looking for a phev kit Plug in my prius 2004

@dutchplug No problems, thanks for answering. In the meantime I have been thinking about the whole and I think I'd like to go for a lighter solution, 5 to 7/8 kWh max. 140 kg is really a lot I think, and I cannot afford to loose too much storage after all. I've been keeping my eyes on used BMW i3 5,3 kWh battery modules. Perhaps they might be used for this project. Very energy dense at 28 kg per module and prices seem to be quite reasonable, same for the reliability. I will contact Ismo again about this.

Which driving mode do you mostly use?

 

@Alepe. The battery set plus charger indeed take all luggage space, I used the supplied alu box for the cells. May be positioning can be more compact when situating some cells in the space for the spare wheel; I even considered to replace the round shaped spare wheel part for a welded-in square box, also to lower the center of gravity. Current handling of the car is despite reinforced spring not fantastic, tail heavy in cornering, bit steering sensitive in straight line.
Depending on battery technology, a BMS for those BMW modules might be connectabled to the controller boxes/firmware. I will also have an eye on that, since real automotive cells might be better instead of the standard cells in my set.

Netherlands is flat country.... The car has three settings for EV-ICE.
We live in rural area, so for trips in the neighbourhood (narrow roads). I use EV-only setting. Range is abt 100km. Speeds here are low due to lots of agricultural traffic. On (inter)city roads (max 70km/h) , one does feel that the power of the two electromotors is limited, overtaking takes time. Also on highways (we have general speed limits here 100km/h for environmental reasons) pure EV is not practical, so there use ICE with electro support. Yesterday I made a Netherlands roundtrip from N to S and back N 550km, mostly highway.(avg 4,5L per 100km). Then I use emulated hybrid drive, where the battery is kept charged. Locally I switched to EV. No problems, smooth drive.

Energy density numbers for the BMW modules is very interesting! I will have a look on what is available here. Smaller modules maybe easier packed /spreaded in car space, to have more luggage area available!

 

Very interesting reading, I do have also 2 gen and I like doing mods. I was thinking how much space it take in trunk, but I am socked that it's almost full... isn't there more compact solution like spread all parts as flat as possible and put some cover plate on it, so trunk can be at least functional....
Greetings from Rotterdam

Edit: 4.5L /100 Km sounds normal to me, like without batt.mod. Does it also do with battery's same consumption in winter ?

 

you could use a smaller battery. prius plug in fits below the hatch deck, gets 10-15 miles on a charge

 

Interesting option, any updates on your car? Have contacted Ismo for some details.

 

@TomasEU I simply installed the box that I bought from Ismo, he did his functional development/experiments with that one. As I mentioned, an option would be to make a square opening in de bottom of the trunk (take out the round spare wheel space) and weld in a square box: one has to maintain body stiffness (although violating the type approval of the car...) but definitely the centre of gravity will be much lower (improved handling!) and there is a remaining bootspace as well. Other solution would indeed be the spreading of clusters of batteries into unused spaces (eg rearwards of rear wheel arches). Just connect the different blocks with appropriate cabling, I think 25mm2.
A battery of 14kWh does not lower fuel consumption very much, the advantage is that it gives abt 100km pure EV possibility. Locally, my fuel consumption is zero (but cost for energy from mains and/or solar park). During emulated hybrid drive (my trips to southern NL and back north, abt 550km) the battery remains charged between 244V and 250V, recent fuel consumption is now 1 liter for 25km, I adhere to speed limits (with this car.... ;-) ). In real winter periods I mainly use my Vito 4matic, I have no measurement of battery capacity at low temp.

@Maunite I am busy with other projects, so no real updates here for this car. On the roll: battery from Leaf or BMW. Ismo is apparently busy with his company, I have no info on release of single board solution. I also find no developments on battery technology for this car, or affordable hydrogen stacks. I might consider termination of this project in due time, unless interesting battery/H developments appear. It remains daily driver for now. Upcoming is dutch APK, MOT yearly technical inspection. Just curious if there will be comment on the modifications of the car...

Greetz from a small town near Coevorden, Drenthe.

 

Sorry for the late reply. I'm still considering the customisation but I have many doubts. The only real options for me to limit the weight (I want to the car to increase its weight by a max of 10 to 20 kg) and keeping the price as low as possible are either the BMW i3 battery modules (5,3 + 5,3 kw) or 20 new LiFePO 0,432 (so a total of 8,64 kw). Both options weight about 55 kg, which is OK considering that the old heavy Prius battery would be removed.

But when both scenarios would push the price towards 4500 or even 5000 (including labor and the extra parts to be installed, charger etc.), I'm very doubtful about the investment. It would start to make sense if I could run the Prius at about 70% with electricity. Very difficult to understand if that value may be achieved in real life scenarios.

P.S. the new LiFePO batteries are almost as dense as the BWM i3, and, of course, they are new and very long lasting.

 

In all honesty I'm not interested about the emulated mode. That would be the last resort for longer trips where charging is not possible/viable. The main three driving modes are what I'm interested about, especially the EV MODE (with engine idle and little fuel consumption) and BOOSTED HYBRID MODE (with the 50-50% between electric and gasoline for trips between 20 and 100 km).

@dutchplug in pure EV MODE how many km do you usually drive? Max 10 or 20 or more?

 

I was thinking, how is the motor design of the prius non-plug-in car? Can it run in the EV state for a long time? In addition, can the system that supplies power to the brushless motor work for a long time? If the answer is yes, then I admit that the plug-in kit defeated me. There are many second-hand lithium iron batteries or ternary lithium battery packs for sale in China. I think it should be eliminated by the upgrade of electric vehicles, and some can work at high currents. The capacity is also large, which is a good thing if feasible.
[COLOR=rgba(0, 0, 0, 0.87)][/COLOR]

 

Let's wait for answer here, but, imho, I would not dare to run it at 100% electricity for more than 10 or 20 km (and not above 65/70 km/h) for fear of ruining the electric motor.

 

it is my daily driver, and make some pure EV rides on local roads (up to say 50kms) , on highways I choose hybrid mode to keep up with fast traffic, but once on speed most of the travel is in EV mode then.

There are quite some experiences with long pure EV drive: a french guy, Planetaire, also wrote on this forum, and once published on a tour he made:
208km (129 miles) in electric mode with a gen 2 prius | PriusChat
He wrote quite some more interesting stuff on the french forum (brush up your french):
>> Prius 2 - Conversions (Plugin , GPL) | Forum Prius Touring Club
He also has his own website with quite some information (google).

The guy from pistokehybridi drives Prius since 2011; his advice is to pay attention to the lubrication of the ICE, choose a premium brand oil, since the engine will run at a relatively low temperature.

Edit: on his site, Planetaire published some of his experiences with (very) long EV runs on a day:
Consommation en mode 100% Ev | Prius Toyota

anyhow, to react on the doubts earlier raised here in this thread: yes, people make (very) long runs in pure EV mode with their Prius 2 conversions...

 

Thanks for the reply! Very interesting information, thanks. The French guy pages are filled with info, very good. He has a very aerodynamic car, sure, but still impressive that with all that weight he manages to ALWAYS stay below 11 Wh/km from August 2014 until July 2015.

@dutchplug extra question: you spoke about EMULATED hydrid mode but did you ever used BOOSTED hydrid mode for trips of 100 to 150 km?

 

@Alepe: Sorry for delayed response…

I revisited the utube video that Ismo made about this system on his english site. It is a typical presentation of features from designer point of view…let me try to describe the system functions and its controls from user perspective (well, my experience).


As user/driver you have: throttle, brake, pistokehybridi-switch (ON or OFF), EV button, lever for choice D or B (and R), charger select 2kW or 3kW.



If you start the car while Pistokehybridi-switch is ON:

then system will be in HYBRID mode: EV + ICE. Push lever towards D then push the throttle and the car will start its ride.

Throttle halfway, then the car will accelerate; throttle pushed further, the car will accelerate much faster (this is BOOSTED HYBRID drive, will be active until you finalise acceleration by lifting the throttle somewhat, it is not used permanently!). While car is rolling, take your foot shortly from the throttle and the drive will change to EV (EV shown on the dashboard), speeds possible up to about 85km/h. Acceleration is restricted to the power of MG1 and MG2. Pushing throttle further again, ICE will kick in.

Driving in EV faster than 85kmh, then ICE will be running at roughly tickover to allow the planetary system to make that speed at its output.

Changing with the lever to B will allow for more regenerative braking; it is however not a one pedal car. In this mode, Cruise Control will not function.

If you push two seconds the EV button on the dash, the mode will change to pure EV.!

To change this mode to another mode, you have to stop the car and restart.

This all will work until low level of battery is reached, the system will then switch automatically to Emulated hybrid drive mode.



If you start the car while Pistokehybridi-switch is OFF:

Car will drive in Emulated hybrid drive mode, a mix of EV and ICE. Battery level is maintained between 240V and 250V roughly. My experience in flat Netherlands. No idea what charging level will be in uphill/downhill driving.



Chargingpower of the system can be adjusted by selecting either 2kW or 3kW. Charging starts when plug is put in 230V wall outlet.


So lot of functions are handled by the system, some by driver foot/hands.
Hope this explains a bit the system….

Then: I do not recognise the figure of 11Wh/km....where did he report so? Planetaire reported to my recollection mostly in the range from 76 to 94Wh/km.

 

My Engineer system using 76 x 40Ah LFP cell extended range pack did 80km/h 50 km a few times, but the pain of driving at 80km/h was just too much for me so most of the EV only trips were from home to the workshop (5km) with a mix of 80km/h and 50km/h driving and half of it up a hill steep enough put the electric drive under full load to hold the 50km/h from the bottom until the crest. The 5 km home was half down hill, the rest relatively flat driving through town at 50km/h and then 80km/h for the 2.5km from town to the house.
We did this for mths with no sign of the electric motors suffering any ill effect.

If I get to actually do the LTO 55Ah cell battery conversion that does away with the NiMh traction battery and the 76 cell x 40Ah battery, making it an LTO 55Ah traction battery, I'll be looking for ways to increase the 80km/h limit Toyota computer system imposes when the fuel pump wire is disconnected. The added load spinning the ICE motor to save MG1 from over speed damage will be easily handled by the LTO cells and full regen will also be possible for a lot longer than with the original NiMh traction battery, that is where the heat might become an issue .... yet to see if that is the case.

T1 Terry

 

The voltage maintained between 240vdc and 250vdc is interesting. On another thread, a member is trying to develop a traction battery using cylindrical LFP cells and reports the drive is rough if the battery voltage exceeds 232vdc ..... maybe the higher voltage is not actually measured at the battery but rather at the inverter and it is the internal resistance of the NiMh battery that causes the higher voltage reading.

T1 Terry

 

@T1 Terry : this voltage is read from the Scangauge 2 that I use, and acc Ismo it is the input of the Prius upconverter, so actually one does read the battery pack voltage. Car runs smoothly on all voltages. Fully charged I reach some 260V, also from time to time measured with a voltmeter on the charged pack.
Your LTO idea is very interesting! I know only the round LTO cells with radial M8 (I think) threaded connectors. Acc a chinese contact here in NL LTO is mostly used in chinese busses because of the room you need. As their cell voltage (and energy/cm3) is lower than that of LFP you need much more cells! Which type LTO do you consider?

 

The cylindrical cells are 55Ah Yinlong brand. The charge rate is 4CA and discharge rate up to 10CA. The energy density isn't as good as other electric vehicle battery cells, but the ability to hold voltage at a high discharge rate than other chemistries and recharge at a high rate makes them the better choice for hybrid battery use where rapid recharging often occurs and fast charging stations can be used as well rather than the slow trickle charging from a home recharging point.
The recharging to 260vdc at the battery, yet the vehicle still runs fine, is very interesting. The higher the voltage the more cells I can add to the series string and this will both improve the range and the speed/torque available because the battery would hold its voltage better than an LFP or NiMh battery.
The same 84 cell LTO battery was planning to build could handle a max voltage of 252v, but the 95% SOC voltage of 2.6v means I could use up to 100 cells in series, just have to find where to put the additional 16 cells ...... maybe in the spare wheel well ....

T1 Terry

 

FYI: I sold the car, but took the Pistokehybridi set out of it.

The set is now for sale, however without the 78 LFP cells, those are being integrated in our power wall and solar park setup (and we may need that badly here in Netherlands/Europe with winter coming and expected blackouts due to shortage on energy/russian natural gas and not sufficient electricity generating facilities since coal and nuclear were being phased out since few years.....).
Anyhow, Pistokehybridi set is: 2 canbus spoofers, various cablings, electronics and switches, big alu box for 78 LFP cells, 3kW canbus charger (from 230V AC), and 78 BMS for top balancing of LFP cells. With extensive description of building this set in your car.
Pls PM if interested.

 

How much are you looking for it ?