Yamaha/Yaris/Toyota MGR Trike testbed build

[thornogson]

Hello World ,

John here from North Wales UK , Here is my project trike using Toyota MGR , Yaris Inverter , and a Yamaha front end .

I decided on this combo as the minimum solution to getting an EV on the road as the bike retains its identity and only requires a change of wheelplan and fuel type on the logbook. The intention is to build something to run around locally so range is not an issue.
The project started around Christmas 2019 with the purchase of a cheap MGR from eBay , unfortunately, it was damaged on its way from eastern Europe to the point that it wouldn't hold oil so it is now my benchtop test pig.
At the same time I bought the cheapest Toyota inverter I could find and spent a good 3 months finding out how these things work, including all the videos from Johannes, Damien and John Kelly at Weber State University. In that time the quality of hardware and how-to instruction has improved immensely and coincides with a trike rear end for sale locally.
The intention is to document the journey to functionality to ease further the journey for those who want to follow this path in the future and curate useful knowledge along the way.

let me know if you're local

[ZooKeeper]

Nice!

You are further along than I with very similar drive components.

[MattsAwesomeStuff]

I don't think I've actually seen anyone finish a project using an MGR, so, I'm looking forward to this!

Please keep posting progress pics

[thornogson]

Realized I'd got the motor in backwards, fits nice and low in the correct orientation now with the driveshafts square and level.
The new brain arrived from Damien and I spent a challenging couple of hours soldering all the connections on but it's installed in the inverter and blinking at me now and showing all the right voltages.
I'm struggling a bit with where to attach the common wires of sin+cos coils? in his tutorial he shows them on a prius board coming from pin 2 on the grey plug ,
Hopefully pick up the bike frame tomorrow.
Bought a cheap e-bike throttle and picked up 2 x 288v toyota battery packs for a good price.

[Bratitude]

the prius packs? junk. good for testting, but thats about it.
but this thing looks awesome!

[thornogson]

the prius packs? junk. good for testting, but thats about it.
but this thing looks awesome!

Yeah I understand ... , my philosophy is ' Just build it !' with what you can afford/find and swap it out when it holds you back. For £300 I have 80 NiMH cells , contactors and a bunch of other stuff to get going with. I see projects all the time where people spend heaps of time and energy fretting and arguing over all the peripherals and details but dont actualy build something that moves. I hope to be down the road by Christmas

[celeron55]

I'd say two prius packs can work fine for this application. Enough voltage, enough power and maybe 20km of range. What will you use to charge them? A li-ion charger won't really work unless it's reprogrammable.

[thornogson]

Latest release of Openinverter board has charging via MG1 power electronics onboard , Johannes and Damien just released the firmware

[thornogson]

So, a Sunday morning, a pack of cutting discs and the bike frame , time for some CAD (Cardboard Aided Design) and GTE (Gaffer Tape Engineering ) and the trike progresses.

Meanwhile on the electronics side I read again the assembly instructions and solved the resolver question , next job make up the plugs and sockets that connect to the 34 way ribbon.

[thornogson]

Extended the wheelbase by 6”

[thornogson]

A couple of useful hours today hooking up inputs on the breakout board

[thornogson]

Now the festivities are out the way , got another couple of hours to get some more work done putting some torsional stiffness into the frame.. and somewhere to sit

[thornogson]

The learning continues ..
I've been struggling a bit with my early Yaris/Auris board and the changes that need to be made. In my haste, I plugged it all in as soon as I got it blinking and started looking for resolver plots. Then the learning curve went into an overhang.. I later discover 1. the notch annotation on the ampseal board is the wrong way round, 2.the MG2 current sensor is reversed which may have shorted the -5v supply. 3. R41,R42, R45,R46 need swapping out for other values and 4. to use with a resolver R30 and R29 need to be removed...

Good news! , my desoldering skills have improved no end! having discovered the wonder of bismuth desoldering alloy ( hint .. plenty of flux and mop it up well with wick before re-tinning pads and resoldering, otherwise it can be brittle... ask me how I know). An upside of this is that I have been able to harvest unobtanium parts easily from several old Toyota boards. I've made most of the changes above except for pulling one of the tracks off MG2 current sensor which will need further repair so will be ready to go hunting for jitter soon.

More good news , found a pair of RX450H driveshafts for cheap and just got the V5 document back from DVLA so it has an identity, just need to submit change of fuel type and wheelplan

[thornogson]

yay ! Repairs have been successful and I have had the MGR spinning in open loop at 150v , now to sort out the current sensor connection, load the FOC software , make all the resolver connections , build the contactor setup and fit it all to the bike...onwards and upwards

[Romale]

where did everything go? did you finish the trike?

[thornogson]

where did everything go? did you finish the trike?

Trike is still in the build , I have a couple of other builds on the go too , and been reengaging with the world post covid, designed, built and installed off grid solar on the workshop and house and married off youngest daughter! Basically life slowed down progress but we continue . Updates soon