Hey guys,
I've been thinking, after a life of absolute carbon-murdering gas cars, to get a used Prius as a daily and start tinkering around with the electric motor stuff. I do quit a bit of programming stuff, but I'm pretty dumb on the electrical side of things. I've been thinking about doing an EV conversion for some time now, and I saw all the inverter boards for sale, but as far as I can understand, that's for use on EV conversions right?
I can't just plop an openinveter on a running Prius and starts tinkering around with the MG's right?
I do know my way around CANBUS, so if it would need help to make it work, I could take it upon myself. But I just know how to do things with gasoline engines, and i feel like I should start learning about electric ones soon.
Thanks beforehand!
Thinking about buying a Prius to learn about electric motors...
- rstevens81
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Re: Thinking about buying a Prius to learn about electric motors...
Personally I would keep the cash back towards the project car, as the biggest money pit in the conversion bit is sorting out the mechanicals (non ev related - just fixing the car!)!
Get yourself a good condition base car (that you like) and buy a mig welder & gas! Many of us have been tripped up by this
Most modern cars have can bus so you might as well play on the real car.
The zombieverter project is a good place to start as it's made to be simple I want to say plug and play
Buy a auris/Prius motor and inverter with a zombie would be the way I would go (if I were doing a fwd), Outlander motor & inverters (rear) Look good if your happy with 60-70kw.
There is lots of videos out there to get you head around electricals (zero, Damian etc)
Get yourself a good condition base car (that you like) and buy a mig welder & gas! Many of us have been tripped up by this
Most modern cars have can bus so you might as well play on the real car.
The zombieverter project is a good place to start as it's made to be simple I want to say plug and play
Buy a auris/Prius motor and inverter with a zombie would be the way I would go (if I were doing a fwd), Outlander motor & inverters (rear) Look good if your happy with 60-70kw.
There is lots of videos out there to get you head around electricals (zero, Damian etc)
Rule 1 of EV Club is don't buy a rust bucket....
Which rule does everyone forget
Which rule does everyone forget
Re: Thinking about buying a Prius to learn about electric motors...
I think I framed my question wrong lol
I meant keeping all the hybrid stuff, I just want to be able to change the power output of the MG's, and maybe the engagement points/shutoff points between the MG's and the gasoline engine, no full EV conversions yet.
I have people to do the welding and stuff for the other project, but I was thinking that tinkering with the Prius first would help a lot, which would just be basically tuning the gasoline engine AND the electric engine.
How about that?
I meant keeping all the hybrid stuff, I just want to be able to change the power output of the MG's, and maybe the engagement points/shutoff points between the MG's and the gasoline engine, no full EV conversions yet.
I have people to do the welding and stuff for the other project, but I was thinking that tinkering with the Prius first would help a lot, which would just be basically tuning the gasoline engine AND the electric engine.
How about that?
- celeron55
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Re: Thinking about buying a Prius to learn about electric motors...
What you're talking about is modifying how the Prius VCU works. It's fully proprietary with not much interest for open source replacements and it's useless as a generic part in conversions. Modifying what it does would require reverse engineering basically the entire vehicle and then replacing it with an open source board, probably a custom one.