The learning curve

"Aren't you going to sell it?"- Co-worker

As the months went by, and the EV sat idle I did think about it. The problem is, people would expect me to give it away since it didn't work and I wasn't exactly sure how serious the damage was. Well I'm not a quitter and I wasn't going to just give it away.

Now it's early August. After spending some quality time and money on the Delorean, I turned my attention back to the EV. My parts guy told me that brush springs were not listed as a part but the entire brush holder assembly, complete with springs is. The cost was only $113.00. I figure it's a safe gamble so he ordered it and a set of brushes.

His suppliers operate on a "whenever" business schedule so it took some time for the parts to arrive in the mail. I opened the package and the brush holder was....different. Totally different springs. It looked too small. This can't be right I groaned.

On Friday, a buddy came over and helped me remove the motor. We made special note of what cables went to which lugs on the motor. Wow...it took 20 minutes and we barely got dirty. Try that with a gasoline engine. In my basement, we examined the motor and took some pictures.

Next, we figured out how to take the end-cap off where the motor brushes are. This took about 10 minutes. The brush holder is attached to the inside of the motor cap. 2 of 4 springs had snapped. The brushes were ruined. The metal frame that holds the brushes was melted in places. It could be salvaged if necessary but the springs...where would I get the perfect tension and length of spring?

We took some more pictures and then I unscrewed the 4 screws that hold the brush holder assembly to the end cap and removed it. I positioned the new, wierd brush holder and lo and behold- it fit perfectly. It just uses a different style of spring to hold the brush in.

Sigh...are you kidding? The new brushes I just got are the OLD style. The pigtail is in the wrong place and the little metal spring-hook itsn't necessary anymore and it's just in the way..or it will be when the brushes wear to a certain length. I called my parts guy again and emailed him pictures with a detailed explanation of the problem. New style brushes are on the way. I cut the hook off of the old-style brushes and moved the pigtail out of the way of the spring and used them anyway. I'd keep the new-style brushes on hand as spares for when these wore out....hopefully in about 10 years.

I drove down to Rexel bought another circuit breaker for the charger to replace the one I cannabilized for the house A/C and installed it. The next Thursday my buddy came back over and we reinstalled the motor. Again, it only took 20 minutes or so. Done right? Not quite-

I attached the armatures 180 degrees out...backwards. The motor ran backwards. I had 3 reverse gears and one forward gear. Shit. We crawled back underneath and I removed the end-cap and swapped the armature wires on the brush holder assembly and we put it all back together. This took about 15 minutes. Now it all works fine.

I paid:

$113.00 for the holder assembly
$56.00 for the replacement old-style brushes
$56.00 for the new-style brushes
$117.00 for a new, higher amperage contactor (not related to my original problem)
_________
Total: $342.00.

$225.00 if you don't include the contactor. I bought it because the original contatctor is only rated for 100 amps. When I drive the vehicle, I draw up to 400 amps through it. It gets HOT so I bought a tougher one.

Considering I would have lost a LOT of money if I sold it broken, this is a bargain. I've been driving it for a month now with no problems. Since then, gasoline has ranged from $3.17/gallon and fell to $2.79/gallon.

I don't really care. The price of gasoline is so volatile these days that I'm still way ahead of the game.