EV for clubman racing
Discussion
I’m partaking in my normal evening activity of planning my next track car, and found myself wondering how hard it would be to build an electric car.
I hill climb, so acceleration and handling are more important than top speed. Distance travelled is rarely more than 1 mile per run, and rarely More than 4 runs.
Given my budget is “15 year old Audi TT” rather than high end performance car, is an electric car a ridiculous fantasy, or actually quite do-able (assuming their was a category to race in!)
I hill climb, so acceleration and handling are more important than top speed. Distance travelled is rarely more than 1 mile per run, and rarely More than 4 runs.
Given my budget is “15 year old Audi TT” rather than high end performance car, is an electric car a ridiculous fantasy, or actually quite do-able (assuming their was a category to race in!)
For that budget you'll have to start with a written off production EV, or use the parts from one retro-fitted into a different body. There's an electric Elise (or might be an exige) on You Tube with Tesla motor and battery, and that is RAPID!
For a hill climber, that only needs about 1 mile of range (you can regen on the way back down to the pits too... ;-) ) then the battery can be a paired down production battery, meaning far less weight!
Realistically, your donors are going to be a Leaf, i3, or Zoe in the UK, which have the downside of not having been hacked much. The Tesla powertrain is pretty much open source these days, with lots of custom solutions for driving the inverter or interfacing with the std BMS, but is pricey and has poor availability. Low mass is going to be key, so you need a small car to put the drivetrain into.... An i3 would actually be a decent start, but expensive if you bend it again......
For a hill climber, that only needs about 1 mile of range (you can regen on the way back down to the pits too... ;-) ) then the battery can be a paired down production battery, meaning far less weight!
Realistically, your donors are going to be a Leaf, i3, or Zoe in the UK, which have the downside of not having been hacked much. The Tesla powertrain is pretty much open source these days, with lots of custom solutions for driving the inverter or interfacing with the std BMS, but is pricey and has poor availability. Low mass is going to be key, so you need a small car to put the drivetrain into.... An i3 would actually be a decent start, but expensive if you bend it again......
Max_Torque said:
BTW, for a short hill climb, if you force cool everything in the pits, down to say zero degC, then you have a massive performance gain over standard (and probably hardly need to carry any on-board cooling)
Be very very very careful if your going to use Tesla cells with no cooling - the Tesla cell chemistry is very unstable and prone to thermal runaway.https://youtu.be/WdDi1haA71Q
Max_Torque said:
For that budget you'll have to start with a written off production EV, or use the parts from one retro-fitted into a different body. There's an electric Elise (or might be an exige) on You Tube with Tesla motor and battery, and that is RAPID!
Its an electric Evora, it's running a Tesla motor but Ampera batteries. Unless you know what your doing don't go messing with Tesla cells!!https://youtu.be/If09etyztl8
It might be worth contacting the hill climb organisers for the events you are interested. I chatted to a guy lasy year who competes in an electric Westfield and some tracks are not allowing EVs due to unknown unknown safety concerns.
If budget is low it might be worth looking at overdriving DC forklift motors.
see https://www.diyelectriccar.com/forums/showthread.p... for some inspiration.
If budget is low it might be worth looking at overdriving DC forklift motors.
see https://www.diyelectriccar.com/forums/showthread.p... for some inspiration.
I’m open to correction on this but when discussing this with our local club racing organisers the feedback was there is currently no MSA provision for EVs club racing (not even sure the FIA have it covered outside Formula E).
The big issue for most circuits and organising clubs would be how to deal with a fire.
The big issue for most circuits and organising clubs would be how to deal with a fire.
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