Solar Powered Electric Vehicle

Here are some random photos of the electric car charging at one of those ChargePoint chargers using the high voltage, level 2 port, with the J1772 adaptor. I’ve charged at the Pleasanton Stoneridge Mall, Hayward Walgreens, and SFO airport.

With the knowledge of my new limited range, I need to find charging stations around the bay area to extend my range. The good news is that there is plenty of free charging around the bay area. San Francisco has announced that it will charge EVs for free in public garages until 2013, READ HERE

I’ve charged a couple of times at San Francisco International Airport.

The chargers in San Francisco seems to be mostly run by Chargepoint. I needed to apply for an access card that unlocks the stations that I want to use.

Also, since I use a Nema L15-30 plug for 220V charging and these stations are using the new EV standard SAE J1772 connectors, I ordered an adapter box so that the car can accept SAE J1772 connectors at these stations from Tucson EV.

Here’s another source for the connectors and adapters.
CurrentEVTech

Here are a few links on lists of charging stations through out the US/Bay Area.
EV Charger News
The EV Project
www.afdc.energy.gov

I’ve also downloaded the following Android apps to help me locate charging stations. Look for them on your phone!
Car Stations
Chargepoint
Blink

Now that it’s getting dark early, my ammeter display has not been visible on the drive home from work. Also the original dash lights were also not working, so reading the dashboard was difficult. I purchased some LED bulbs from autolumination.com
and now I have a lighted dash and light ammeter.

I also replaced the analog voltmeter with an EV display 2, which tracks state of charge using Coulomb counting, pack voltage, and a bunch of other power stats per suggestion from my EV friend Honn. It has been great for tracking my energy usage.

A update on my range. With the new data from the EV display, I’ve determined that I use about 2.15Ah per mile on average in my daily commute. The battery pack is 144 V nominal, so the power usage per mile is ~310wh/mi (2.15Ah * 144 V). This seems in line with what other EV’ers are reporting for their conversions. Since I do not want to shorten the life of the batteries, I do not want to discharge more than 80% of the pack. With an 180Ah pack, the effective range is (180Ah/2.15Ah)*.80 or 67 miles. Not as good as I had hoped with 80-100 miles, but at least it will get me to and from work with a bit of energy to spare.

According to the Sky energy battery manufacturer, cycle life is 2000 cycles if I discharge the batteries to 20% and 3000 cycles for a 30% depth of charge. With this information, I estimate that the battery pack, which costed me $10k should last me:

~134,000 miles if I discharge the batteries to 20% each time.
(180/2.15) *.80 *2000 = 133,953 miles.

~175,800 miles if I discharge the batteries to 30% each time.
(180/2.15) *.70 * 3000 = 175,814 miles.

Since my daily commute is only about 50 miles, I am well within the 30% discharge depth daily of 58 miles, these batteries should last me a long while.

Here is a compelling calculation for those of you that are contemplating the purchase of solar panels.

We purchased our 3.6KW solar panels almost 4 years ago for a net cost of $22,500 after tax incentives. In the 4 years, we’ve saved an average of $90 per month on normal electricity usage.
That’s $1080/year savings. At that rate, we would have the panels paid off in 20 years. Commuting daily for about 50 miles in my electric car, we are saving an additional $120 per month on gas, that’s an added ~$1400/year savings. Including the gas savings from the car, the panel payoff accelerates to 9 years. I am now tracking the actual payback of the solar panels here:

Solar Payoff Progress

I am contemplating the sale of my 2009 Corolla S and purchasing an all electric Nissan Leaf for my wife. Assume she commutes for the same distance daily, our payoff should accelerate to 5 years.

I spent a couple of weeks last month getting the car ready for the cold and rainy season.
I had installed a electric heater a while back but never crimped the wires. The ceramic electric heating element feeds off the main battery pack and draws less than 10amps to give instant heat. I’ve wired up the heater to a switch on the dash that will only turn on when the fan is turned on. Besides the heater, I’ve also added some stainless steel plates under the car to protect the batteries in the fuel tank tunnel as well as the control board that is in the rear motor bay from rain splash/road debris. The only thing that is left is replacing the temporary wooden rear hood.

Here are some pictures from the heater install.

Getting to the heater box under the passenger side dash was a real pain in the butt.

Got it out!

Time to cut the original heater box and fit the ceramic heater inside.

I applied and received a parking decal from dmv. The decal allows me to park in special parking public parking spots that are equipped with charging stations. I originally thought that the parking was free, which could be significant in a city like San Francisco, but it is not, only the charging. Still, it is nice to have the convenience of charging away from home to extend the .reach of the vehicle. The cost of the decal was $17.

Gas savings update
I’ve been commuting daily to work for the past 2 months and it is saving me around $120 per month.
Mr2ev Gas Savings Tracker

After the 4th trip to the DMV, I finally have the MR2 registered as an EV through 2012! I’ve also applied for a clean air vehicle sticker (the white one, they stopped giving out the yellow ones for the hybrids a while ago). Next challenge is to get some insurance for the car. My agent at State Farm gave me temporary coverage of 1 month to get my registration and to find a company that will insure it for the long run.

So far, I’ve got about 500 miles on the car as an electric. I’m now tracking my gas savings from driving the ev.
Mr2ev Gas Savings Tracker

I got the car weighed again today. 2725 lbs from 2365 lbs… a gain of only 360 lbs! Try that with lead acids!!!

The 2nd DMV trip took a lot longer than the first one. The lady asked me to pay VLF based on the conversion cost which I thought was fair. However, she said that I needed to pay for the previous 2 years while the car was being converted. I argued that the cars been sitting in the garage without being driven and is only being commissioned as a pure electric vehicle this month. She agreed and took off ~$300 off VLF fees right away.

Based on what others have told me about their experience, just as I was ready to walk out the door with my new sticker and registration, I asked her to double check the system to make sure it was not an “Q” for hybrid. Good thing I did because she called sacramento, realized that she had done everything wrong, and took back the sticker. She had to fax the paper work to Sacramento, but says that I should expect to have my official tag sticker within 2 weeks. ….Fingers Crossed….

Got the car BAR refereed as a pure electric. The appointment took 20 minutes after the inspector looked at the batteries in the car. Next, I have to get the car registered at the DMV. Mileage: 130543.