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Did you know you can convert your existing fossil powered vehicle to use electricity instead? And that you can even produce that electricity yourself?

Open Inverter is a community of people and projects focused on open source solutions for EV conversions. Founded in 2008 by Johannes Huebner as an open source inverter control firmware, the project has since expanded to include the reuse of components from production EVs and hybrids, including inverters, motors, batteries, on-board chargers, and DC-DC converters, as well as the open source implementation of other necessary systems for EV conversions such as DC Fast Charging controllers.

#Reusing motors and inverters - aka drive trains#Reusing Batteries#Onboard chargers and DC/DC converters#Onboard chargers and DC/DC converters#Rapid Charging#Auxiliary Parts
About this image
Click on the captions to learn more about the respective system! Image source: https://www.newkidscar.com/

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Reusing motors and inverters - aka drive trains

Tesla LDU.jpg

The drive train is one of the defining building blocks of your conversion as it defines how well your vehicle picks up speed. Over the years we have reverse engineered many popular drive trains from production cars such as Teslas. As a bonus using such complete drive trains facilitates getting the vehicle road legal in many countries. By now you have a choice of low to medium power drive trains that only cost a few 100€ up to high performance ones at many 1000€.

We have established two methods of running these OEM systems: reverse-engineering their communication protocol and making the drive train "think" it is still in its original vehicle OR swapping out the control electronics for our own open source motor controller. The latter method gives your more control and power but also a steeper learning curve.

Nearly all drive trains are targeted at 400V battery voltage. Run at a lower voltage they will produce proportionally less power. Here is what we have done so far and how we've done it. Some is still work in progress (WIP)

Manufacturer Drive Train Control Method Approximate Power Output
Tesla Large Drive Unit Board Swap 335-475 kW
Small Drive Unit Board Swap 180 kW
Model 3/Y Rear Drive Unit Board Swap/Board reprogramming [WIP] 239 kW
Model 3/Y Front Drive Unit Board Swap/Board reprogramming [WIP] 121 kW
Nissan Gen1 CAN spoofing with ZombieVerter VCU 80 kW
Gen2 CAN spoofing with ZombieVerter VCU/Board Swap 80 kW / 130 kW (board swap)
Gen3 CAN spoofing with ZombieVerter VCU/Board Swap [WIP] 110 - 160 kW
Toyota Lexus GS 450h Communication spoofing with ZombieVerterVCU 250 kW
Lexus GS 300h Communication spoofing with ZombieVerterVCU 105 kW
Prius Gen2 External Control Board (Buy here) 40-70 kW
Prius Gen3 Board Swap/Communication spoofing with ZombieVerterVCU 100 kW
MGR Prius Gen2 or Gen3 inverter 18-50 kW (various models)
Mitsubishi Rear Drive Unit Communication spoofing with ZombieVerterVCU 60-70 kW
Front Drive Unit Communication spoofing with ZombieVerterVCU 60-70 kW
BMW i3 Board Swap 125-135 kW
Chevy/Opel Volt/Ampera Board Swap 160 kW
Ford Ranger Board Swap Unknown
Renault Zoe Board Swap [WIP] Unknown
MG ZS EV Board Swap [WIP] Unknown

Reusing Batteries

A09A7634.jpg

The most expensive and probably equally defining component is the battery that stores all the energy for running your car. Batteries are usually assembled from a number of modules that in turn contain a number of cells. Usually batteries are reused on a module level. In rare cases the battery can be reused as is in its original battery box.

While there are also various open source implementations of battery management systems (BMS) we generally recommend using as much of the OEM BMS as possible. Sometimes the OEM BMS comes as an all-in-one solution that measures cell data and spits out state of charge and power limit information. In other cases the BMS is split into module units that measure the physical data (voltages, temperatures) and a central unit that calculates the high level information.

Sometimes we managed to reuse the complete system which is generally the safest as you can rely on the manufacturers well tested charge and discharge limits as well as reliable state of charge information (i.e. how much energy is left in the battery at any given time). In other cases we only managed to reuse the module units. This adds the convenience of having a well tested piece of hardware with the matching connector but required us to calculate all high level battery data ourselves. This also incudes cell balancing.

Manufacturer Model BMS usability Energy Content
Tesla Model 3 Module and high level [WIP] 60-80 kWh ?
Model S Unknown 85-100 kWh
Nissan Leaf/NV200 High Level 24-40 kWh
VW Passat/Golf Module Level 8.7-36 kWh
MEB Module Level 52-77 kwh

Onboard chargers and DC/DC converters

Onboard charger

The DC/DC converter takes energy from your HV traction battery and sends it to the cars 12V systems and 12V battery. It is basically a 1:1 replacement of the former alternator. An onboard charger (OBC) takes AC current from the grid and converts it into DC current to charge the battery. These two devices are often combined in one common enclosure hence why we treat them as one.

Manufacturer Model OBC DC/DC OBC power
Tesla Model S and X (Gen2) yes no 11 kW
Tesla Model S and X (Gen3) yes no 22 kW
Tesla Model S and X (DC/DC) no yes
Tesla Model 3 yes yes 11 kW
Chevrolet Volt yes yes 3.7 kW
Chevrolet Volt 2 yes yes 3.7 kW
Dilong yes yes 6.6 kW
Eltek yes no 3 kW
Mitsubishi Outlander / iMiev yes yes 3.3 kW
MG ZS / MG4 / MG5 yes yes 6.6 - 11 kW

There are more chargers under investigation, only the proven working ones are listed here. See our charger listing for more.

Rapid Charging

CCS2 rapid charging socket

The above mentioned onboard chargers always have limited power as the space requirements and cost rise with power. To overcome this limitation modern EVs offer external access to their HV battery via a so called rapid charging port. This allows to charge the battery with a much more powerful external charger. As a bonus it also allows taking energy from the HV battery and powering appliances with it.

There are 2 rapid charging protocols and 5 connector flavours world wide

Connector Communication Prevalent countries Open Source solutions
CHAdeMO CAN Japan, world wide ESP32, Arduino, ZombieVerter
CCS Combo1 PLC US Foccci, pyPLC
CCS Combo2 PLC Europe Foccci, pyPLC, I3LIM
NACS PLC US Foccci, pyPLC
GB/T CAN China

Auxiliary Parts

We have now treated all the major building blocks of an EV, but there are many other components to complete the vehicle such as heaters, gear shifters and so on. We will summarize them here.

Additional Reading

Who we are

There is no static team or openinverter company but here we list the most active community members with links to donation or information sites: