openinverter forum

OK, so here's what we are going for

I swear bending these center drop support brackets took the longest, I made 3 perfect bends, and the fourth and last one took 7 tries

hanging on its own still only tack welded

had to try the inverter on for size, I think it might could work

and here's a behind the scenes pic of the free range organic Metal Shop

you know what they say: grinder and paint make me the welder I aint, and I sure got some clean up grinding to do tomorrow morning

Gregski wrote: ↑Sat Mar 14, 2026 6:44 am and here's a behind the scenes pic of the free range organic Metal Shop

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you know what they say: grinder and paint make me the welder I aint, and I sure got some clean up grinding to do tomorrow morning

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Love the dirty work, work space! Well ventilated environment.

Nice fabrication as always

You do realise that the better your tools the less excuses you have?

Ghia66 wrote: ↑Sat Mar 14, 2026 9:23 am Love the dirty work, work space! Well ventilated environment.

Nice fabrication as always

I can always count on you for the positive reinforcement mate, appreciate that.

here I am starting to work on a simple way of mounting the Camry inverter on top of the Ding Dong charger by simply using two removable 1"x1" square tubing rails


since I was not a fan of either the Camry nor the Altima inverter stock brackets I decided to make my own out of literally garbage

the point of this boring and mundane update is to show you that when it comes to EV Conversions the devil's in the details

here I quickly learned that not all of the four Toyota Camry inverter brackets are identical and you would be a fool [like me] to attempt to make them all off of the same template


one down, three to go

this second bracket not only had to be tickled on the left to clear the protruding appendage but Toyota decided to move that little stubbie over as well

this third one turns out to be a mirror image

and here's the 4th and last one for your viewing pleasure

it's getting there

I swear this happens during every one of my EV Conversions, and as my old co worker puts it:

"Few Proplems, Nothing Minor"

A good time to upgrade to Linux Mint! (other distros are available)

Gregski wrote: ↑Mon Mar 16, 2026 3:58 pmsince I was not a fan of either the Camry nor the Altima inverter stock brackets I decided to make my own out of literally garbage

Did you just WELD steel into a 90 degree bend?

You own a hammer, and a vice.

At lest give them little 1/2" triangular shoulder gussets at the sides.

MattsAwesomeStuff wrote: ↑Wed Mar 18, 2026 3:25 am Did you just WELD steel into a 90 degree bend?

You own a hammer, and a vice.

At lest give them little 1/2" triangular shoulder gussets at the sides.

Ha ha, did you see the garbage I had to work with. First I only had to make two to match the two that already came off of the treadmill. So how do you bend two 1"x1" squares into an L shaped 90° to make a 1"x2" L ?

and as far as strength if you look closely you will see they have a dimple or a knurle that makes them impossible to flatten out, (the two I made by welding two squares also have that it's just buried in my sexy welds) so they are stronger than Aunt Robyn's Mimosas

but good looking out, I appreciate the QC

work continued on the charger/inverter bracket, as I set out to do things no one would ever see


I know you may not care, but the judges at Pebble Beach might ?

once done, I decided to weigh this monstrosity


this is adding 8.2 KanGaroos

or 18 pounds

ok it's done so let's just do a walk around it

fine here's some close 'em ups

Gregski wrote: ↑Wed Mar 18, 2026 4:09 am work continued on the charger/inverter bracket, as I set out to do things no one would ever see


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I know you may not care, but the judges at Pebble Beach might ?

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Okay, now you are just showing off!

so happy having figured out how to mount the charger/DC-DC converter and Camry inverter

so the third weekend of this 30 day project was spent tinkering with the CV Axles, first I decided to weigh mine individually, and since I yanked the hardware out of them I am rounding the numbers to 10 pounds each


9.8 freedom units

.7 stone

since the stock 2009 TOYOTA Highlander AWD rear CV Axles were 9 feet long I decided to make stubbies out of mine


note the stickout on these Highlander ones, this will effect the driveline angle

and we're half way done, but not weighted down we are looking at 18° drive line angles, that's too much

Gregski wrote: ↑Tue Mar 24, 2026 3:14 am and we're half way done, but not weighted down we are looking at 18° drive line angles, that's too much

At the risk of sounding stoopid, could you use wires to prevent them drooping too much? It might be easier than remounting the whole thing.
Edit: Just watched the video so maybe not.

On my "Beetle", which had LITERALLY A THOUSAND POUNDS OF LEAD ACIDS in it, half in the rear, half in the front, the assembly manual describes a process to re-clock the suspension one or two notches. Bugs notoriously get saggy butt and need this done anyways.

But, perhaps you need this done in reverse?