I have converted a 1993 Saturn SL-2 into an electric vehicle (EV). The engine was dead on this 1993 Saturn SL2 making it the perfect car for a conversion project. In fact, a lot of the engine was already broken down and sitting in the trunk when I found it. Below are some notes and photos of my progress with the latest information at the top.
If you are reading it for the first time, start from the bottom.
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Progress log:
Forgot to add this photo when I finished up the gages. I managed to get all the new gages into the original cluster.
The
car was riding 2" low due to all the extra weight. Well, only about
450 lbs extra. So, new springs have been now installed bringing the
ride back to very close to normal.
These photos show the old spring/strut removed, one spring in process of being compressed and one new spring/strut ready to be installed. This process was not that complex.
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I DID IT! A few more minor things to work on and some cosmetic repairs, but the car is an EV now!!!
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Below are the latest photos. It is getting very close. The potbox is now installed just in front of the 12V battery connecting the electron-petal to the controller.
The travel of the cable for the Saturn is only 3/4". The smallest hold on the potbox arm allowed for about 1.5". So, I had to build the extensions the allow the short travel distance to pull the potbox arm into the full on position.
And, this step has allowed the final
testing of the controller and other electronics. Turning on the key and
pressing the electron pedal now results in wheels turning!!!
Finally!!! I'm so close.
The only thing holding me back now is the one part that was bad. This is the switch that tells the vacuum pump to start and stop at predefined settings. I'm working with a new switch that may solve this problem.
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Lots of work done in the last month. I've built a bridge from the existing 12V battery to the motor mount on the left to hold the electronics box (a place for all the wiring connections, relays, etc.), circuit breaker (emergency shut off), DC-DC converter (charges the 12V battery) and the pot box (accellerator cable hooks to this). This photo shows the circuit breaker and DC-DC converter installed.
This photo shows the electronics box mid installation.
The battery charger has also been installed on one side of the trunk space.
And the power cord plug in is now installed in the old gas tank fueling door. Now the electron port.
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The
batteries are installed, cabled and charged and ready to go. This is
the first time electricity has run around this car. It is now
offically be an EV!! Though not running yet, it is just around the
corner.
These are some of batteries in the front of the car. There are three more out of sight where the radiator use to be.
The charger is not quite installed, but I hooked it up so I could get the batteries charged. This is the charger in its temporary location next to the batteries in the floor of the trunk. My plan is to run the power cord out through the old gas tank fill door.
As the battery pack has been sitting around for a while it was in need of charging. This was easy now that the batteries are in their final home.
These are the 8 batteries in the floor of the trunk.
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The battery racks are done in installed. These photos show the four battery racks that will hold the 15 8V batteries.
These two racks that sit on either
side of the motor. These hold 2
batteries each. The aluminum plate is
where the controller will be installed.
This rack holds three batteries and is sitting where the radiator use to be.
The last rack is in the floor of the
trunk that holds the last 8 batteries.
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To secure the motor in place, it is held on one side by the clutch. The other end is held in place by a motor mount. Portions of the original Saturn motor mounts were used along with a bracket we had to build between them now support the motor. The last few weekends were getting this built, fitted (the first one didn't), painted and installed. This is the final look of the motor installed.
The
bracket on the left top hangs off of the original motor mount. This has
a rubber core that will provide support to the motor but allowing it to
move a bit. On the lower end of the new bracket, we tied it into the
lower motor mount to keep the motor from moving from front to back.
We tested the motor after this using the existing 12V auxiliary battery and go the wheels to turn. It's all down hill from here.
So,
now the motor is ready to go it is time to get the batteries into
place. That work starts next weekend. Other tasks will be to untie this
knot of wires. This bundle was all around the old gas engine. I need
to find a few in here that are required.
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And,
what now finally feels like progress, the electric motor is installed
into the car. The adapter allows the motor to bolt to the car's
existing clutch.
Here we are bolting it into it's final position.
The
new electric heater is installed using the old heater core as a frame.
This saved trying to fabricate something to hold the heater in the
correct place. We cut a hole in the heater core to allow the air to
flow over the new heater. This is then installed back into it's
original location.
And,
finally back to work after all the travels. Before the motor can be put
into the car, the clutch and flywheel are mounted onto the motor and
adapter. This entire assembly will then be lowered into the car in one
piece.
What
has really been slowing us down is the lack of a few key supports.
Finally, the last one has arrived. This is the adapter that will allow
the new electric motor to mount onto the clutch and transmission.
As
this is a front wheel drive car, the drive shaft is split in two. The
side on the driver's side of the car, is very short and requires no
support. The other end, was supported on the back of the engine block.
We built this bracket to bolt that support arm to. It is then bolted to
the underside of the car's unibody beams. It still needs to be painted
and then securely bolted to the car.
This
week the power steering rack was removed and replaced with manual
steering. There is no pulley system left to drive the power steering
pump. The Saturn is small and light enough that manual steering should
work just fine.
The old power steering rack:
We are off and running again. We had a good day yesterday and all
parts that need to come out of the car are gone. We took out the gas
tank, gas lines, exhaust heat shield and the heater core out from under
the dash. Just love these great designs in cars today that forced us
to remove the entire dash just to get at the heater.
We
also started cleaning out the grease from the engine compartment (from
now on, known as the motor compartment). Since there is nothing that
produces grease here now, might as well start with a clean compartment.
It will look like a brand new car when we are done.
The
engine comes out. All the old parts have been removed and are gone!
John hauled them to a junk yard on his way home today. Here I am
removing the engine block.
Plus, as long as we are taking out the engine and have access to the clutch, we are going to replace those parts that have 139,000 miles on them. Saves work down the road.
And
this is what we will be putting back in place of that large greasy
mess. We hooked it up to a car battery just to make sure it ran. The
box it came in was banged up a bit and I wanted to be sure it was OK.
More of the engine parts are out, in fact all except the engine block. We are ready to remove that as soon as we get an engine hoist. We are leaving the transmission and clutch plus some other existing parts like the window washer, power breaks, existing battery/wiring, etc. Here John is working on taking out the old engine parts.
Start
of project: Here are the first photos as the engine removal begins.
With with engine over 1/2 out, there's no backing out now.
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Thanks: This project would not be possible without the help of my brother-in-law John Ramsey, a great book called Convert It by Mike Brown and Shari Prange (and all their e-mail responses), and some great advice I found from Ken Norwick who converted a similar car: http://www.docdockdocuments.com/conversion/conversionstart.htm