Gaining Momentum

I am back after a couple weeks of R&R, but before we left on vacation I got to work on the car for a week. As usual, I got less done then hoped, but it really helped push the thought of getting the project done to the front of my mind. Travis and Naiche came over on the Saturday before my week of work on the project. They liked what I had done so far on the battery racks and boxes. One rack needs some better support, but I had a feeling it would anyways, so they confirmed that feeling. They also pelted me with questions about control board wiring and layout. They also really motivated me to try to get as much done in the week as I could and got me focused on finalizing my wiring diagram. The goal was to get a bunch of the wiring for the control board done and then test out the various components to ensure they were functioning properly and maybe spin the wheels with all the components hooked up.

This was a great plan, but I was still awaiting some wiring and hardware items in the mail as well as the 12Volt motorcycle battery I ordered. I worked on the high voltage wiring diagram and I also started on a 12V wiring diagram. Here are the latest "In Progress" versions.

High Voltage Wiring Diagram Ver 7 - In Progress

12Volt Wiring Diagram Ver 2 - In Progress

I laid out the control and safety components on my component board to look for the best possible layout. Here is what I think will be the final layout of the components. There is blank space on the left side that will contain some terminal blocks for 12 volt and 140 volt distribution.

Component board layout

About mid-week I received my 12Volt motorcycle battery to run the car accessories, lights, blinkers, and the control components for the electric system. I made a little bracket out of some older aluminum which I had originally bent for my first attempt at battery boxes which didn't work. It was a perfect size for the 12V battery. I will probably just use zip ties to hold the battery in place.

12 Volt battery bracket

Motorcycle battery sitting on bracket

 At about the same time as the 12 Volt battery arriving, the ERX was moved into the garage. My landlord cleaned out the garage and agreed to let me put it in there for the time being. We actually got a notice from the city since it was sitting on jack stands in the driveway and listed as non-operable. The garage is going to help me a lot since now I can put my tools and parts in there and won't have to do so much prep and cleanup work every time I work on it. It also allows me to work in the evenings this summer when I get home from work and when it is not so hot outside.

The last task of the week was finishing the rear battery box install. I am 90% done with this task. I still need to tighten all the bolts. I had to drill holes in my battery boxes for mounting, but needed to have the batteries in them to make sure the boxes were nice and snug up against the batteries before marking the location for the holes. It took some time with putting in the batteries, tightening up the boxes, climbing under the car, and marking the locations. Then taking out the batteries, drilling, checking, drilling more, checking again, and finally putting the batteries back in and putting all the bolts in place. Here are a few shots of the work as it progressed.

Ahhh Happiness

So, I did not do much with the component board section, other than getting my wiring diagram in better shape and laying out how I think the components will fit on the board, but I accomplished other things that needed to be done and feel pretty good about the progress.

Next, I will try to borrow a heavy duty crimper for the 2/0 battery cable, so I can start to make some connectors for the batteries and the control board. I would also like to start adding the spade connectors to my component wiring and hook some items up and check their functionality with other components in the system.