| Owner | Alex Chamberlain | ||||||||
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| Location | Hurricane, Utah United States map | ||||||||
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| Vehicle | 1995 Geo Tracker "BEV" is my personal project of about 2 months. This is my first conversion, and it works beautifully. | ||||||||
| Motor | Clark 1774059 Series Wound DC Oct. 2008 - Old ES-15A Motor just burned up. Despite what the company selling it told me, it was way too small for the Tracker. Dec. 2008 - I have purchased an old Clark Electric Forklift and I am in the process of having a coupler machined for the 12" drive motor to couple with my transmission. . . we're getting there. Jan. 2008. After basically rebuilding everything from the ground up, this is once again a working electric vehicle. I advanced the brushes on my forklift motor 10 degrees so that I can eventually upgrade to a higher voltage (144 volts), but for now it's slogging around at 72 volts once again. The lift motor is a bit slower than the old ES-15A, but it has much more torque, so the performance is very similar. I have a bit more power into the higher gears than I had before. | ||||||||
| Drivetrain | Original 5-speed manual transmission coupled to motor with clutch removed (simply let off gas pedal to shift - works great). | ||||||||
| Controller | Alltrax AXE 7245 72 volt, 450A Max (2 minute rating), 300A 5 minute rating, 200A 60 minute rating. Computer programmable for acceleration, etc. | ||||||||
| Batteries | 12, 6.00 Volt, Lead-Acid, Flooded These are made by Johnson Controls and purchased at Costco. I have them connected in series by lengths of copper plumbing pipe with the ends smashed and drilled-through. | ||||||||
| System Voltage | 72 Volts | ||||||||
| Charger | Schumacher SE-1072 Simple charger capable of charging 6 12v or 12 6v in series. | ||||||||
| Heater | None. I live in Southern Utah, so I should be okay. | ||||||||
| DC/DC Converter | Everstart Deep Cycle Marine Battery 8-year-old 12v from Walmart that I originally bought to power a little robot that I'd made. | ||||||||
| Instrumentation | Ammeter | ||||||||
| Top Speed | 45 MPH (72 KPH) Tested. Loses a fair bit of power on the high end of its RPM range, which should improve somewhat when I move to a higher voltage someday. | ||||||||
| Acceleration | Fast starts, slow to get up to speed. With the old motor, I left it in 2nd gear for around-town driving. Now, with the forklift motor, I leave it in 3rd and pop it into 5th if I need to go fast. | ||||||||
| Range | 35 Miles (56 Kilometers) I actually haven't tested this. I've gone about 16 miles without charging and it didn't seem "tired" at all. But as of yet, I haven't had any need to go any farther. I believe my batteries are about 225 Ah each, which, if I can use 60% of that after Peukert's Curve has its way, should allow me to drive at 100 amps for about 80 minutes. On a flat grade in 3rd gear, it pulls about 100 amps at 30mph, so that should equate to about 40 miles of range. | ||||||||
| EV Miles |
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| Seating Capacity | 4 adults | ||||||||
| Curb Weight | 3,000 Pounds (1,363 Kilograms) This weight is according to a paid-scale. My battery pack should weigh about 756 lbs, my motor is probably in the 200 lb range. Beyond that, there are probably 50-100 lbs of extras. | ||||||||
| Tires | 225/75/R15 | ||||||||
| Conversion Time | 2 months | ||||||||
| Conversion Cost | $4,200.00 + $600 for engine-less tracker. +$350.00 for an old Forklift. +about $200-ish for various machine- shop fees, tools, etc. to get the forklift motor working. | ||||||||
| Additional Features | Brake pump from a Volkswagon. Front Coil Springs from a Suzuki Grand Vitara (the stock springs weren't doing such a great job negotiating the weight of a fork lift motor and 7 golf cart batteries under the hood). | ||||||||
| As mentioned above, the ES-15A Motor died after only a little over 300 miles. I've put a 12" Motor from an old Clark Forklift in. I'd like to give it a paint job someday too. Like everyone else, I'm waiting for Lithium Iron Phosphate to become a lot cheaper. My wife deserves a special thanks for her patience while I work on this, and my good friend Andy Wright, among others have been indispensable with their advice, assistance, etc. | |||||||||
1995 Geo Tracker
“BEV”
Last Updated 10-22-2009
Copyright © 1997-2024 by Mike Chancey