolt heat would touch something conductive on the other pack and ... BANG!

But end terminals are welded to battery tabs. And any twisting could tear them off and destroy that module! And taking 2P8S modules apart is out of the question since i already taped the modules up and made all packages nice and tight.
Question is how to bend 1mm thick end terminal by 90deg in a specific spot? Answer lies in a correct use of torque and support.
To achieve that i made a bending tool. It is made from 4mm copper contact, steel could do, but it is more difficult to form.

I bent it at right angle and cut one end to size, so it will support the force of my torque directly on the spot where contact needs to bend. The other side i bent up and taped it up so it wouldnt hurt my hand.

I also drilled a hole for the M6 bolt and after some thought i decided to solder a nut underneath it. This allows me to assemble the whole thing without having to look everywhere when that nut rolls away .

With this tool bolted to the terminal i pushed into the terminal to keep it in position and pushed down on one end. Terminal twisted exactly on the spot i desired and the form of the tool allowed me to remove it sideways from the bend. Voila!
I now have all my end terminals bent so they accept rails from the side.

[arber333]

This weekend i went through the RLS RMF44U, commutation encoder manual here: https://www.rls.si/eng/fileuploader/dow ... utions.pdf

Because i just couldnt capture encoder 0° I decided i need to take apart the encoder and inspect magnet mounting and rest of assembly. Because i needed to do lots of steps quickly and by myself i wasnt able to take pictures.

What i found out...
1. I found my encoder mount had only 2 bolts fixing it to the motor case. What an error! It seems i was in a hurry and put only 2 bolts in to test the assembly and then forgot to close everything for sure.
2. I found that my magnet mount was rubbing on the encoder mount/plate on the inside. Probably because of the incorrect fitting.

I also discovered when i tightened the fittings that magnet mount protrudes just a tiny bit over encoder fitting. I couldnt torqued it more because it came to its stop on the motor shaft, So i took it off and put it in my lathe and shaved about 1mm off of the rear side. I deburred edges and tried to install it. I could set it in ok with a little play.
Sergio Fabris from RLS explained to me that magnet itself is not susceptible to high temperature and can withstand some 600°C before it looses its magnetic properties. But he also explained the optimal gap under the encoder plate is 0.5mm to 1mm. If encoder is too close or too far it would not capture correct sensor position.

Then i went on to calibrate hall sensors and i got good 0° capture with some 3° of deviation. I will need to work on that still.
But now i get really good driveoff in reverse. But i still got quite some jolt in the forward direction. That got me thinking my motor mount is to be blamed... It has large holes in its rubber to alleviate vibrations from diesel engine. Electric motor does not oscillate, but rather moves through the whole amplitude. This might move the sealant block center to its edge where it hit the metal edge... bang! Also that move is detrimental to motor position readback.
I took the mount down and filled the holes with some Sika window sealant that is elastic after drying and can withstand a lot of force. After drying off i put the mount back in the car and went for a test run.
That trembling just before stop is gone now. All I had to do is recalibrate sensors.
Vibration has lessened substantially but that mount rubber is still too soft for my liking. I think i will order replacement sealant block and push it in the mount later.

Also i had another problem. All the banging and motor jumping has caused my motor mount to break. It split on the weld seam and was causing terrible noise in my engine bay. I guess 3mm box and my welding skills were not enough to prevent that.
I took one 5mm metal plate and cut myself L shape out of it plus a triangular brace. It even looks better and more compact now. I welded old fork and new mount together and paint it with Zinc spray.
I finally gave it a coat of black paint and then put it in the car. Now there is no more banging and motor feels really firm.

[johu]

This sounds familiar, you might remember: viewtopic.php?p=2142#p2142
My motor mounts are also too flexible and the whole drive train swings a lot. The left motor mount is not even solidly connected to the rubber, it just inserted into a rubber hole.

[arber333]

This sounds familiar, you might remember: viewtopic.php?p=2142#p2142
My motor mounts are also too flexible and the whole drive train swings a lot. The left motor mount is not even solidly connected to the rubber, it just inserted into a rubber hole.

True! Remember our conversation about Openinverter vs Lebowski shaking on start? Well i just brought that to minimum.
I recommend you revisit your motor mounts because they actually contribute a lot to general resolver control stiffeness. Now that my 3rd rubber mount is allowed to only move a little under torque the counter shakes at driveoff from standstill die off really quick. I really need to replace that rubber shock block with one made from full rubber.
Any electric motor only needs rubber mounts so it doesnt transfer noise to the frame. It does not need mounts to dampen any amplitude vibrations. If you install some you will get undesired movement in your resolver control which you will have to dampen with software. It all creates undesirable delay in FOC feedback and means motor feels less springy.

[SKB123]

Hi and well done, I'm also working out a Peugeot project

I'm planning my motor and drive shaft attachments at the min, do you mind sharing photos of how you have dealt with the driveshaft behind the motor please.
Thinking of adding an angled plate to the motor gearbox plate - looking for your best advice

[arber333]

Hi and well done, I'm also working out a Peugeot project

I'm planning my motor and drive shaft attachments at the min, do you mind sharing photos of how you have dealt with the driveshaft behind the motor please.
Thinking of adding an angled plate to the motor gearbox plate - looking for your best advice

Hi, thanks.

This is my 3rd iteration and considering i am ME i have not done a good job untill now .

For my EM61 Leaf motor i have made a 5mm back plate to bolt on to the back of the motor and i welded my mount iterations to it.
For connection to the chassis i used mounting block from Renault Traffic diesel car mostly because it was available and it was also oriented correctly for my purpose. Most work was with the "fork box" where the rubber mount meets the motor. In the latest iteration i took the old "fork box" which is evidently satisfactory and welded it to a new L shaped 5mm sheet metal profile. I had to make a hole where the bolt meets the fork nut and that required some tack welding and trying out at first. Then i verified all clearances and movement arcs of the mount under torque.

Here is the link to my blog where i post pictures of my build. https://leafdriveblog.wordpress.com/tag/mounts/
There are tags to choose from on the right side that lead you to various items. I welcome you look through there if you can find some helpfull info.

[arber333]

Today i made some needed work to remove the small battery and use the "normal" 55Ah size one under the trunk. That cleaned right side in the trunk and left more space for parking sensors unit.

I installed the parking sensors to add some safety since i noticed i can lean onto the rear battery box when i park into a higher curb.
Some day i may also install rear camera for parking assist.

I also installed 2x DS18S20 digital temp sensors in the front battery box. I taped them onto the top battery stack near the contacts. I may move them if i find that is not a good place. I also setup power reduction if my battery would go above 45degC. Ramp is set to 50Arms/degC reduction after 45degC.

Those sensors work on single wire bus. Every sensor has unique digital code that Lebowski brain recognizes and they read 19.3deg C in my garage. Since this system can work with like 8 sensors on the same bus i would recommend Johannes to code those in Openinverter as an option for motor/controler/battery sensors. https://pdfserv.maximintegrated.com/en/ds/DS18S20.pdf
I see some code here: https://gist.github.com/bassdread/6050f ... 4d7c995783

Also i would like to point out i got some very similar sensors from ebay. When i connected them i got huge values. It seems genuine DS18S20 sensors are 9bit and shady ebay sensors are 12bit. But they carry the same name... . I could use them and set every value x8... but why bother. Genuine sensors work very nicely.