Electric Porsche!

After eleven months of waiting, it is here! 2003 Porsche 911 Carrera. 200 amp-hour (28 kWh) LiFePO4 battery pack. Conversion by Paul Liddle of CoolGreenCar-dot-net in West Palm Beach, FL. Attached are two pictures. Pics of the innards will come later, probably tomorrow, after I figure out how to open the car without setting off the alarm, so I can pop the hoods.

A few disappointments: The car does not accelerate as fast as I expected. I had been told to expect zero to 60 in 6 to 8 seconds, and I don't think it will do that. But I have not had it up to 60 yet (I've had it about 4 hours) and maybe it's just so smooth that I'm not getting the feel of how fast it's going.

Paul neglected to send a charging cable with the car as promised, so I cannot drive it more than another 20 or 30 miles before I get a cable made, but Paul installed an under-rated connector and the electrician will not make a cable that plugs into a 50-amp service at one end, and a 20-amp connector at the other. Tomorrow the electrician will come and see what he can do. Ideally, he'll be able to replace the connector and build me a cable.

I cannot figure out how anything works in the car. Ordinary car stuff, that is. I am reluctantly going to have to read the owner's manual.

Updates to follow as available.

 

Real EV??? Hey, the Zap Xebra is a real EV. It's just not a fast EV.

If the electrician is willing to install the proper connector, he'll probably be able to make me a cable tomorrow. If Paul used below-code size wires beyond the connector, the electrician probably won't do it.

Paul said he'd make me a cable if the electrician won't. But based on past performance, he'll probably take two weeks to do it! I'm PISSED that Paul did not make up a cable as soon as he realized he had forgotten. he could have FedEx'd it and I'd have had it before the car.

It would probably be a chick magnet for anyone else. But they turn and run when they see me. Sigh!

I had warning. In January they said two to three weeks. At the end of February they said "days" and then "real soon." Then about 3 weeks ago they said "There won't be a truck in the area until Tuesday," which sounded like it was done, but a week later they said "We're almost done testing it."

So last week when they said they'd send it Friday, I didn't believe them, and on Friday when they said they'd loaded it onto the truck, I half believed, but half expected another excuse.

Yesterday the trucking company told me they'd deliver it today, but I didn't know if there'd be another delay, so I didn't want to post anything.

It's got a 144-volt, 200 amp-hour, 28 kWh battery pack. The attached chart is range vs speed for the Tesla Roadster, which has a 53 kWh pack. Call it about double mine. So my range ought to be half what you see on the chart. The battery importer says these batteries can safely be taken down to 20% SoC. So 4/5 of the total range, or 0.4 times the range on the chart should be my safe range.

Once I can charge it, I'll go on the freeway and chart amperage vs speed for 4th and 5th gear at 55, 60, 65, and 70 mph, probably with Allan's help. Once I know the amperage, I'll know the range for a given speed, but I'd expect my safe range it to be close to 0.4 of what the chart says.

I originally asked for enough batteries to give me 125 miles at freeway speed. The chart gives me that if "freeway speed" is 50 mph. But only 90 (to empty) at the freeway speed limit here.

On the other hand, if you want a freeway-capable EV what are you going to do? There are not a lot of choices. The wait for a Tesla Roadster is a couple of years, and it's not a comfortable car. Several companies are promising EVs in two years, but they've been promising that for a long time. Aptera won't be selling outside CA for the foreseeable future. And who knows when they'll begin production anyway?

A conversion car is about all there is now. I picked a guy who was maddeningly slow and didn't do exactly what I requested, but another shop might have been worse.

I think once I get used to it I'll be happy with it. It's a beautiful car.

 

Update. The electrician cannot do anything for me before next week, because he's booked up. Paul is going to build me a cable and send it. He said he'd try to ship it today. Maybe he will, though nothing has happened quickly up to now. I begged him to ship it overnight with Saturday delivery. He understood, but did not make any promises.

I should have a charging cable some time next week, if not tomorrow, and I think tomorrow is unlikely. Meanwhile, my EV that I've waited eleven months for sits in my driveway. I've got a few miles worth of charge still on it, but probably won't drive it again until I can charge it.

 

Update.

They sent me the cable. They said it would arrive Monday. Apparently they were not willing to pay for Saturday delivery. I had hoped to get it Saturday, but had feared it could be next Friday, so Monday is better than expected.

What Paul told me:

Since there was not room for the second charger (I didn't want two, but Paul decided to give me fast charging which I didn't need) and the spare tire, without giving up my back seat, and I didn't want to give up my back seat, I would have the option of leaving the second charger on a table in the garage. It would mean more cables to plug in, but I'd have my spare and still have my back seats. Paul recommends leaving the spare at home and carrying a can of fix-a-flat. But I don't like that idea because it ruins the tire, and is useless if you have a sidewall blowout or a really big hole. He shipped the car with the spare in the back seat and the charger in the tiny space that remains of the trunk (front) after it was mostly filled with batteries. I knew I wouldn't have much of a trunk if any. I accepted that from the start.

What I discovered:

Today I moved the Porsche into the garage and the Prius out into the driveway. (The Xebra uses the other side of the garage, since it, like the Porsche, must plug in.) Then I opened up the trunk and took the charger out. The first thing I found was that one of the cables was too short to reach with the charger outside the trunk. I'd have to set the charger on top of the spare tire before I could plug in its cables. I wrestled the spare out of the back of the car, and the second thing I found was that the spare does not fit in the trunk. It is several inches too long and/or too high.

Then I discovered that the right rear seatback will not latch into place, and the right rear seatbelt tensioner is stuck and the belt cannot be pulled out. This is probably not Paul's fault, since he would not have been doing anything around there. Finally, I climbed into the rear seat and learned that a circus contortionist would probably find it acceptable, but no civilian would, so it didn't really matter if I lost the use of that seat after all. I very nearly was unable to get out. Perhaps there are more contortionists and midgets hitchhiking in Germany than here, and the back seat of a Porsche would serve some purpose.

So I got the tire back into the back seat, in a manner that still allows the left rear passenger seat to be used, if I ever have occasion to offer a ride to a contortionist, and put the charger back into the (front) trunk.

The one positive thing in all this is that to charge the car I'll only have to plug in the one cable, as with any normal EV, and not the three cables of the outboard charger as well as the pain power cable. I lose half my back seat after all, but that turns out to be less of a loss than I had thought.

Here are pictures of the innards. Three of the charger sitting in front, and three of the stuff in the back. I have no idea what any of it is, except for the charger in back, since it's the twin of the one in front.

 

Nope. No 110 volt charger. There are 48 LiFePO4 cells, charged in two banks by separate chargers. Each charger measures about 15 x 10 x 8 inches and includes an integrated BMS. (One is seen in the pictures of the front trunk of the car, above.) They run on 220 volts and draw 18 amps each, so the car plugs into a 50-amp circuit. My Xebra has 24 LiFePO4 cells and a single 220-volt, 25-amp charger, also with integrated BMS.

But if you think that's big, check out the humongous wall-mounted charger for the Tesla Roadster.

Paul can install lead or lithium batteries, as many as will fit, depending on your budget and how much range you want.

Good advice about strapping down the tire. Bad advice about leaving it at home. A simple flat would require a tow truck. This is the original "doughnut" spare that fit in the trunk until Paul filled the trunk with batteries. They don't power the windshield washers from the spare tire any more.

AAA is not my friend. AAA is the friend of Big Oil. They lobby consistently against the environment. I have road hazard coverage on my car insurance. I can call any wrecker I like, pay them cash, and file a claim with my insurance. But when I do, I want them to put on my spare, not have to tow me to a service station.

Since I still have 3/4 of my charge, I am going to take a short freeway jaunt tomorrow to log amperage vs speed. That should give me a good idea of my range. I'll post my results. What I know about the range of my Xebra and the relative size of the packs does not make me optimistic. My only hope is that the motor in the Porsche is a LOT more efficient. It might be. Everything in the Xebra is pretty cheap.

 

:rofl:

The rear seats do not move, but the seat backs fold down and form a shelf which extends toward the back. I believe the real wheel would fit.

But if it does not, the road assistance driver could take the real wheel after he puts on the spare. I cannot change a tire. I could when I was younger. Not any more. Maybe if my life depended on it, but in that case I would not worry if I had to abandon the flat.

I have had a number of flats in my 40 years of driving. The most recent is telling: Not quite two years ago, I was returning from Canada on a Sunday and got a puncture in a nearly-new tire out in the middle of nowhere. I cannot remember if there was no cell service, or if I just could not reach a service station that was open. But I was on my own. I tried to change the tire but could not get the flat off. Eventually some good Samaritans stopped and changed it for me.

If I had not had a spare, I'd have had to abandon my car and hitchhike home. The three-hour drive home (slowly) on the doughnut spare was terribly frustrating, pulling over constantly to let traffic pass. But that was preferable to abandoning my car.