818C + Tesla Sport LDU

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KimchiKimKim
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818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

Hi,

After seeing EV-Control make an 818C a few years back I have always wanted to do my own spin on it. I started the project a few months ago but figured it would be worth documenting my progress here in case someone else wants to do a similar project.

Specs:
FFR 818C
Tesla LDU Sport 2014 - From a Model S
2x Chevy Spark EV 2016 batteries (LG Chem V2 based batteries) - (41kwh)
Orion BMS V1
CHAdeMO
Hopefully, CCS support in the future using the LIM!
2x LEAR 3.3kw chargers
Advantics VCU for Tesla LDU control
Delphi 2.2kw DC/DC (please let me know if you have experience controlling it through CAN I can find any DBCs for it)
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by P.S.Mangelsdorf »

I've thought about doing this, I imagine it'll be a lot of fun when it's done!
If at first you don't succeed, buy a bigger hammer.

1940 Chevrolet w/ Tesla LDU - "Shocking Chevy" - Completed 2023 Hot Rod Drag Week
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

UPDATE:

I have been working on the project pretty steadily so far. I have mounted all of the batteries (54 kwh in total!)

I was able to score a chevy volt 2017 battery pack for $1000 and it only had 65k miles on the car so definitely a snag. I had to at least try to fit it in the car, lucky for me everything seems to work out.

If anyone has knowledge on the CAN DBC for the Delphi 2.2kw DC/DC I would super appreciate them linking me it!

Also picked up a Chevy BOLT CCS port so I can get CHAdeMO and CCS Combo on the car! I was tempted to pick up the K190 module (PLC comms) but I already pushed the wrecker so hard on the price (I got him to sell me the CCS port and HVJB + all HV Aptiva connectors for $180) that I didn't want to annoy him anymore. I plan on repurposing the HVJB to hold all my HV contactors (4) for my DC fast charger junction box.

I found the service manual for the bolt online and have a full pinout of the PLC module I'm curious if it's easier to reverse engineer than the LIM. My parents got me a Saleae Logic 8 for christmas and I'm really itchy to find someone with a fast-charging BOLT that would let me tap into the K190 boxes comms.
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by Bratitude »

the great thing about the Gen 2 volt/ spark Modules is they are the same + stacking them together is quite easy.

if you get some threaded rod, you’ll be able to remove all the backing plates inbetween the modules to make on big one. You’ll save a lot of space and coolent plumbing.

https://openinverter.org/forum/download ... &mode=view

ratch strap the modules as you take them all apart and make sure you purge all the coolent out. As don’t want coolent leaking between the pouches.
https://bratindustries.net/ leaf motor couplers, adapter plates, custom drive train components
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

Bratitude wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 3:48 pm the great thing about the Gen 2 volt/ spark Modules is they are the same + stacking them together is quite easy.

if you get some threaded rod, you’ll be able to remove all the backing plates inbetween the modules to make on big one. You’ll save a lot of space and coolent plumbing.

https://openinverter.org/forum/download ... &mode=view

ratch strap the modules as you take them all apart and make sure you purge all the coolent out. As don’t want coolent leaking between the pouches.
thanks for the tip, However, I don't want to mess with dealing with BMS plugs flex PCB going out at weird angles so I'm just going to keep them as stock modules. I took most of the plumbing from the original pack so it was essentially no extra cost anyway.
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by Bratitude »

There’s no effect on the bms taps on the cells. it’s just the side plates your swaping/removing. they stack like Lego.

Less coolent fittings, less chance of leaks/ failure!
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

Bratitude wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 9:26 pm There’s no effect on the bms taps on the cells. it’s just the side plates your swaping/removing. they stack like Lego.

Less coolent fittings, less chance of leaks/ failure!
If I fit the modules together like that I would need to bend the BMS taps upwards. Also, I would have to remake the way I hold battery modules down It's a great idea, I just don't feel comfortable modifying that part of the battery pack for now.
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by Bratitude »

KimchiKimKim wrote: Wed Jan 05, 2022 11:26 pm
If I fit the modules together like that I would need to bend the BMS taps upwards.
upon looking closer at the photos of the spark modules I see what you mean. interesting to see the slight differences between the volt and spark packs
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by lsh3rd »

Great project! I've always admired Factory Five's products and had eyed the 818 as a great EV swap candidate since its introduction. I'll be closely following your build and would like to see more pictures.

I've always thought it would be kind of neat if FF did their donor car swap strategy to something electric - maybe take a complete Nissan LEAF and build something more interesting out of it. Push the motor stack and reduction box to the back and maybe even build battery boxes to accept battery modules from the LEAF. Unfortunately, this idea might be a little ahead of its time since FF's main audience probably isn't quite there yet.
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

lsh3rd wrote: Sun Jan 09, 2022 4:08 am Great project! I've always admired Factory Five's products and had eyed the 818 as a great EV swap candidate since its introduction. I'll be closely following your build and would like to see more pictures.

I've always thought it would be kind of neat if FF did their donor car swap strategy to something electric - maybe take a complete Nissan LEAF and build something more interesting out of it. Push the motor stack and reduction box to the back and maybe even build battery boxes to accept battery modules from the LEAF. Unfortunately, this idea might be a little ahead of its time since FF's main audience probably isn't quite there yet.
Thanks for the interest!

Here is a photo album of the build and everything thus far:

https://photos.app.goo.gl/akbdh1tJnDSf5RMD9
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by johu »

Wow, that's a lot of pictures :) And cool build as well
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

johu wrote: Wed Jan 12, 2022 6:09 pm Wow, that's a lot of pictures :) And cool build as well
I really want to make sure I have a ton of photos to look back at when I'm done to remind me of how fun that adventure has been! Thank you for the kind words!
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

UPDATE

Got the Tesla gen 2 OBC (onboard charger) mounted in the vehicle! I probably spent 4 hours drawing up ideas for where to mount the charger but I'm pretty happy with what I ended up with. A big part of its location is the fact that the gen 2 charger is not weatherproofed (as it sits under the rear seats in a model s. I don't have room under seats and I didn't have enough money to get a waterproof enclosure so it basically had to be mounted in the interior of the car.

The Igus cable came in the mail today. Super high quality and the RAAL 2004 orange looks super nice brand new! Both SKUs of cable I got are fully shielded.

Starting to fab up the emergency HV disconnect mount. I'm making this super overbuilt as the last thing I want is dangling HV.

I got my hands on a Prius electric power steering column at pick-n-pull (I also got an inverter gen 3). If anyone is looking for cheap inverters the Prius gen 3 inverter is absolutely beans cheap for what it is. It was $51 for the inverter and $42 for the steering column + control module that goes with it. The column uses the same spline as the Subaru rack I got off my donor, Perfect! I just cut up the console spaceframe up to get the epas motor to fit. I plan on adding CAN control on the column but I need to use my logic analyzer to look into how the control module communicates with the rest of the car. I've been asking all of my friends but none of them have a Prius with the same year as the donor I got it out of. Just another tangent to go down...

I also got my hands on my JLCPCB shipment of tesla gen v5 PCBs! I will be getting the Huebner firmware as soon as I can confirm that it works using the 5 min of charge time.

That's all for now!
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by lsh3rd »

I enjoyed the pictures... it's a very great level of detail, so thanks for posting them for all to see. Your level of workmanship on this is very high and I'm sure the final results will reflect this.

I was thinking since you used an electric steering column, you might be an electric brake actuator away from being able to port comma.ai OpenPilot to the car. Did you consider this? It seems like with the open source nature of that project you should have yet another potential rabbit hole to climb down even after the car is "finished".
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

UPDATE

Worked on the HVJB for the Tesla drive unit as well as got the charger logic board working. I sadly need to add a few parts to I had to pull it after I took that picture. I'm also building the negative HJVB (since I am using 3 separate parallel strings. This means that I need to move away from the Orion BMS and instead will be using ZEVA BMS24 as well as some custom firmware that I will have to write up to support 3 parallel strings since that is not incorporated.

I sent the CV half shafts out to get a custom hybrid. This saves me a bunch of money since a set of custom full axles would set me back $2K from the driveshaft shop. Dutchman Axles should be about $1K all said and done (including the axle stubs).

I also swapped the IVT-S for Sendyne SFP200 current sensors since I was able to get a good deal on them. Because of this, I am selling my IVT-S.
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by EV_Builder »

Very nice.

But I did spot something are your relais correct? I would expect A1 and A2 at the battery or delivery side. Now I see two times A2. Thought these animals had polarity.
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see http://www.wdrautomatisering.nl for bespoke BMS modules.
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

EV_Builder wrote: Fri Feb 11, 2022 9:38 am Very nice.

But I did spot something are your relais correct? I would expect A1 and A2 at the battery or delivery side. Now I see two times A2. Thought these animals had polarity.
You are correct. I was so excited to finish the contactor box that I just threw them in without remembering proper polarity.

good eye and thank you!
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

lsh3rd wrote: Sat Jan 22, 2022 3:00 am I enjoyed the pictures... it's a very great level of detail, so thanks for posting them for all to see. Your level of workmanship on this is very high and I'm sure the final results will reflect this.

I was thinking since you used an electric steering column, you might be an electric brake actuator away from being able to port comma.ai OpenPilot to the car. Did you consider this? It seems like with the open source nature of that project you should have yet another potential rabbit hole to climb down even after the car is "finished".
Thank you for the kind words. I'm happy you enjoyed the picture album.

I really like driving so the idea of autopilot is cool but not of interest to me. Also, it's scary to think about how much damage this thing could cause, last thing I want is to trust my life with software then I don't need to.

Also when this project is finished I will most likely not tweak it at all. I rather take what I learned and build another car but try to design as many parts of it as possible BMS, Inverter, steering nuckles, etc. I think it would be sick to truly build my own electric car not just assemble one from parts. But that's long after I'm done with college and much further down the road.
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

Update

I redesigned the HVJB since I got a great deal on a large enclosure box on eBay. I added a bunch of goodies to it (like DC fast charging for CHAdeMO and CCS.) Took a while to CAD it all up but it was definitely worth the time. I built up the custom CV axles and they fit perfectly adapting Tesla inner cv to Subaru STI 27 spline rear CV. They are much beefier than the regular wrx spindle and should be more appropriate for the Tesla LDU. Here are some pictures of it so far. I'm also wiring up the HV and torquing down the chevy volt/spark gen 2 battery HV cabling to spec (80 inch-lbs according to the service manual).
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

UPDATE

Working on the cooling system right now. I had to buy new seats since the NRG ones I got were too wide to center the steering wheel properly. Since I am using a Prius EPAS column, I needed to redo the mounting system for the WRX column. I'm pretty happy how it ended up but since I am using the stock AT Subaru pedal box (that is really wide compared to the manual one, I needed to hack it up to make the u-joint fit. Even with this mod I still can't center the wheel perfectly in line with the driver seat space so I ended up getting some Kirkey Seats. Although they were expensive they were much thinner in x y and z so I'm definitely going to enjoy the extra legroom as well as the ability to offset them inwards to be centered with the steering wheel.

After the cooling system is tested in a vacuum I will proceed to fill both the power electronics loop (with G48) and the battery loop (deionized dexcool). I'm hoping to be able to fire up the motor then and get my VIN! A bunch of features that I want on the car are being skipped right now in the interest of time such as the battery conditioner logic as well as a majority of the CAN bus system including the BMS integration with an ECU that I will have to design down the road.
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

UPDATE

The motor finally is spinning! I really wish I knew how the can emulation works for the Tesla drive unit. I don't know how they are able to flash a firmware on the board sadly but it would be cool to be able to get this working for the masses to open source this. I thought that the mcu was locked and not possible to flash over JTAG.
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by Dlud »

Did Advantics reflash the ldu for you? Or did you have to do through one of their retailers? Great progress!
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

Dlud wrote: Tue May 10, 2022 2:05 pm Did Advantics reflash the ldu for you? Or did you have to do through one of their retailers? Great progress!
Advantics did. I'm 99% sure that no one besides Advantics can reflash them. I would not buy this controller through anyone but Advantics as they are most likely not adding any value to the transaction (for that matter I wouldn't recommend anyone purchasing this controller since the support is non-existent and more like a black box even after you buy it. It's been 8 months of requesting a dbc/can doc for my drive units flashed firmware and no response.)
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Re: 818C + Tesla Sport LDU

Post by KimchiKimKim »

UPDATE

I got a VIN! Luckily the CHP didn't care much for body panels and just riveted on the VIN no problem.

I've been really quite since I'm diving really deep into embedded systems coding. I decided to redo the BMS system and instead leveraging chevy volt gen 1 BMS modules (since the CAN network is completely reversed engineered). I bought most of the LTC6802-2 ICs on eBay and lets just say that although most of them worked have some had some pretty wack mem register values when reading cell voltages this reliably issue caused me to swap. I have 3 months before college starts so realistically I don't think I can finish with how much more I have to learn in the coding department. I'm now using a TMS570 MCU with 4 CAN peripherals. Its a really cool chip that has dedicated ECC memory for each CAN message box as well as super robust watchdog/hardware level clock protection. CCS and HALcogen is still super confusing to me so don't expect any sort of serious leap forwards anytime soon haha.
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