EV Conversion using prius gen 2 inverter/transaxle

[voti]

What was the light bulb that is connected in series on your High Voltage circuit doing? Does it light up brightly?

The lights bulbs were dim at fslipspnt 3, 10 %ampnom but and their brightness grew at 15% all the way to 30% and after that they went dark and stopped blinking. Above 30% ampnom the bulbs turn off, could this be due to my power supply supplying to little amps because it is only rated for 3amps max?

[RetroZero]

I was talking about the light bulb on your High Voltage circuit. Do you have a power source connected to your inverter, with a light bulb in series in the circuit? It is your fuse if there is a dead short -the light glows brighter the more there is a short circuit.

[voti]

At some point of this troubleshooting, they told me to disconnect all the light bulbs and Resistors in series connection. And ever since I didn't connect them back on.

Should I reconnect the 55w light bulb on the HV positive?

[RetroZero]

I would have done as per Damien and Johus FOC video - see around 30 min point and see if you get the same results.
I think 3 amp/12v is too low for your HV circuit. Use a 12v car battery if you can, along with light bulb for protection.

[voti]

I just tested with the car battery. I connected a 12v 55w light bulb in series with the positive line of the car battery which now powers the HV side of the inverter.

I put in the parameters
Set ocurlim -1
Boost 37000
DefaultForward
Manual start_on
Ampnom 70%
I started with fslipspnt 1 and increase by one all the way up.

[johu]

It all works in principle but the light bulb limits current too much. Take it out, set fslipspnt=1 and gradually increase ampnom from 30% in 10% steps until you get movement. Then increase fslipspnt.

[RetroZero]

It all works in principle but the light bulb limits current too much. Take it out, set fslipspnt=1 and gradually increase ampnom from 30% in 10% steps until you get movement. Then increase fslipspnt.

I will update the wiki once this is tested again.

For my own info, is the fact that this test is being carried out at 12v makes it too low for the light bulb in series, as apposed to the higher voltage Damien had in the video?

[johu]

For my own info, is the fact that this test is being carried out at 12v makes it too low for the light bulb in series, as apposed to the higher voltage Damien had in the video?

Yes, 12V leaves little room for anything already, then dropping it further will disallow any sort of power

[voti]

I removed the light bulb and tested, the transaxle didn't rotate. All I noticed was the output shaft rotating back and forth on the same position as seen on the previous video. The shaft was a bit more aggressive as i increased ampnom, it seemed to be receiving enough power to rotate, but couldn't due to something which I don't know what. I increased ampnom all the way to 100% and all the shaft did was rotate a bit back and forth.
As I was running the test. I spun the shaft by hand and it rotated and came to a stop shortly and continued to make the same cracking sound as seen on the previous video but like I said this time its a bit more aggressive.

Am I missing something on the settings. On my control board I have pins 1 to 8 and 11 to 18 disabled "not connected" am I missing something?

[MattsAwesomeStuff]

This sounds to me like normal synchronous motor problems.

That procedure Damien had a video of, where you narrow in on it moving, should get you the result you want. I think. Someone with synchronous experience would be better able to advise you. I'm at a dead end.

[voti]

My encmode was set to resolver but I didn't have my resolver connected to anything yet. So I set encmode 0 in custom command but the motor still won't spin.

My research answers also suggested set focctrl to 0 under custom commands,I did and the results were "unknown parameter focctrl"

[johu]

There is no parameter focctrl. Where did you read about that`?
At this stage motor feedback is irrelevant. Can you scope the phase output? Probe ground on HV-, probe tip on L1, L2, L3. Are you getting the PWM with varying duty cycle there?

[voti]

Please don't mind the noise on the scope but I think the duty cycle with PWM is there

[voti]

When watching the collab video of Johannes and Damien, the resolver part of it. The final working pair for the resolver was brown + yellow and red + green.

When Damien first tested these pairs to see which one was the correct one the first group had yellow + brown and green + red. What he did was link yellow and green together and connect them to pin 2 of the control board. Then had red and brown on pins 1 and 3.

My question is if the correct combo is brown + yellow
Red + green
Does it mean i should link brown and red together and connected them to pin 2 and the have yellow and green connected to pins 1 and the other to pin 3?

Another question is to which pins on the control board should I connect the blue and pink wire for excitation?


I'm planning on moving to connecting the resolver cable because I suspect that the jerking of my transaxle is due to the resolver cable not being connected hence the inverter doesn't know the position on the motor.

[johu]

Yeah I'd consider the open loop test sort of good enough. Would be nice to see it spinning but I think you can skip ahead to FOC software now and see if you get it spinning when following our video.
The the open loop test the resolver mustn't be connected, so that's not the issue.

[voti]

My question is if the correct combo is brown + yellow
Red + green
Does it mean i should link brown and red together and connected them to pin 2 and the have yellow and green connected to pins 1 and the other to pin 3?

Another question is to which pins on the control board should I connect the blue and pink wire for excitation?

Question above still stands???

[voti]

I connected my resolver and on the spot values I got an angle reading, does that mean that I've connected it correctly ?

Even with the resolver connected I still could t get the motor spinning, which is sad.

I've taken screenshots of my spot values for you guys to please go through and see if my parameters are OK.

What I noticed was I had my "laster" on PRECHARGE, I don't know it it should be like that because as I followed the video and put in some of Damiens parameters, it changed to TMPMMAX and opmode at that time changed to RUN. During that stage the light bulbs connected on the inverter output stopped blinking meaning the was no PWM coming out.

Following the video I also noticed that Damiens web Interface had settings light manualid and some other manualiq or something. Mine doesn't, should I be worried?

Im stuck and I don't know what to do next.

[johu]

Didn't look through everything, but first mistake: you haven't flashed FOC firmware https://github.com/jsphuebner/stm32-sine/releases

[voti]

I have flashed FOC firmware and I can see changes in the parameters.
Please guide me on how to test spin the motor now because the parameters have changed. Under testing now I have manual start, manualiq and manualid

Another question is, should I still set ocurlim -1 still even with the new FOC ?.

and how do i start the inverter now because when I click on "start inverter in manual mode" is says " not implemented in FOC variant: openinverter.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=2809.

I follows the link and it took me to some post where Johu explain about having replaced manual mode.


Please guide me through once more.

[MattsAwesomeStuff]

Well you're half way there. Definitely at a dead end for me, I've never run the FOC firmware.

I think this thread is really valuable, because it shows what even someone with moderate electronic knowledge (you built your own power supply) will struggle with when they haven't been with the community a long time and seen the project evolve, and aren't an engineer who can troubleshoot what is supposed to be happening. On one hand it points out how far away a lot of this is from average people from being able to use it, but on the other hand this is exactly what is needed to identify the weakpoints in the documentation. On one hand I see Johannes is generously dumping a lot of time into one-on-one troubleshooting this with you, but, ideally this evolves a better process and won't have to be repeated with the next person who needs a procedure to follow.

Stick with it. You'll get there.

[voti]

Well you're half way there. Definitely at a dead end for me, I've never run the FOC firmware

You don't know how much I appreciate the help I'm getting from this forum, especially Johannes. I may not have the knowledge of how electronics work but I'm learning everyday. This project means so much to me and thank you for making it a dream come true. I hope other people can learn from this who also have the same dream of owning a self built EV.

You guys are awesome