EV Weblog Comments - Wazzup? http://www.evconvert.com/ Helping people get rid of Gas since 1995 by: James May (Wazzup?) http://www.evconvert.com/article/wazzup#c000771 <p><strong>Wazzup?</strong></p><p>Hi Woody</p> <p>Mine is getting better as well. I have noticed the regen working much better as the new batteries wear in. I was thinking that the motor bushes might be shot because there is such a rumbling on regen under the brake pedal. Have since learned that my controller, the Zapi H2, pulses its regen for higher currents and that explains the rumbling I think. Glad to hear your car is improving. in the long term I have improvements to make to mine. I want to lighten the flywheel, add a belly pan and put high efficiency tyres on it. The gear oil I put in dies make the gearchanges slightly slow and notchy in the hot weather but it’s not a problem</p> by: Woody Becher (Wazzup?) http://www.evconvert.com/article/wazzup#c000770 <p><strong>Wazzup?</strong></p><p>I originally had significant drag on the my 240SX. I rebuilt the rear brake cylinders and that helped a bunch. Since then I’ve put about 1000 miles on the car and it steadily gets better range. Not sure if it’s the bearings and such wearing in (the car sat in a junkyard for a while before I helped it escape) or if the warmer weather and battery wear-in is helping. But I do notice that it coasts down slight inclines much better. But I can now get a good 30 miles before losing some performance, and 40-50miles before the pack voltage drops to 105-110V. It now draws only about 200Amps at 50mpH in 3rd gear. Started looking to have it painted. Then Tuesday night I hit a deer and put a watermellon sized dent in the hood. I’ll send pictures of the finished car once it’s painted.</p> by: James May (Wazzup?) http://www.evconvert.com/article/wazzup#c000427 <p><strong>Wazzup?</strong></p>One more note, if you end up using engine oil, use a single grade and synthetic. It has less unsuitable additives like thickeners and the molecules are less likely to get chopped up. My vote is with the specialist gear oil by: James May (Wazzup?) http://www.evconvert.com/article/wazzup#c000426 <p><strong>Wazzup?</strong></p>Hi Woody<br /> <br /> I have a standard manual transmission and I am using a clutch. Since the power going through the transmission is considerably reduced, I reckoned that a lighter gear oil with possibly slightly less high load protection would be more suitable for me because it is likely to have less hysteresis (frictional) loss when the oil is deformed and therefore reduce losses.<br /> <br /> I originally had 3 oils in mind, synthetic engine oil (engine oil is used in the Austin Mini g/box) ATF (used in autos) or the Red Line Superlight. My worries with the non standard gear oils were mainly with seal compatibility. I spoke with Red Line and they said that seal compatibility would not be an issue but there would be a risk of reduced synchro efficiency as synchros rely on the lubricity of the oil and RLS has added friction modifiers. I went for it anyway, no problems. My results are that I noticed a significant reduction in g/box noise and I reckon approx 10% improvement in road efficency. (I was not able to isolate this totally from changes in tyre pressure). My conclusion is that it was worth doing. If I had had Synchro problems I would have swapped out some of the RLS with another compatible product such as Red Line MTF (manual transmission fluid) until the problem went away. by: Woody Becher (Wazzup?) http://www.evconvert.com/article/wazzup#c000425 <p><strong>Wazzup?</strong></p>James, I’m getting ready to fill my manual tranmission, and am interested in your results with Superlight. Are you concerned that it is too thin to provide protection, especially in summer? Is yours a standard manual trans, and are you using a clutch? by: Jesse (Wazzup?) http://www.evconvert.com/article/wazzup#c000424 <p><strong>Wazzup?</strong></p>Larry might be getting higher amps in a higher gear, but you’re also accelerating and moving faster because of it. I can think of a few good ways to test that theory though. Mark off a length of road that you can make “runs” on without disturbing traffic. Get the car up to speed (running start before the marked section of road), and try going an even 30 mph start-to-finish in all of the gears, and see if you expend any more total energy in one gear than another. If the road is empty-enough, repeat the trial, but in different gears. Also maybe try different speeds. You could also do a trial of accelerate-coast along that marked length of road, start off at 0 mph at the start, accelerate and then try to coast so you end up right at the finish line, see if you use any more energy in one gear than another.<br /> <br /> I did tests similar to this with my previous car, I had a palm-pilot datalogger to watch speed, fuel consumption, etc. It was interesting. <br /> <br /> -Jesse by: James May (Wazzup?) http://www.evconvert.com/article/wazzup#c000420 <p><strong>Wazzup?</strong></p>Thanks Larry for the driving tips. I’ve only driven mine less than 500 miles so far so I still very much learning how to get good range. Have cracked all the forward thinking at road junctions andkeeping my amps low, but I still have to remember to keep the revs high. So far nobody has told me why the motor is more efficient at higher revs but I am taking it on trust and trying to remember to keep it between 3 and 4000. It regenerates much better up there.<br /> <br /> Good work on the Saab, I liked the site and might follow you with the twistlock AC connector as my 16Amp caravan power connector seems to be getting hot and has signs of burning.