Project Z - ICE to Electric Car Conversion

Update

2011-01-23T11:50:00.000-08:00

Hi folks! It has been a very busy year teaching! We have made a great relationship with Nissan Design center of North America. Our crew was able to make a visit and see the process that a car design goes through up to production. Very inspiring!

We have sketched out the high voltage system and looking for a driver side location for the high voltage breaker switch. Since it is a sports car, it is a tight fit. We have cut out the entire trunk space and made mock up batteries. A wire frame model has been created and it looks like we have a perfect amount of space to place 8 batteries in the rear of the car. Just the right size! Fitting all of the controls and 8 more batteries under the hood, may be a greater challenge, but so far everything has been fitting perfectly, so I am optimistic. Our current challenge is welding the battery boxes together so that they fit and are strong enough to safely support 500 pounds of batteries! The school has purchased a welding unit thanks to Phil Wagner and his Robotics crew getting a very large grant. Great how things continue to work out for our efforts! We are aiming for showing it off at the Festival del Sol exhibition on April 7th. I think we can get everything up and working but may need to hold out for getting final funding for the batteries. Once again, I know it will work out!
I will try to keep this blog up to date more often.
Wishing you for clearer skies - Ted

Project Z update October 28, 2010

2010-10-28T07:25:00.000-07:00

The beginning of the new year has been a busy one. The past summer had me doing summer school and helping my wife, Jill, recover from hip replacement surgery. So, we have not worked on the car until the beginning of the school year. So far, we are working on the battery racks and I am working with a friend, Matthew, who is a welder by trade, to build the racks and supports for the motor.

Students have built 16 cardboard mock up batteries to simulate where we will place those big suckers! 16 batteries is lots of batteries!

We have begun to layout the high voltage system. Part of the anxiety about it was looking at the amazing job that Operation Z did their car. However, after looking at the photos, we are saving lots of problems in not having air conditioning. More room and it is not that hard to develop the high voltage system. The 12 volt system will be more problematic, but I think we are up to it.

Lots to do but we are on our way.

Car is Painted and Shown at Gala!

2010-05-25T07:23:00.000-07:00

We picked up the car from Styler's Auto Body shop and the car looked beautiful. We worked on the car cleaning it up and getting it ready for the "Faces of the Future" gala, which is an annual fund raiser and small exhibition of projects. Tally had spent lots of hours on making posters and putting together the media. Jimena has a great looking new "Los Rayos Engineering" logo that we are refining. This group of kiddos is awesome.
I was able to retrieve the completed motor to transmission, but I had a couple of things happen this week, so we were unable to try to put the motor into the car. We should be able to get some work done this coming Tuesday and the students are pretty excited about getting to the next step.
Let's see how this goes next week.

Update

2010-05-15T16:12:00.000-07:00

I have been able to take the students to Styler's Body and Paint and have the students do some body work. The students were very interested in the process of filling in the dents, fixing areas and getting the car painted. It's quite a bit of work! I cannot thank Joey Reyes enough for painting the car!
We will be exhibiting the car next weekend, Saturday, May 22nd at the annual "Faces of the Future" Gala. It is a fundraiser for the school and they are looking forward to having the car there to display. We have recycled some old doors, painting them black and setting them up for a trade show display. The students are also going to mount a monitor onto the doors so that it can show a slide show and possibly some video. We have had a few good sessions planning out the display. Alex and Tally have been chosen to represent the project and they will do a good job presenting. Actually I would think that all of them would do a great job presenting.
The adapter plate is coming along although when we started to get it together, the ring spacer was about an inch to thin. Mr. Q had rigged up the motor and transmission with some extra long bolts to simulate what it would be like with the proper ring spacer. He had hooked up an 8 Volt battery and we put it into gear; it worked great! Hopefully, we can get the ring spacer made this week and put it all together next weekend. I will have to work with the students next Saturday in the morning to get ready for the Faces of the Future, so I may not have lots of time, but we will try to do what we can next weekend.
Hopefully the next time I update here, we will have a newly painted car!

Trip to Operation Z in Northridge

2010-04-26T07:57:00.000-07:00

Our annual Team Vista trip to Magic Mountain was right on our way to view a 1975 280Z that had been converted already. I drove up with Jimena, Ashley, Shannon and Marcus. We took lots of pictures and the owner Joe Porcelli was great about showing all of the things he worked on to make it all work out. Dave was especially great about telling us about any questions we had about the challenges working on this particular car. The Z was beautiful and we were a bit intimidated by how great his car looked - we have lots of work to do! Deciding the size of batteries is the biggest challenge at the moment and lots depend upon what we decide to use as batteries. I had a thought about using LiFePo (Lithium Iron Phosphate) batteries (only $7500!) but maybe we could work something out with a dealer or the manufacturer itself. That would save lots on weight! Anyway, once we decide, we can move forward with designing everything to work with those batteries.

Adapter Plate Progress

2010-04-26T07:52:00.001-07:00

The adapter plate has been moving forward quite well. Mr. Q from our Kick Gas Club has been awesome about helping me out with getting that taken care of. We worked together one Saturday to find the center spot on the bell housing profile (using a piece of card board!).

Q had the flywheel lightened and the ring gear removed. Once that was completed and the outer adapter plate was machined for the profile, we put everything together to see how it all fit. It looked beautiful! Next is to have the flywheel/pressure plate/clutch assembly put together and balanced (which is now complete).
I have already made the purchases of the motor and a good portion of the electronics. That should come in this week. Hopefully, next Saturday we will be able to put the motor and transmission together!

Updates and Styler's Auto Body

2010-04-26T07:38:00.000-07:00

Well, it has been a long time since I have updated and logged the progress so far. First I have been able to deliver the car to Styler's Auto Body in National City for the auto body and paint. I can't say enough how great it is for Joey Reyes to hook us up for this gift! Since after spring break we had a chance to visit the shop and do a bit of body work with his resident expert, Enrique. Here is a photo of them getting taught a bit about bondo work. Enrique was great, putting each of them to work and showing them the processes for smoothing out small dings and such. He was a natural teacher and I was glad he was available to show them this process.

Presentation at the Chula Vista Rotary meeting.

2010-04-06T14:31:00.000-07:00

We made a visit to the local Rotary chapter meeting on Friday, March 26th. For our first presentation for Project Z, we did a great job! Here is a link to the newsletter with a write up of our presentation to the Chula Vista Rotary: http://staff.hthcv.hightechhigh.org/~tcuevas/hthcv/09-10/project_z/4-2-2010_chulatarian.pdf

Hopefully, it is the first of many presentations that the students will provide to the community about Project Z!

Car is being painted!

2010-04-06T14:25:00.000-07:00

Well, we got the car to the auto body and paint garage, Styler's Auto Body and Paint in National City. Thanks to their sponsorship they are doing body work and giving it a paint job! Thanks to Joey Reyes (owner) for the awesome donation!

Took a look at the adapter plate last Saturday. Looks good so far although it looks like the flywheel is so heavy that it needs a bit of lightening. The distances between all of the parts is also an issue so we are not sure if further machining will be necessary. I hope not... I would much prefer having a clutch so that other people can drive it more easily. I feel pretty confident that it will all work out.

Still on Spring Break. Once we get the motor and connect everything together, then hopefully we can get the other electronics moving forward...

New Logo and sponsorship!

2010-03-23T09:24:00.000-07:00

Well we have a great new logo for the project! One of my students from last year (Josh B.) did an excellent job creating a project logo. We are now working on creating a group logo for "Los Rayos Engineering" for some crew shirts that will be donated by Mission Federal Credit Union.

Great news came from Curtis Instruments who is the manufacturer of electric motor controls. The needed controller for the project and associated electric controls have been donated to the project! This is a donation of approximately $1600! Thank you Curtis Instruments!

Weekly update: getting things together...

2010-03-14T20:07:00.000-07:00

Since removing the ICE engine, we have managed to remove the transmission and flywheel from the engine. We also managed to place the engine onto the engine stand. We have a couple of pictures of the empty engine bay and Marcus basically in the engine bay helping to put the hood back on. Once we had the engine on the stand, I had some of the crew remove the valve cover. There is Shannon learning to use a ratchet and going to see the cam and timing chain! The students were very interested to see the inside of an internal combustion engine. Just seeing the cam and timing chain and a brief explanation of how it works (valves) amazed them to how complicated it looked and how well they kept on running. There are hundreds of moving parts inside an engine, lots of places for friction and wasted energy! They agreed...

I ordered the adapter plate after measuring the "magic number" (measurement of rearmost of engine to the flywheel clutch surface), which is 1 5/16 inches, I had a chance to go to the "Kick Gas Club" garage and get some help from the master EV converter Abran Quevedo (Mr. Q or just Q). His brother is a retired machinist so he will be making the adapter plate. Q gave myself and Dan (another EV enthusiast who I took the conversion class with) a drive in his "Little Red" VW Rabbit convertible. He sure is tough on his car! Accelerates and moves just like a normal car, but with MUCH less noise. Sitting at a stop sign is absolutely quiet...

Next steps is to start measuring out the battery space, taking a look at the suspension and other things for wear. I will most likely do very little other than support the suspension and then restore brakes, etc as they are needed (as suggested by my brother-in-law, Robert, the master mechanic). I do see his wisdom, I could go and start replacing things that MAY need replacing, but don't fix what is not broken!

Hopefully we get to order the motor soon and get the adapter plate and transmission all matched up and put together. Making the motor support is another issue, but it looks like I have flexibility as to where it will connect. Lots to do! Until later...

ICE Motor Removed!

2010-03-03T19:47:00.000-08:00

All of us were very excited about this moment! We were planning on doing this on Saturday, but the entire morning there was pouring rain! Very disappointing... However, we got the transmission all taken care of. When Alex, Marcus and Michael removed the transmission cross member, we were shocked to see how much the transmission sagged down! So we ingeniously tied it up from inside the car. We were ready to pull the last four bolts and lift out the motor.

We started to get everything in place when we could not get the engine lift under the car. We saw that the lower control arms were just a tad too low to get the lift all the way in. So, let's lift the car a bit, right? We get a bit further then hit the jacks! Should of thought about that... When we finally got it in as far as we could the bumper kept the lift from reaching to the motor. Darn 280Z's have such a long front end! Could we get the lift in place? We tried to think of doing it from the side, but that would not work. So the guys removed the front bumper, voila, just right! Strapped it up, tightened everything we could and started to lift it a bit. Removed the last four bolts (I can't believe that only four bolts kept the engine up) and got ready... It started to slowly rise and quite easy at first. We cleared the engine bay, with the front of the motor. Then the oil pan. Then... We were a bit short. Hmmm... Ah! Lower the jacks! The lift had cleared the lower control arms so we let it down that few inches. Ok, let's keep it going, then... The lift could go no higher! What were we going to do?! We were committed, so we put our thinking caps on... Let's see if all of that weight lifting pays off. I climbed into the engine compartment and lifted! Just enough to clear! We moved the whole engine and transmission to the next parking stall and hmm.. just leave it there? Well, for now. Next we will disconnect the transmission and engine to get at the clutch, pressure plate and flywheel. Then we can mount the engine onto the engine stand. Thought it would be cool to be able to take a look at the insides of the motor for a learning experience. All of that complicated pieces of moving metal! It has worked well, but the time has come for a more efficient and much less complicated mode of transportation!

All of us were so excited to get the engine out! It was surprisingly easy, all of that nervousness and anticipation really tired me out... Now to the challenging part, designing the electronic drive components and putting the new parts IN. That under dash mess of wires is a concern, but not insurmountable. Next is to get things rolling to build an adapter plate... More to come...

Getting ready to remove the ICE

2010-02-26T09:05:00.000-08:00

Well, we are getting ready to pull the motor this Saturday. Had a visit yesterday from San Diego's resident expert Mr. Quevedo (Mr. Q) to talk about machining the adapter plate for the transmission. Another great resource coming our way!

We have a pesky bolt that is stripped and does not want to come loose, but we may be able to remove the drive shaft without removing what it is connected to. Once the drive shaft is removed, we will be ready. We hope to get some video and I will post pictures of our progress on Saturday. For some reason it does not seem like it is really happening until that ICE motor is out of the car.

Exhaust Manifold removed

2010-02-21T09:50:00.001-08:00

We removed the exhaust manifold this Thursday. A few pesky bolts were a bit of trouble but so far no major trouble. Some of the students continued to make mock battery boxes so that we can estimate the battery box we will need. I am thinking that I will use most of the back and place a sheet of plexiglass or similar clear material between the back and front of the interior of the car. I have a few fun ideas too about that, but that will be a few months away.

One major concern is under the dash. Lots of loose wires and I am not sure where everything was supposed to be connected to what. The car had Air conditioning so some of the wires are meant for that. I plan on just having a heater (I do not like cold at all), I can tolerate the heat during the summer. I am reading up on auto electronics and it does not appear too daunting. I may end up rewiring most of the electronics as much of what the wires were there for were to support the internal combustion engine and it's support systems. I just need to be able to run the accessories (which I am learning are on a seperate harness - I hope...). Headlights, heater, dash instruments (I will be adding a few new instrument panels anyway so will have to rewire those). I am not sure if I want to remove the AC system and then just try to keep the heating system or replace the AC system with the stock heater system (from the junkyard). I will install an electric heater core and there is no need for water to run through it so that makes it a bit easier to manage.

Next up is to remove the exhaust pipes and the drive shaft. I may leave the old fuel lines, but if they are easy to remove, I will do so. Taking stuff apart is fun and easy, but putting it back together will be the interesting challenge.

We have a new sponsor: Mission Federal Credit Union! They want to fit us up with shirts and we hope to get some mechanic type pit crew type shirts. We are working on a logo for "Los Rayos Engineering" (our team name) and the Project Z logo is coming along as well.

The crew will also be included in a newsletter from Southbay Expressway!

Next up will be (finally) getting underneath the car to work on the drive shaft and transmission to prepare for removing the engine and transmission next Saturday!

Fuel intake removed!

2010-02-17T07:20:00.000-08:00

We had a few pesky nuts and bolts, but we finally removed the intake manifold. With so many wires and lines going in we have now freed up considerable space in the engine compartment. Since there is so much room, we should have a fairly reasonable time removing the engine and transmission (hopefully on our next Saturday, Feb. 27th). Some of the students are creating model batteries from cardboard and duct tape so that we can plan out the needed configuration of the batteries in the back. Those batteries will be big!

Hoping to get to the exhaust system this next Thursday and take a look under the car.

A mouse and a black widow...

2010-02-10T07:09:00.000-08:00

We took out more parts on Tuesday; the starter, fuel filter, and fuel lines. Almost all lines have been removed from the engine including most of the electronic fuel injection cables. Looks like we are close to being all clear around the engine. We will have to take a look under the car at the transmission and the lines that go to that.

While removing the starter, we found a nice juicy black widow spider, and we will have to be extra careful to watch out for that little girl. Also, we found a little mouse who lives in the ground near the car. Not sure if he is making visits to the car to keep warm, but he may be trying to get stuffing from the car seats for his little abode. We will have to keep an eye on those guys. The school has displaced their home, so they have not really gone anywhere...

Next, taking a look under the car and the transmission.

Summary of the week

2010-02-06T21:02:00.000-08:00

It was great to see so many interested students! We had great fun in taking a look at what we could remove and dreaming of what the finished car will have. Here are a few pictures of the awesome students!

First Saturday Work session

2010-02-06T20:49:00.000-08:00

It rained most of the morning. I suspect most kids decided to stay home and dry, but Arlet, Michael, and Marcus showed up to work. We managed to drain the oil, remove the old air conditioning condenser and pump and all of the old heater hoses. We had to take breaks here and there because of the rain, but it wasn't too bad. Thanks to Marcus one of the work benches we have for the classroom is now enclosed to secure some of the power tools. It looks great too!
Everything is coming off so easily and quickly, we may have a chance to pull the engine sooner than I imagined. However, from countless times working on cars and other home projects, one bolt can create countless hours of toil. I don't expect it though, things were built for surprising ease to work on. Great engineering for the 1970s!
We brainstormed about a crew name in the hopes of doing new projects in the future. Who knows what we can do. We voted on "Los Rayos Engineering" which was by far the best of all the ideas we had.

Ironically, as I was set to go home, my van would not start! Turning over, but not catching. I suspect it is the fuel system as I just gave it a tune up, but it could be so many things! Can't wait to not have to deal with oil changes, filter changes, fuel pumps, exhaust leaks, radiator flushes, heater hoses breaking, and all of the other stuff the infernal internal combustion engine requires. Well, thank goodness for the school vans I was able to get home to get out of the rain. Hopefully I can figure out what is going down with it tomorrow, I would hate to have to tow it somewhere! $$$ Hopefully, I can spend more on this conversion than on keeping my other cars running! Until next post, El Rayo signing off...

Started with the Students!

2010-01-31T16:34:00.000-08:00

We started on Tuesday, January 26th, 2010 for the conversion! I have a solid crew and more are interested! It was very exciting to go over the process and some of the procedures (mostly about safety) we will use. Some have a pretty good knowledge of the tools, but I began to teach what each tool was and what it was for. On Thursday, we took a picture of ourselves for a newsletter for Rotary International. They have generously made a wonderful donation to the project and they wanted a short quote and photo of the starting crew.

We had an example transmission and electric motor that I was able to borrow from a pioneer in a electric car conversions in San Diego, Mr. Abran Quevedo (Mr. Q). He is a retired auto shop and art teacher and I am currently taking his class on electric car conversions. He will undoubtedly be a great resource for us on this project. I taught the studens about the tools and I had a few dive in and take the tranny and motor apart. Next, the students took out the alternator, which was easy to get to. The car itself is great to work on, there is so much room to access everything in the engine compartment.

Also had some exciting news! The Southbay Expressway (new I-125 toll road) has made a donation as well! In addition, we have a donation of body work and paint from Joey Reyes from Southbay Dent Repair and Auto Service in National City. This is great news as we needed that before we were to be able to put up sponsorship logos onto the hood of the car.

The students will be creating a website and documenting via photos, videos and their own reports on our progress. In addition, I have a couple of students designing a logo for the project. More info will unfold and we are all excited about the start of the project!

Starting to work with students this week!

2010-01-24T11:00:00.000-08:00

It has been long in coming but I am now ready to work with students on the project. We will officially begin Project Z on Tuesday, January 26, 2010! The interest is high and my hope is that I can find a way to give so many students meaningful ways to learn all of the wonderful concepts and skills involved in this conversion. I know that I have learned so much, especially about electrical engineering, that I have been more and more excited to begin the project. So far we have gotten more sponsorships and I hope that I can get a sponsorship from an auto body shop to help with the rust spots and paint. Since we have a car wrap being donated for the project when it is complete, it will have to be painted, a cost that I had neglected to calculate! As the project grows, a website will be created and you will hear from other students about the progress of the project. Here is until next time you hear from me, after we have begun! Let's hope that the rain does not come as it has been extremely stormy the past two weeks.

Moved the car to school!

2010-01-13T19:23:00.000-08:00

I have now committed further to the project! On Saturday morning (January 9th, 2010) I had the car towed to school. We will begin with the after school program on January 25th! Recent developments are that I am taking an Electric Car Conversion class which is giving me a preview of what I have to look forward to. This has been great to see where other people have converted cars and hit some challenges. Makes me more optimistic than ever too.

Attached is a picture of the car at school! Until later...

Gas tank removed!

2009-12-23T14:12:00.000-08:00

Finally got the gas tank strap bolts removed.. From there it was a pretty simple process of removing the tank. First step is done! Here is a picture of the tank (looks to be in great condition) and underneath with no tank! This will be fun removing all of the un-needed parts. I wish I could pile them all up when I am done and take a picture! However, I will want to get rid of them as soon as I can to keep our project neat... Next, anti-freeze drained, then off to park it at school!

Finally back to working on the Z

2009-12-22T08:58:00.000-08:00

After a very long and busy fall semester, I am getting a chance to work on removing the gas tank and anti-freeze. I was hoping that there was only going to be a couple of gallons of gas, but unfortunately there was 7 gallons! It took awhile to drain it and store it in tanks and I am disposing of it safely. My hands, despite having latex gloves on (the gas destroyed them!), were dried up and itchy for a couple of days after handling the gasoline. The tank strap bolts are fairly frozen up so I am working on loosening those up. Looks like I may have a trade of the gas tank for an interior door panel and steering column cover. However, how do I ship a gas tank? I imagine lots of duct tape...

Cleaning out the car...

2009-07-16T20:58:00.000-07:00

The inside of the car was pretty dusty and parts were everywhere. I had an interesting morning taking an inventory of all of the miscellaneous parts. Thank goodness the ones I had no idea what they were for were undoubtedly for the engine (won't need that anymore!). The interior of the car is in pretty good shape! The heating system and ducts were apart and will need some investigating (although it looks like I have all of the parts). Thank goodness there are replacement parts for the cracked dash (I wondered why there was an extra dash and instrument panel!). A new dash on-line was about $200! The center console is also there (and in great condition). Things just need a bit of putting back together. I will probably do that when waiting for new electric parts. Next, taking out the gas tank (don't want students playing with gasoline - what an amazing experiment waiting to happen!). I swore that I would not do incendiary devices of any kind as a teacher, although the 14 year old in me would love to!

The Cops!

2009-07-15T18:32:00.001-07:00

Ah summer! For a teacher that is... Sorry for you folks that are not in education! Anyway, as I drank coffee with my beautiful wife, she mentions that there is a cop outside who is checking the Z. I hurriedly grab the registration and run out to see what's up. He tells me in the matter-of-fact tone that I think police have to have, "The car is being impounded", after I queried what was going. I asked why, and he tells me because the registration is out of date. OOps! I forgot to even check that! Fortunately, I explained that I just brought the car in last week and it is a donor car for a school project, he was understanding. He told me that he will come back tomorrow and the car better be off the street. Well, thanks to my nephew, we push the car (thanks Jill, for driving) up onto a patch of dirt beside our driveway (had to use the old bumper to bumper move with our van to get it all the way up). Thank goodness we caught the police, I would have hated to pay to retrieve the car from being impounded! Sharp eyes Jill!

Retrieved the donor car!

2009-07-13T20:33:00.000-07:00

I want to thank Larry Kerr for donating the car to this effort! Also, to my buddy Mike Hayes for making the long trip to Victorville and towing the car to San Diego. The beautiful car is a 1976 Datsun 280Z. We found a big black widow hiding among the spare tires, but lucky for us that we grabbed a couple of the tires! On our way back to San Diego, the Z blew out a tire when we were almost home! We debated getting a trailer vs a tow dolly, and we went with the tow dolly. The one tire did look like it was dried out, well, it was. A quick call to AAA and we luckily had those two extra spare tires. Whew! Picked the best one and off we went back to San Diego! Right now it is parked in the front of my house awaiting to be given some TLC.

In the beginning...

2009-06-30T18:03:00.000-07:00

Like many beginnings, this project began as an idea that was born from my love of tinkering (especially on cars or other mechanical devices) and my own passion for environmental impacts of the "most dangerous weapon ever made" (see how many deaths from automobile accidents per year, decade or any other time frame - you will be shocked!), the automobile. Since I knew from fundamental laws of Physics that the internal combustion engine is very inefficient, I began to research other modes of propulsion. What about biofuels? I did some research, not much more efficient nor less polluting. Besides, using FOOD for fuel? How many people in the world are starving and we want to use corn for fuel? Especially in a terribly inefficient, polluting, internal combustion engine. What about hydrogen? Well, where does most of the hydrogen come from? From processing good old fashioned OIL. It is a byproduct. Sure there are other ways of making hydrogen, but I want that hydrogen left for fusion reactors (cheap electricity for everyone on the planet!). However, fusion is just a dream at the moment. Anyway, hydrogen fuel cell technology actually runs an electric car!
Soooo, here I go in my attempt to take a 1976 Datsun 280Z and make it into an electric car. It may take awhile based on funding and time. But I am committed and will track our progress here!