LOL, steady but Slooooow!
Not nasty surprises I hope.
That's sensible. No point in addressing a problem, unless you know there is problem to address.
Nice to see this progressing
Thanks mate, I already use them but if you're wondering why the welds are so full of holes I had issues with my gas bottle. Also I hadn't properly cleaned the steel before welding. I'm doing a little better on the subsequent brackets.Nice to see this progressing
Seeing as you're going to be presenting this for inspection by a government employee, who could be a right stickler, I'm going to give you a tip to make those welds pretty... Zirconium flapdiscs.
A flap disk is comprised of lots of little overlapping flaps of sandpaper like this:
As such they have a little bit of spring in them, so they generally don't dig in, instead they only tend to catch the high pits, and are less aggressive to the base surface:
The flaps sweep across the surface with minimal pressure / friction / abrasion, like a wire brush attachment on your grinder, yet the lock up and become like a solid grinding stone when they encounter a high bit:
View attachment 238571
which means they dig in and take a chunk out of the weld without gouging the base metal. They give a really nice smooth finish, and in the case of those battery brackets, they would make the welds invisible on the underside, looking very factory from the point of view of the inspector. Don't get the cheap brown aluminium oxide ones, get the ever so slightly more expensive, but vastly superior blue zirconium oxide ones, they last about ten times longer and are much nicer to work with.
Not nasty but I was surprised there is no physical disconnect. The Leaf has a big plug you remove from inside the car to disable the battery connection from the outside world whereas the eGolf disconnect is automatic.
Probably not unless I can find a way to do it and keep the boxes water proof, they will be under the car and at the mercy of all the rain Ireland can throw at them. (And that's a lot!)
That is strange. I'd have thought they would have had a manually operated isolator.
It might be worth putting an inverted U shaped breather, which will reduce issues with expansion and contraction of the air inside the boxes, although I suspect you'll not make them totally sealed.
I might put in a breather like the rear diff and the IRD have.
That's what I'd do Ali.
OK - I thought the slotted plate was going underneath the batteries... as in:
LOL, I built my main computer from components bought last year. It was the first time in about 20 years I've actually paid for a motherboard, memory and processor as normally I make do with ancient salvaged PC's from customers after they had tech refresh. I was too mean to pay for a graphics card so bought an AMD processor with built in graphics.
Forgive me for being a clanky,but I'd prefer a manual Isolator than some piece of automatic electronic witchcraft... Could Ali reuse the leaf connector/isolator? Or should we look for an alternative? What kind of current are the motor and invertors likely to be pulling? If it's around 400V working voltage, you're probably looking for like a 250 amp contactor, could be done...
That's something I can help with, turns out oilrigs are wet and windy places too, hooda thunk ?
That's actually a good shout, can I suggest a slight improvement on it, can we route all the battery box breathers to a manifold that goes through a dessicant breather filter to keep the moisture / humidity out of the boxes?
I don't have the Leaf isolator so will have to purchase a manual switch for the job, it's normal practice in DIY EV's.
That's very kind of you and so when I reach the stage of sealing this thing I'll be giving you a shout.That's something I can help with, turns out oilrigs are wet and windy places too, hooda thunk ?
And for some reason they don't like the sparky-wirey bits going anywhere near the air with the potential gas / hydrocarbons in there. In the marine world we use "cable transits" which are basically holes cut in the bulkheads (walls) with rubber inserts to form a tight seal around them.
On hatches etc we use adhesive closed cell foam and bolted down flanges to form a seal. Actual proper electrical boxes are IP47 --> IP69k rated, depending on how stingy or generous the person writing the cheques is.
You can get cable glands in most sizes, so it's going to be pretty easy to make your battery boxes 99% water tight, if not necessarily International Space Station type of hermetically sealed. I'm happy to donate my consultation services to this endeavor
Aye, you've taken on a giant project and are doing a grand job of it, I just hope you realise my observations and suggestions are meant constructively rather than snidely? I'm well aware that I seem to spend a fair bit of time critiquing your welding with you, but there's aye a suggestion on how to improve it. I've fired you some stuff in a post above this one just to let you put pictures in your mind to go the words I've used, but when you are at that stage we'll roll up our sleeves and I'll wade through the catalogues with youI don't have the Leaf isolator so will have to purchase a manual switch for the job, it's normal practice in DIY EV's.
It will initially be 88S or 88 cells in series so approx 270V to 360V. In theory the Leaf inverter is 80Kw but I will have a lower voltage as the Leaf is 96S so expect a current draw of around 200A to 240A
That's very kind of you and so when I reach the stage of sealing this thing I'll be giving you a shout.
You've probably realised by now I don't get too excited about future issues as I'm having a hard enough time sorting out the current issues. I'll worry about that stuff when I get there.
You hadnae mentioned the desiccant in the breather, which is why I brought it up.
Cheers! You were probably heading on that track if you were already contemplating the of a desiccant.I didn't mention it, as my thoughts didn't make it into text.
I'm liking the positive dried air pressure, or even negative dried air through the boxes. Nice thinking.
Bare in mind this will be drawing a lot less current than it did in the eGolf. The Leaf was 80kW and the eGolf was around 100kW so I think the battery modules will be well within their comfort zone so I don't think over heating will be an issue.
I figured the input was where the air got sucked in and the output was where it was blown out.You mean the input to the vac pump Ali.
I plan to have the sides of the box high and put a lid on it with the sides of the lid coming maybe half way down the sides of the box. That way water would need to go up the gap between lid and box then force it's way through a seal to get into the box.
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