The motor shaft is about

Don't forget this is only going to be a neighbourhood type vehicle. Average speed will probably be 30 km/h. :p

Which is exactly my plan when I get bored with the electric thing! Just saving on future machining costs...

:D :D Lateral thinking. Gotta love it.

It'll cause lateral driving too.

I don't follow that volts-to-amps relationship.

If there's any play at all, I would expect it to get bigger, especially if you're planning on supporting regen brakes (alternating torque in either direction - I didn't say it that time :) ).

I anticipate great things from this project. :thumbup:

This evening: axles out, exhaust removed, shift linkage disconnected.

At what point did it become apparent that I'm completely winging this? :o

No regen - just "go!" So the wear is in one direction.

I anticipate breaking things! All in good fun though.

So how much more before you get that thing on the road?

I don't want to predi

I think that does count. It's the current thing to do. :thumbup:

I don't think jumper cables have enough surface area in contact with the battery cables to handle the current you'd need (even in a test). The clips will probably heat up, and may even burn them at the contact points (you might be shocked to find the battery terminals burned as well), but I may be wrong. Don't let this impede your progress, just keep an eye on it. I read about many EV builders who regularly check and tighten their battery terminal connections because of the effects the high current has on them. One of the advantages of going with higher voltage is lower current:

Volts * Amps = Watts (Watts law)

But you may not be able to change the top voltage your motor/controller can take, so don't get too wired about it.

The other potential problem is the voltage drop across the jumper clips in proportion to the current:

Ohms * Amps = Volts (Ohms law)

So you want to minimize the ohms (unit of resistance) wherever you can: thick cable, heavy duty terminal connections, high surface area connections to your controller, fuse(s), motor, kill switch (eventually), etc. Try to have as little 'etc.' as possible. :)

As a matter of fact, we a

No I hadn't seen the new evconvert article yet (I check it almost daily), thanks for letting me know.

Non-superconducting wires all have some finite amount of resistance and so will cause some amount of voltage drop across them (proportional to current). This loss of wattage amounts to loss as heat. Note that this wattage doesn't need much voltage when the current is high (ex. 1.88V * 400A = 752W or more than 1 hp).

Somewhere there exists well proven recommendations for the guage wire for a given current. As for voltage, thickness of wire is irrelevant, but thickness of insulation is, but you'll not likely exceed the wires' voltage ratings.

There's no electrical reason not to go too thick with your cables, but at some point it adds too much weight and expense (for both cables and connections). Copper is heavy and I don't recommend aluminum wires. Very heavy cables may also be more diffucult to work with.

Cables that are a little on the light side will protect you from overloading the batteries by providing you with a little series resistance and heat when things start to go wrong. The input shaft of the tranny is designed to handle the load of the clutch being dumped with a ICE reving so you have the torque load and the inertia load of the flywheel to consider. If you knew the torque output of the electric motor or at least the Torque constant NM/AMP or voltage constant rpm/volt you could get a good idea of the torque output. Chances are that you are NOT going to exceed the tranny limits unless you start pushing 1000+ amps into the motor. Actually if you know the rpm and watts you are pushing into the motor you can figure out the HP and the Torque but then you would be running it and would already know. Only consideration with the coupling is the shifting without the clutch when moving . . . them syncros are going to get a workout!

That's an interesting point. There's also the internal resistance of each battery to add into the loop which also has a current limiting effect.

[quote=JanGeo]The input shaft of the

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Wow, out through the bottom? I haven't seen that since the old beetles.

I once took an engine out using an old swingset and a come-along, another with a chain over some garage rafters with the come-along, and a couple with a shop crane. The most memorable was the MGB engine I took out with another guy by looping a chain across some head bolts and sticking a long log through the chain. We lifted each end of the log up, and hurled the block up and over the radiator support and down into the dirt (I only wanted the the engine for the crankshaft).

It's how most shops remove engines...for Hondas anyhow.

I became familiar with the "out-from-under" trick with my 914...there is NO way to get it out from the top.

Most front wheel drives engine/transmisions go out the bottom.

https://images6.theimagehosting.com/m...er-R-fixed.jpg

This would fail a police examination immediately in Australia. :D

Huh. I definiately had to 'lift' the Passat engine to do the waterpump.

The Metro drivetrain could have come out

Hmm... Based on past experience, I suspect a funny image is not showing up... :)

All things considered, it probably is as easy to lift a metro off the motor than to remove the hood and lift out the engine. :)

I can't wait to see this thing come together. :thumbup:

If you're going to put racks of batteries and/or the controller module above the motor/tranny in the engine compartment, you might want to mount them both so you can remove them from the bottom as with the oem ice (I know, you're waay ahead of me :) ). As I think you said, you expect to break things.

That's a good idea.

In fact, the only reason we're

So are you saying that with the 4-cyl mounts, you do have enough room to slide the motor off the tranny? Does that mean it would come out the top or the bottom of the car? Just curious.

Where are the batteries going? Are you able to keep the CG low? There are so many less dense things taking up valuable space up front on a car like that (trans, rack, etc.). Or can you reclaim gas tank space?

I'll be watching.

That's it, yes - room to slide it off the tranny,

I didn't actually install the motor. Ev

BTW, apologies for the crappy picture quality. Antique 1 mega pixel camera. :p

Great progress! It's taking shape!

If I had the garage space, I'd love to do something like that myself. In the meantime, it's all I can do to find time to breath some life back into my Austin-Healey. If I can get some pending projects done on that beast, I may 'free up' the space it's hogging in my garage. :)

What's keeping the Healey off the road (aside from the fact that according to your avatar, one of your carbs is on the kitchen table :) )?

OK, but remember that you asked. ;) That's one of the original 3 SUs that I couldn't get to lean out. They're a peculiar but faascinating design: they

actually alter the venturi size while metering the gas with a tapered needle to keep the mixture correct for all engine speeds. Usually the throttle shaft bushings get so worn that they let in too much air in and the carbs just won't work right. In this case, the needles and seats were worn as well. Compared to doing a rebuild myself, 3 brand new ones were only slightly more (about $1k in all), so I bought new ones from the SU factory while it still existed. When I got them, they didn't fit the existing linkage and I didn't want to alter the original parts. So, I chose to grind down the brand new parts.

Meanwhile, back at the oasis, the car has sat motionless for several years. I feared the inevitable varnish would plug up the new carbs, so I removed the whole fuel system from the tank forward. Now that that is done, I'm finally ready to install the new carbs and get them tuned up. Yay!! Then synchronizing all 3 is an iterative process of mixture adjustments and airflow measurements. It sounds harder than it really is, just time consuming. Before I get the brute started, I need to carefully make sure nothing (like a valve) is stuck, or I might do as my brother did and break something that requires an engine teardown.

The battery cables also needed replacing and are all set now. Oh, and the speedometer has been broken since I bought the car. It's off to a rebuilder.

...and I try to tell kids this today and they just give me the thousand-mile stare. :D

Bummer about the speedo drive. Sounds like the part of the cable that threads onto the trany twisted off the threaded part on the housing (is that right?). Is that part replaceable? If not, I'll be watching to see how you solve that one. :thumbup:

Do you have an ETA?

Ah, but this kid drew a picture of an Austin Healey as a 12 year old in grade 6 that he still remembers. ;)

That's the right idea, except it's not threaded. The cable end just slides in, and is held with a circlip type of fastener. It's replaceable, but only if I dig out the part of the part that broke off *below* the level of the main housing. I think we'll just MacGyver something instead. We have a bolt nearby we can use to hold the MacGyverness.

Unless I'm delayed, I should get it started in the next week. Get it tuned about a week after, and get it mostly road ready by December (maybe).

That's how I was!

That would be a BOSS I believe. Yeah it just pops in the hole - that way it can be disconnected easier . . . maybe.

Hey I think you may know of this conversion but am not sure . . .

https://www.austinev.org/evalbum/325

Boss - that's it.

I have seen that Honda conversion before. Neat job. AND: under $2K US conversion cost (not sure if that included the car or not).

Well, do keep us posted.

This week/today:

Started work on the bracket to

Well, you seem to be making steady progress.

meanwhile...
I got everything hooked up and ready. I was actually delayed because I needed to put some gas in the tank. My old container still had 6 year old gas in it and I wasn't about to use that, but I had to get rid of about 5 gal. :cool:

...anyway, I'm ready to test the pump and do the leak checks (so many fuel connections). I'm sure everything will work the first time. ;)