1971 GMCe Lexus GS450H BMW 530e Tesla Model S Electruck [FINISHED]

[Gregski]

I am pleased to report that this ELECTOP Fuse Block appears to be of very good quality, it feels hefty and not flimsy for starters

the reason I got this one is because of the dual isolated power inputs (the two studs on the bottom) the left side can be operated independently of the right side

[Gregski]

I was very excited and wanted to install it straight away but it was still 90°F in the garage at 9:00 PM last night with high humidity so I watched Damien's YouTube Channel instead, lol

then the next morning at 0600 it was labalization time

got the turn the key in the ignition switch to the left aka the ACC (Accessory) side for charging all labalized, it's a tedious process and if you're not careful you might even stick one on there straight

[Gregski]

remembering that perfection is the enemy of progress we inch forward, the goal simply being, rewire everything so that when we turn the key to the left we charge automagically (without a laptop) and when we turn the key to the right we drive automagically (this part we have already automated)

the fuses are just a random bunch I had, may be fine, may be too small

the truck has 3 circuits, and this USB charger panel is hard wired to the always on Red Circuit (the On/Off switch on the panel is a nice touch)

[Gregski]

so all the EV related wiring is done, finally, wires still need to be shortened and loomed, but all the capability is there

I do wish the Lexus GS450h ver 2 VCU hardware had 2 PWM output pins instead of just one so that we didn't have to use a separate Arduino UNO little box just to tell the Tesla Model 3 water pump to slow down, ha ha

the green thing is a 5 pin relay that simply turns off the Charger when I turn the key to the ON position (this is needed since the Charger is wired to the Accessory side which is part of the Key On power, without the green thingie the charger would always be on)

[Gregski]

a short clip demonstrating how I plan to switch between "Drive mode" aka Key On and what I call "Charge mode" aka ACC in this old rig

[Gregski]

Reason #7 why I like to buy the factory OEM wire harnesses: you get to harvest quality automotive grade wires out of them and recoup some of your moneys


this was a grade score, 9 ten foot long wires in a variety of colors

[Gregski]

with the charging automated, there was no more need for the laptop, so how will we see the charging progress?

Time for a Nextion display

It's too small! (where have I heard that before?)

[Gregski]

so this thing talks to an Arduino, and since our VCU is like an Arduino on steroids, it ought to should talk to this thing. However unlike the Arduino Due which has 4 (counting the DEBUG one) Serial communication thingies, ours has 3 but they all seem to be in use.

so out with the little red WiFi card and in with the little blue Nextion, this thing literally only needs one wire to spew things out to it


here I am trying to figure out this little creature, and on top all I am doing is providing power to the Nextion using a separate USB cable that then uses a tiny little 2 pin adapter which comes with the Nextion, just to connect to the red positive lead and the black negative lead, this little adapter is completely pointless and useless as it has no data capability

just prototypin' the GUI

[Gregski]

as soon as I figured out the pin out of that little red MOD-WIFI-ESP8266 wifi card I connected it directly to our VCU to feed it power as the EV Gods intended

[Gregski]

and here it is displaying the same info the Serial Monitor did for us on the Laptop except we don't need no stinkin' laptop

[Alibro]

Very interesting. Very nice start for building on.

[Gregski]

Very interesting. Very nice start for building on.

Thanks, I'm working on a Nextion Tutorial write up in excruciating detail here: Newb Asks: Does the Lexus GS450h VCU have any Serial Pins for Communication?

[Alibro]

Thanks, I'm working on a Nextion Tutorial write up in excruciating detail here: Newb Asks: Does the Lexus GS450h VCU have any Serial Pins for Communication?

I have a Mk1 VCU that Damien made for the Nissan Leaf Mk1 1 inverter but I suspect they are very similar in many ways so In the future I may be back here asking questions.

[Gregski]

my AC vent didn't look quite right without it's grille so I decided to shove the little 2.4" Nextion display in there so that at a glance we could tell how late we was gonna be to the next place we need to drive to on the account of charging this electric truck

using only the finest of scrap plastic, literally found on the side of the road:

[Gregski]

and from the back seat it's gonna look great

honestly, it's still work in progress

[Gregski]

with my right knee still hurting I've been staying busy touching up the Arduino code aka sketch, I made some simple changes to the Menu where it now shows the current configured values so that I don't have to press an additional menu option to display them, I can just see them straight away

this really helps especially if you decide to aggregate the 3 menus (VCU, S-Box, and Charger) like I have, I always forget which letter does what if I don't have the menu on display right in front of me

[Gregski]

[Gregski]

so I unplugged my VCU and moved it from the truck to my home office where I could work on cleaning up the code and reformatting the little DEBUG menu, and after doing all that when I hooked it back on in the truck it would NOT power on !!!

[Gregski]

so first a little background, I bought and assembled this board during the great electronic parts shortage and the thing that shut down the world for 2 years, one of the things that I installed that was not exactly the same was this little voltage regulator and I never liked how it protruded 9 feet above every thing else, and I yanked it out with the USB cable once and it hasn't been the same since, well till finally it stopped working all together, yesterday

it's three legs from left to right are

INPUT - 12 volts in
GROUND - should read 0 volts
OUTPUT - 5 volts out

[Gregski]

well with a little help from my Lexus GS450h secret FaceBook chat group I fixed it by running a ground wire directly from Pin #5 of the B connector/plug to that little rascals middle pin, hey it aint pretty but it will get us over to the Olive Garden for unlimited Zupa Toscana

[Gregski]

the BMW 530e Safety Box aka the contactor box comes with a 15 Ohms resistor, and this is what a good 15 ohm resistor reading looks like

[Gregski]

and this is what a bad 15 ohm resistor readings look like:

a little video showing the type of behavior I was observing with that bad resistor

[Gregski]

Reason 392 not to work on your EV Conversion at 2:00 am in the morning !!!

Hint: that S-box works much better with that white plug plugged in to it.

austin-powers.gif (224.62 KiB) Viewed 18888 times

[Gregski]

but enuff doom and gloom, after a solid 12 hour day of wrenchin' on the truck yesterday with a help of a great new friend I meet whilst on this EV Conversion journey, as far as the EV stuff goes, this EV Conversion is done !!!

Yeah we still need to mount some [matching] eye balls (no money left in the budget this month) swap out the lap belts with three point over the shoulder ones, install some digital gauges [once the new bezel arrives] and maybe pop in some Lexus floor mats, ha ha


this was us late last night just sitting there starring at her, after we each took a celebratory spin around the block under the cover of darkness with no headlights mind you

[Gregski]

just some premature glamour shots with horrible lighting