It's Saturday, the sun is out and hope is on the horizon.As of Friday, not only had the car not burned down, but the DeltaQ (Battery Charger) display looks right according to the manual I downloaded Thursday night. Actually that's after I plugged it back in. Some helpful citizen had gotten in behind the car and unplugged it. Probably with their body while moving sideways. Plug prongs are a bit bent. Additions to broken glass in the area indicate alcohol might have been involved.
Sean's (Grants Pass Electric Vehicles) crew is sending me a replacement for the failed ignition switch. Not so much a replacement for the existing switch assembly as an additional switch that can be used to bypass the bad switch contacts. Yes, that will be key number five.
I spent some time Friday finding a temporary switch I could use this weekend. The first 'find' at True Value Hardware said it's rated for 35Amps. Sounded pretty good until I switched it back and forth in my hand a couple dozen times and the bottom fell out. Some of the crimps around the base weren't, actually. Got another switch at NAPA this morning. Also says 35 Amps. Ha, I've heard that one before. Took me 40 min. to figure out how to remove the plastic housing around the steering column. I'm kinda slow, but I'm not real bright. OTOH I didn't break any of the fussy little plastic clips. For some reason I started with the assumption that the plastic might not have been built in a highly robust fashion. Two of the five screws were missing, one of the remaining was stripped. Off to the hardware store for a screw assortment.
Got the switch on a temporary mount and put the steering column back together. Can't get one screw hole to line up right but it's on pretty solid.
When you flip the switch it works! Yes, the car too...
The PakTrakr battery management display shows 13.1 +/- 0.1V for each of the batteries at a toasty 34deg.F and we're off!
Now we're off? ...or maybe that's 'on!' Turn down into the alley and stop to adjust mirrors. The middle mirror is worse than useless. Even people under five feet can't get any useful 'rear view' image. It's once again obvious that the people designing this product never actually tried to use it. It *is* useful for seeing what you just hit while backing up. No, don't ask how I know this.
The side mirrors have cool little adjuster joysticks. You can adjust the mirrors from inside the car over a fairly wide range: from looking down at the ground to looking at the ground just behind the car. Oh, you want to see the traffic behind you? Well, that costs extra. The 'extra' involves getting out of the car and adjusting the mirror inserts with your thumbs.
Driving over to the apartment to pick up our guest for the weekend (a musician friend) I get reacquainted with the gear whine. It's not quite as bad as I'd thought similar but not as intense or high frequency. Other than that it drives pretty well. Acceleration is nothing to write home about but it's enough for the intended use. Visibility is pretty good. Steering is direct and positive feeling. Granted it doesn't track quite straight and the steering wheel points a bit off to the left but I'm guessing that's just an alignment issue.
The musician is pretty stoked about the vehicle in a 'once they get the bugs sorted out' kind of way. Everyone thinks it's too cute for words. Roughly half the people passing by stop for a look. It would be really fine to be able to say *more* positive things.
I have direct personal experience with other Electric vehicles from the 80's and all the really early 60's Japanese (gas) imports: Toyopet, Subaru 360, the two cylinder Honda cars, the just-post-war Italian/German Isetta's. What can I say, obviously a weird little car freak...
We went out on a drive around town. It gets up to speed fairly well (in KPH as indicated) and drives better than expected. You still want to have your medical plan paid up on your kidneys and/or fillings before hitting any serious potholes (partially due to the high tire pressures I'm running) but that kind of stuff doesn't really upset the composure of the car. We went about 6km (I'm assuming the odo is in km) and came back.
The PakTrakr display showed 100% SOC after charge, 92% after two blocks and 82% at the first km. It dropped rapidly to 64-65% and stayed there for the rest of the trip. It was probably pretty close to right toward the end of the trip. The 'new' switch failed stuck on when I tried to turn it off. I whacked it with a screwdriver handle a couple times to get it to turn off for real. The switch body was getting warm. Plugged the car in for charge and hoofed it off to NAPA for a replacement.
