My official Prius Plus mods thread.

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(San_Carlos_Jeff @ May 30 2007, 07:09 PM) [snapback]452412[/snapback]</div>

Some of each, I had batteries and gear. I had three of us in the car, camping gear, about half a case of flyers, water, food and all the spare parts from the build. It looks much better now. I 'll have more pictures after I do some more work on documenting the conversion.

 

Smokey say’s “Only you can prevent forest fires.â€

Now that I pulled all the wires off of the control board we had no more problems with the PHEV system at all during the trip. We love road trips and we get to see so much and meet so many interesting people. Lots of fun. Then somewhere this side of Yosemite we hit some long downhill’s leaving the park. We all had smiles on our faces while we took in the breathtaking views when my wife turned to me and said, “Honey, do you smell smoke?†Yes again, it was smoke. We pulled over and this time the smell was coming from the front of the car. It seems that when you are going down long, long steep graded downhill’s you should use that funny little “B†on the shifter that you have not even thought about or messed with since about a week after getting the car once you realized it gives you worse gas mileage. I had my can view turned on (That’s another story) and it showed the OEM battery to be at 138 degrees and fully charged. Not the wow look all green bars with the little white line on top, but all green bars.

We let the car cool off and used “B†for all the downhills. Now I am sure I would have had a few more paragraphs about our trip home but for some reason at that point with all the worries about heat, smoke, and imagining the car bursting into flames, I opted out of going through Death Valley during midday. Death Valley, and Area 51 would have to wait to get me on another road trip. We made it late into Vegas and cruised the strip before we pulled out our sleeping bags and camped in the car just a few miles from Hover Dam. The rest of the trip went smoothly.

 

To boldly go where no one has gone before.

How the heck did I get here? It seems that I am the first to get the 701 version of the lilliput screen. I really tried to get the same one as The Force but Norm with Can-view said they are not acting the same. Either The Force has a 700 version, or the 701’s are not all the same.

I noticed, actually Ron noticed, that the can view did not seem to be working correctly. Once I returned home, with some frustrated attempts to navigate through the screens I could never get what I pushed to come up. I would push graph one and I would get “Graph one†but “Graph two†came up as only words. Norm talked me though it and he discovered that my screen’s X and Y coordinates are reversed from The Force’s screen.

What was going on is that the top left corner was x=1, y=1 and reversed it made no difference so that is why I would get “Graph one.†However, just below that when I pushed for “Graph two†at x=5, y=1…the can view read it as me pushing x=1, y=5 right where another button was and I got that screen instead.

Norm is building into the programming a screen with a button right in the middle that will allow you to switch between the two, that way no mater what order you screen gives the data, x first or y first the button will still read and appear in the middle of that screen.

I have ordered, and received yesterday, the program downloading device from Digi-key for the Can-View and Norm is working on the programming now. If you don’t have a Can-View I highly recommend it as it is nice having all that data available to you in real time. I know it saved my butt once already being able to figure out that my OEM battery was way to hot which lead me to deduce that I was overcharging it on long downhill sections. Otherwise I would have called a tow truck and let a pro figure out what was going on. I can say now that from where I was, my Can-view has paid for itself.

For now I just have to look at the screen and imagine it flipped before I hit a button. Then I just press where I imagine the button would be and it works ok. I can’t wait to get it fixed. So while having a in dash pop out screen for my 2006 Prius is really cool, being the first with this type of screen is not.

 

What to do when your PHEV is not working?

I know when I picked up my car in San Francisco that Ron was headed out to Belgium for a conference and that it might be a while before I could get my second pack working like it should.

Just like Priuschat is always there with those people who step out of their way to help you figure out what is going on with your car, Calcars and Plug-in have a support community.
Chris Ewert is one such person. His knowledge and willingness to help is appreciated by me more then I can say.

So, what do you do when your PHEV is not working? Just ask for help. The main control board needs to be reworked due to the fact that the Tip127’s are not acting the way they were originally thought they would. Calcars is working on that right now. In the mean time Chris gave me instructions, schematics, and pictures on how to do a temporary work around that should get me up and running by this weekend. Unless of course Mrs. Cheap! has other plans for me, like cleaning the garage, mowing the lawn, or any of a host of things I have been neglecting lately.

Broken Control Board
[attachmentid=8685]

Buy some parts.
[attachmentid=8687]

Alter them to make them work.
[attachmentid=8688]

Check the fit
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A little more drilling
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Stuff the board
[attachmentid=8691]

Solder everything in place
[attachmentid=8692]

<strike>Smoking hot</strike> Getting ready to test
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Truth be told, I am just beginning to understand what the control board is doing. Chris knows exactly what each part on the control board is doing and has taken the time to answer my questions and help me. In turn I hope to help others who want to reduce the amount of oil they use.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(mrbigh @ Jun 8 2007, 02:55 PM) [snapback]458243[/snapback]</div>

:lol: :lol:

Maybe I should have my family do fire drills at the red lights?

:lol: :lol:

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(sub3marathonman @ Jun 8 2007, 10:57 AM) [snapback]458042[/snapback]</div>

You can always chose not to use the second pack. I wanted to do that one better and I wanted to figure out a way the you can just pop out the pack and leave it in the garage when you are going on a road trip. I haven't figgured that one out just yet.

As fare as the battey pack the best price I saw was from Digi-Key. They don't stock them so you do have to wait, but not that long.

 

Duplicate entry deleted.

 

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(TheForce @ Jun 8 2007, 04:20 PM) [snapback]458287[/snapback]</div>

That, or they installed the touch part of my screen upside down.[attachmentid=8702]

BTW: Your not jumping in. If it were not for you, Chris, and Darrell, I would not have half the mods I do now.