| 3/8/2010
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Misc stuff
A place to put temporary files and photos... more |
| 3/7/2010
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Some Insight frame dimensions
Some photos from the frame and body manual... more |
| 3/6/2010
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Looking better on the second cycle
Ran a second charge discharge cycle on the #9 stick, and things look better, cells tracking much better than on the first run. Will run a couple more cycles and see what we see. ... more |
| 3/5/2010
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Learning to drive with MIMA
OK, MIMA is installed, Now how do I work this thing???
How do I use it for better MPG???
Some tips and suggestions:
Getting Familiar with MIMA
Just use the joystick at first to see how the extra assist and regen works and feels, and use it to run your b... more |
| 3/5/2010
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Not really rebalanced just changed????
Talk about counter intuitive,here is what happened this morning. Note that the cell 1 and cell 6 were initially (as removed from my old pack)the highest voltage, with 5,3,4,and 2 at progressively lower voltages. At the end of the fast charge they remained ... more |
| 3/4/2010
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Rebalancing?
I had to go out for a long trip, so I set up one of the 350ma CC supplies and put it across subpack #9.
9.6 hours later, it looks from the trace that the cells that were unbalanced worked their way up to the same level as the better cells. After 3 hours, j... more |
| 3/4/2010
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Subpacks 1-8
Zeroing in on a screen layout that works best for me.
Started the pack testing with a quick first charge to see what my subpacks look like, and so far, they look pretty shakey.
The bottom trace shows when the charge current switch takes place, and you can ... more |
| 2/23/2010
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Full power test run
Doug built a test panel so he could better monitor the performance of the V-Buck converter. The photo shows the system bucking down the 220VDC battery pack voltage to 144V, and the 24A output with only 16A in.
test run was for 20 minutes. All is looking ve... more |
| 2/22/2010
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Mikes Saturday Alternative Energy workshop
Starting the Saturday workshop again.
Top projects:
Two stage overnight grid charger
Hi power grid charger
Subpack testing
Cell high current zapper/ spot welder
IMA motor bearings for stand alone motor
3 phase driver for Prius and Insight motors
Labview ne... more |
| 2/21/2010
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Getting better signals
To get cleaner traces, I built pre amplifiers for both the temperature and cell voltage signals, as well as adding a low current charge control nichrome resistor.
Now I can charge at 35A and switch automatically to 6A for a gentler finishing charge. The ne... more |
| 2/21/2010
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more tuning of the controller/ Datalogger
Traced another subpack with the next generation of the tester.The photo shows 4 screen grabs at different times in the cycle.
Still would like more signal from the temp probes, but this should be good enough. The cell and temp preamplifiers bump up the sig... more |
| 2/16/2010
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Soldering iorn degausser
Having a magnetized screwdriver can be a life saver for getting a screw into a tight place, but that same screwdriver when used to nudge a small component around for soldering, or when it falls into a floor with steel chips that stick to it.
We learned in... more |
| 2/14/2010
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Forever solar desk lamp
We lost our power a week or so ago, and the usual search for a flashlight with good batteries was a pain in the A**.
In researching the Insight subpacks, I had to remove a weak cell from the stick to examine it. That left 5 pretty good D cells, the only pr... more |
| 2/13/2010
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Inside the cells
Ok now that I have a good electrical test fixture and have identified a cell that was shorted, recovered, but not back to full capacity, it is time to take a look at the insides of the cell.
The first thing that jumped out at me was the really nice welds. ... more |
| 2/10/2010
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DIY MIMA documents and kit contents
For the electronics savvy people that want to save some money, consider the DIY MIMA.
The PC boards offered here are ready to populate, but you must order your own parts. The documents here will help in construction and locating the parts.... more |
| 2/9/2010
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PTC strips exposed
Finally got a look under the black and clear covers of the PTC strip.
It turns out it is really 6 discrete PTC devices that are connected by stainless steel strips, so the active temperature sensitive area is located right in the center of the cells.Very i... more |
| 2/9/2010
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Refining the tester
Worked like hell to get three MIMA systems ready to ship, only to miss the PO by 5 minutes, so I came back home and worked more on the hardware and software for my subpack tester.
I like the overlaid graphs, and the whole event on one log, so one can see t... more |
| 2/6/2010
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Connecting to the IMACAN bus
Nice group showed up on this frigid Saturday morning.
We made sure of the new CAN analyzer pin out, and rewired the interface to the car to match.
Jon was able to get the data into his notebook, so we should be good to go. He will develop a test procedure,... more |
| 2/4/2010
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Subpack tested first high current run
Same stick, two days after the last test, after charging at 350maCC for a day and a half.
The bad cell still showed s .05V lower voltage that the others at the start of the test. The load got the current up to about 86 amps. The 10 strands of Nichrome ribb... more |
| 2/3/2010
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Solar cookout in 20 degree weather
It was the end of a cold but clear day, Feb 1st and after playing with some batteries for most of the day, it was time to eat. I set up the rotisserie and cooked some burgers. They were fully cooked in only a few minutes. It seems that even with sunlight f... more |
| 2/2/2010
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Subpack tester first test
I got out my working notebook with it's data acquisition system, and wrote a quick labview program to monitor, display, and write to a file what is happening on each cell. I will add AH computations tomorrow.
The high current connections worked reliably t... more |
| 1/31/2010
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failure mode #1 Shorted Cell and the cell Zapper fix?
In years past I have used a capacitor to zap shorted NI CAD batteries back to life.
I ran some test on the first stick from Ron's shorted cell pile of subpacks.
Cell #1 (most positive) was lower voltage than than the others an hour after the stick was take... more |
| 1/30/2010
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Civic power electronics
Ron from Hybrid battery repair gave me some civic power electronics that came with some of the civic battery packs he bought. I disassembled one to get a better look at the parts. Shown here is the major components.... more |
| 1/30/2010
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What is wrong with the subpacks?
After hearing about battery pack failures for the last ten years, I decided it was time to actually see what goes wrong with the subpacks, and see if there is a way to restore some of them. Ron from Hybrid Battery repair gave me a couple of dozen subpacks ... more |
| 1/30/2010
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universal dual stage grid charger
I wired up the two stage grid charger and powered it up.
Put a switch on each of the four 48V supplies, and a master switch that turns on the two CC supplies.
A 6A diode across each of the power supplies output terminals so current has a way to get back to... more |
