A stiff Chinky

As previously posted I had some concerns about the hole the previous owner Pablo had cut in the floor of the Cinquecento to install the batteries under the seat. Having spoken with Andy, my tame MOT inspector it was agreed that some strength needed putting back into the monocoque chassis to replace the metal cut out. £15 worth of 1" x 1" steel square tube was duly acquired and a basic frame was stitched and then seam welded to the floorpan where ever it touched - in more than enough places. Near to the seat belt mountings a strip of angle iron was let in to reinforce

the floorpan to subframe area all the more.

With the new frame built up and a dash of paint it was time to make the battery cover. Plywood was chosen for a few reasons - it is a good insulator so won't short out the tops of the batteries if accidental contact is made, it looks okay, it's cheap, it's easy to work with and I had a bit lying around in the garage. This is a budget project remember, so anything that can be used will be used. Including the old suitcase handle I found in the shed, which makes removal of the cover much easier than levering it out with a screwdriver each time access to he batteries is needed.

The seat refits nicely over the frame and only an inch higher than before, only the ill fitting carpet giving the game away that anything might be lurking under there. A new carpet will be fitted at some point once the car is on the road again.

The broken rear light has now got my attention and has been removed with 2 new replacements on the way courtesy of E Bay £4 each plus postage. These are the newer spec with the white(grey?) style indicator lenses. Looking at the old lamp I have removed I think it will be possible to replace the bulbs with LED bulbs to save the 12Volt accessory battery a little, although the indicators will need a resistor in place so they still flash at the right rate.

I'm also hoping the SAAB sourced vacuum pump will arrive tomorrow, so I can get on with the brakes.

Chinky powered up

On a rare day off work, and with a biting cold -1 plus (or is that minus) windchill factor, I spent a day working on the Chiny Electric car today. First job was to replace that troublesome trip fuse which the previous owner Pablo, had bodged with a bit of wire after the fuse failed in service - his temporary fix of a wire bridge had arced to earth, causing no end of headaches. With the trip fused replaced with new normal service was resumed.

Next job was to get the "Heath Robinson" charger up and running. Avid followers of the project will recall that it is to be built on a shoestring budget, so expensive variable electronic chargers are not an option. Instead a chaep 240 volt AC to 110 Volt AC site transformer has been butchered to include a voltage regulator and a variable resistor, giving a useful variable 0 to 110 volt DC supply - a very crude and cheap battery charger.

As can be seen this initially had a mains plug attached for testing purpose, but is now hard wired into the car and a three hour test shows it works - as long as you check the output voltage and don't try and put too much into the batteries at once. About 66 volts input avoids the problem of the thermal cutout activating. Practice and experience will show what is best for the batteries.

With the charger clamped down and a new control knob fiitted it will just need some calibration marks to make it easily useable in future. 66 volts is okay for the 60 volt battery array present at tghe moment, but tommorow may see the additiona of another battery , so that'll take us to 72 volts in the array and probably around 78 to 80 volts from the charger output to charge them. The multimeter shown is not a permeneant underbonnet fixture, it is just there for calibration and testing purposes.

Tommorow should see the fibreglass work done to secure the charger socket in place. A lick of paint will then have that looking finished. Tonight I have purchased a £39 SAAB vacuum pump which should provide the necessary braking assistance to the brake servo. This will need to go somewhere under the bonnet, probably behind the charger.

Then I need to resolve the heating/demisting issues. A motorhome style Ebracher heater is one option, but I'm also considerign a ceramic heater or two (three or four!) fitted in where the original heater matrix was, and utilising the existing heater box and controls.

I have spoken with my tame MOT inspector tonight also, and we beleive that a frame fabricated from square section tubing should replace any strength lost in the floorpan where the aperture was cut for the battery installation under the rear seat. My plan is to build a ladder frame, which will weld into place around the aperture and stretch from sill to sill, and onto that will sit the plywood cover for the batteries, hinged for easy access and locked down with over centre catches. The rear seat may raise by an inch or so, but I don't see a problem with that, I'll probably only ever carry the children in the rear anyway. Plywood is the preferred option to prevent shorts and to resist the possible battery acid splashes better than a steel cover might.

Chinky still lists badly to the left with his flat and bald tyres on that side, so I may be loking to get a couple of part worn tyres to make him sit upright again, or if money allows, maybe we'll get four brand new ones!