| Owner | Ryland | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Location | Menomonie, Wisconsin United States map | ||||||||
| Web/Email | WebPage | ||||||||
| Vehicle | 1979 Honda CX500 Shaft drive, lighter then stock, lithium battery powered with an EZ-Go golf cart drive and a fully enclosed steel battery box. | ||||||||
| Motor | Advanced DC A95-4005A Series Wound DC Off the shelf used 2HP (rated) EZ-Go golf cart motor pulled when a golf course got a new fleet of carts and some of the carts got turned in to off road hunting electric ATV's, so they had larger motors swapped in, the old motors then collect dust. My design allows for the current motor to be removed easily and a new golf cart motor of choice be bolted on without any modifications other then to the speed controller if a different type of motor is used. This is one of the lowest power golf cart motors out there, at 36v it looks like it might be 1.5hp, common and cheap but it runs hot. | ||||||||
| Drivetrain | Custom CNC machined aluminum adapter plate with custom adapter shaft between the golf cart motor and the stock drive shaft in the rear swing arm. | ||||||||
| Controller | Alltrax AXE 4844 Programmable 400 amp controller designed to be a drop in replacement for stock golf cart speed controllers | ||||||||
| Batteries | 16 GBS GBS-LFMP100AH, 3.20 Volt, Lithium-Ion 4 groups of 4 cells to make up the 48v pack, installed the battery management system from Elite Power Solutions with CAN BUS communication to charger. | ||||||||
| System Voltage | 48 Volts | ||||||||
| Charger | unknown EMC48-15 Charger from Elite Power Solutions, not sure on charger brand, has CAN BUS communications to the battery management system to control charging rate based on cell voltage instead of total pack voltage. | ||||||||
| Heater | The clothing you wear. | ||||||||
| DC/DC Converter | Sure Power Industries, Inc 41010C00 Weather proof, SAE listed, vibration resistant and everything else that you want for an EV! 10 amp output with both switched and unswitched options, the weather proof plug is nice but hard to find as a replacement part so make sure that you get one with the converter and that the plug comes with the crimp on pins! | ||||||||
| Instrumentation | Elite Power Solutions battery management systems LCD display showing pack voltage, current, state of charge, alarms/errors, max cell voltage, max cell temperature and it has the option to change screens to show a list of all cells in the pack with each cells voltage and temperature. Turns out the LCD they sell is not water tight and after getting rained on it stopped working, bought a new LCD for $15 online for a 3.5" instead of the 4.3" | ||||||||
| Top Speed | 60 MPH (96 KPH) Met my goal speed, gear ratio can not be changed easily due to it being a shaft drive motorcycle but speed could be increased with a bump up in system voltage, motor can handle around 75mph before over speeding the motor becomes an issue, my state's speed limit tops out at 65mph and I don't like ridding next to large trucks so I tend to avoid freeways. Some of the upgrade motor options can spin faster giving me a top speed of over 100mph. | ||||||||
| Acceleration | Decent with a programmable controller, on par with a 250cc gas motorcycle | ||||||||
| Range | 50 Miles (80 Kilometers) Range is currently an estimation, 70 mile range would be at 45mph and 50 mile range would be at 65mph. Real life looks to be more like 35 miles around town, maybe 50 miles at 45mph country road joy rides. | ||||||||
| Watt Hours/Mile | 200 Wh/Mile Watt Hours Per mile has not been fully tested, estimated at 100 to 150 watt hours per mile at 45mph and 65mph. My stated watt hours per mile of 200 at 45 is what I got with the first 5 miles and was tested using a Kill-A-Watt at the wall, battery management system wastes some power top balancing, so in theory if I put more miles on between charging I'll use less energy per mile. | ||||||||
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| Seating Capacity | has stock buddy pegs and is at or under stock weigh so a passenger is not an issue. | ||||||||
| Curb Weight | 445 Pounds (202 Kilograms) The stock weight is 445 pounds and I did a before and after with a questionable bathroom scale that seemed to say I was within a few pounds after the conversion, then add gas, oil and coolant and I could be as much as 50 pounds lighter then stock wet weight. | ||||||||
| Tires | Pirelli rear tire, forget what the front is. | ||||||||
| Conversion Time | 4 years of planning and design, 3 months of buckling down to order connectors, fasteners, trouble shooting and making phone calls, 2 weeks of working most days on final assembly with an estimated 200+ hours total so far in the project. | ||||||||
| Conversion Cost | $3,500 not including the cost of the frame ($100 without a title, bought another for $250 with a title) and I'll be able to sell a bunch of used engine parts to recoup some cost that I did not subtract from my cost. I built this motorcycle up a year ago with lead acid batteries and the price came in at $1,572 with 400 pounds of Trojan T105 batteries. |
1979 Honda CX500
“Black Box”
Last Updated 07-09-2015
Copyright © 1997-2024 by Mike Chancey