[DRIVING] leaf powered 1983 Subaru BRAT (dual outlander WIP)

[Bratitude]

okay spent the last 24H at a budys place bringing up some of the low cells with my sky rc hobbie charger. my delta from highest to lowest cell is now about 140mv, down from about 220mv when at 80% or so.

the hobbie charger only outputs 5amps, so its sloooooow.

im currently charging up to as full as i can (highest cell to 4.2) and this is my road trip for the next 3-4 days as i chase some surf on the cost of Vancouver island.

not marked on the map, is a ghost town where ill have access to a 120v outlet overnight. from this point onwards to port renfrew, then lake cowichan, are tight, winedy paved(ish) logging roads.
not sure with my large cell delta ill be able to pull this off safely, shall see how the trip to the ghost town goes.

[Mhs]

What delta is considered "acceptable"?
Interesting trip, keep us updated with how it goes.

[Bratitude]

What delta is considered "acceptable"?

<20mv id say would be ideal.

anything more, and the divergence in state of charge grows quickly, like what i'm currently experiencing

[P.S.Mangelsdorf]

What I saw on my Gen1 Volt packs was that once I brought the low cells up to the pack, they stayed pretty close. I thought I had killed them again when I got the pack super low and super cold, but was able to recover them. The Volt batteries in general seem rather resilient.

[Bratitude]

What I saw on my Gen1 Volt packs was that once I brought the low cells up to the pack, they stayed pretty close. I thought I had killed them again when I got the pack super low and super cold, but was able to recover them. The Volt batteries in general seem rather resilient.

good to hear, iv been slowly pulling the pack back into balance, and yeah they seem to be holding just fine! quite amazed on how strong these packs are.

[Bratitude]

iv been doing a lot of remote driving, so heres some updates:

first trip along the map route went smooth. even with the high cell delta, the brat drove beautifully through the windy back roads. a few thing became very apparent:
-heat for window defog
-water pump controller
-slow charge rates
-some fender trimming
-adjust anti lift geometry(car lifts a lot under acceleration)
-need new axles

water pump gets hot running full blast when stationary, its a Bosch 0392022010.
throttle control via can would be ideal when inverter or charger temps reach a set point.

i had aclim set to the default 16 on the tesla charger. changed to 40, much better. my j1772 port has some millspec 50amp pins that match the original j1772 pins.

meet some guys whom where happy to lend their drive way for some cell balancing befor departure!

my entry for the Darwin award

e-bike charger at a park entrance, stayed the night here and topped up!

[Bratitude]

Few updates:

Had a bad crimp on one of the connectors on the ac side of the Tesla charger. Things got a little hot when charging at 40amps

lots of rough off road driving.

made v2 of coupler and adapter plate, test fit of adapter for a fellow vintage subi getting leaf swapped!

v1 coupler clutch splines deformation this was an aftermarket clutch. v2 coupler has a larger surface area of spline contact, and is a oem clutch center. so hopefully that helps

Leaf side splines look rock soild


looks like my real world range (mix of backroads driving) is about 80km. still don’t know the actual capacity of my 18kwh gen 2 volt pack.

[Bratitude]

winter weather hit hard this week on Vancouver island. electric 4x4 in the snow is a lot of fun.

but got so cold (-10) that my coolent froze. i could not cool the tesla charger fast enough to fully charge!

battery coolent is currently not connected, so no thermal management for the volt modules. im seeing a 20% reduction in range. this could be both road surface condition, and the fact the battery is just too cold!

found a 55kw model 3 battery (short modules) for sale, looks like i can fit all 4 behind the seats. no more rear battery box, 2.5x capacity increase and about the same weight. wild!
mocking up a battery box.

[Ev8]

Cool. time for 4wd drifts in the snow! New battery sounds like it’ll make a big improvement,
Are you able to make parts with external splines also? At some point I’d love to replace my home engineered parts with something more professional and less bits fitted together! It may not be cost effective though what do you think?

[Bratitude]

Cool. time for 4wd drifts in the snow! New battery sounds like it’ll make a big improvement,
Are you able to make parts with external splines also? At some point I’d love to replace my home engineered parts with something more professional and less bits fitted together! It may not be cost effective though what do you think?

They are to much fun

Definitely not cost effective for one off, your parts looks well done! Cutting splines is not as strong as cold rolled ones, which those most likely are. And for one off that would be the way to do it

[Bratitude]

more shenanigans. Installed a rear auto locker, then proceeded to blow a front drive shaft…

Made my aero worse by putting the canopy on. But electric car camping is great.

visited with arlin simon

got to see the beautiful axiom in person, and his now dual leaf motor Honda crx

[P.S.Mangelsdorf]

battery coolent is currently not connected, so no thermal management for the volt modules. im seeing a 20% reduction in range. this could be both road surface condition, and the fact the battery is just too cold!

When I was testing this time last year, cold was absolutely eating range from my Volt packs (also unheated). I saw 30-50% reduction. I'm planning on adding the heater and coolant as soon as I get a chance.

[Zapatero]

I really have to say i love this car! I always wanted an electric camper...

[Igor]

Oh this is shaping up really nicely. Can't wait to see it with the new battery pack!

[Bratitude]

picked up the short M3 modules. got the pan aswell.

missing some coolant hoses sadly.
2 of the isospi connectors where torn off the slaves. but looks like there's pads to tap into on the board. may just repair the traces keep the connection OEM.

1 module weighs aprox 137 lbs. x4 = 548lbs for the 55kwh pack. my gen 2 volt pack is 480ish lbs. so full pack is a 68lbs weight increases. That’s impressive.

packaging and timeline pose a challenge. I have 4 weeks to get the new battery in and working befor i head up north with the brat.

trying to maintain the currently excellent center of gravity, by packaging the models behind the seats. looks very possible to fit all 4.

the complexity comes in packaging. so im starting to think that for now, i may just use 3 of the 4. stacked vertically behind the seats. the pack would be 39kwh and 72s. 290v to 216v and weigh 60lb less. wild!

eventually would put the 4th module in. ether mount the 4th under the bed(or 2 under the bed!) or the 4th on top.

space vs weight vs center of gravity trade offs!

any one have any input on the lower pack voltage?

[Bratitude]

Some updates. Volt battery’s are out. new tray is fabricated. Cleaning up wiring, new routing, etc. waiting on some 2mm rubber sheet to line the batteries with.

Removing unnecessary brackets, reduction in wiring, and lighter batteries is roughly a 100lbs weight reduction. And no more battery box in the bed. So I’m quite happy about that.

[Igor]

So that's 39kwh behind the seats? That's amazingly compact!

[Bratitude]

batteries fit nice, quite happy with how clean it is now.

a few cell taps have broken, so fixing those with a combination of magnets, conductive epoxy and silicon. "re potting" the back of the battery with silicon to fully seal it off and prevent any more cell tap breaks when moving the modules in place.

also didnt get all the coolant fittings when i got the modules, so iv started mocking out some replacements to make.

they seem to be a variation of a strange German part that's unobtanium. if theres interest maybe ill make a batch.

started with replacing the original part. with the barb fitting. im going to move to a threaded piece instead, this opens up different orientation options. and simpler to make. mock up prints came out great.

i would not recommend using a fdm for printing coolant fittings.

[crasbe]

Do you want to print the final version of the fittings with SLS?
In my experience SLS prints are very porous, so they might start to leak. We had some good results with vacuum impregnation, but it's somewhat of a mess and takes some time and effort.

[Bratitude]

Do you want to print the final version of the fittings with SLS?
In my experience SLS prints are very porous, so they might start to leak. We had some good results with vacuum impregnation, but it's somewhat of a mess and takes some time and effort.

for a functional part I’d use MFJ potentially. Moving away from the right angle barb to a AN thread in aluminum. as it’s fairly simple on a late, and a better o-ring surface

[crasbe]

MJF might have the same issue as SLS, it's both powder based. But I'm not sure.

[Bratitude]

batteries are in and wired. first test drive today. cold weather (colder) is back, -5

pack voltage started around 270v, down to 240v. (72s)

running firmware 5.20, tweaked a few parms,

as expected torque and power is down, but at lower pack voltages (240v) torque is waaaay down. barley pulling. lots of tuning todo and i think 5.24 will really help.


cell delta is around 180mv currently so have some serious balancing todo.

few tweaks and the brat should make it up to a remote coastline around Alaska. few days to tighten everything up enough for the journey.

suspension is stiffer and body roll is reduced. had a chance to get the brat weighed.... 2500lbs! stock brat is 2205lbs. take note it has much bigger wheels, and suspension too..

[Bratitude]

some beach driving!

[Igor]

Oh you tease!

[Bratitude]

Long time no updates. I’ve been in northern bc with the brat for the past 4months, no real updates on the ev system, it’s just trucking along…

Range is about 160km have maybe just over 20kwh usable currently.

electric 4x4 is amazing. Very capable. the throttle fidelity is unmatched, very easy to crawl up stuff… or down.

4wd regen is smooth, great rally machine.

I think electric rally is going to be huge. It’s prefect for it. The low end torque and throttle control is simply better.

Mud? No problem cobble stone beach? No problem. it’s impressive… that I’ve have not blown the gearbox yet. did blow a rear axle… but I believe that was from it getting over extended when the brat was getting air born on a hilly gravel road…




Thanks charge north for providing funding for charge station throughout northern bc, its made this much easier!