How to convert an EVT 4000E electric scooter to a solar scooter
from ecoGizmo
August 18, 2005
Primary producer Donald Dunklee has been watching the power grid slowly but surely failing, while the world demand for fossil fuel is slowly overpowering the world supply, driving prices skyward. It made him determined to "get off the drip" and build street-legal, affordable, dependable, sun-charged transport for his daily 5 mile commute. His solar powered motorcycle has not been plugged into the factory charger since April 15, 2005 and it’s now travelled over 700 miles since then. We guess he made it - this is Donald's story, as told by Donald.
Gmax posted a link to a blog about this project in another thread but I can't reply to it for some reason.
Here's another link to another blog on this project
http://www.treehugger.com/files/2005/04/don_dunkees_diy.php#comments
For anyone interested in actually doing something like this, there is also a much more "hands on" and technically detailed article on Don's conversion in the latest Home Power magazine. Alas, I left this issue up in Alaska just recently so I'm not sure of the issue number. I think it's issue number 119. It's whatever is on the stands now, though it's been out for a few weeks now.
http://www.homepower.com/
By the way, Home Power Magazine rocks. I think it's the best magazine on the market, if you are interested in doing hands-on alt energy stuff.
Best,
Dave
Looks like it's issue 120 of HP.
hi i need a evt 4000e charger but do not know where to get one from i found one but was very expensive being $350 nearly £230 um if anyone has a spare charger they want to sell let ma know asap Thanks and nice project
hi mr eco gizmo i saw ya evt 4000e quite a few years ago
and it gave insparation as i had an idea anyway.
as i had a evt and needed to extend the range the scooter .
as i was doing aprox 30 miles and had a masive hill to go up one of many and no
regen . well i decided to .buy one big solar flexable panel for a yacht and 4 . solar panels from a plane and 24 small from hong kong
and 3 rocker switches and a small gel acid
and lots of blocking diods connected to the batteries
my phone video is on youtube.. OTLEYSHEV68
i managed to get to work and leave it all day when i came to it at the end of the day it
was fully charged it was all a bit heath robinson but
as they say if it does the job it works
and desided to prove to my self that not only woud .
my evt 4000e would do dubble the milage it was intended for but
do it with my 8 stone son on the back aswell
we did it 60 miles but indoing so we broke down away from home aprox 5 miles but it was in the name of science
and we eat free food on way home .
i did lurn some thing if my son says he is bord when we get to our destanation and the scooter has only had 3 hours of pure sun dont listen to his
and leave the scooter at least 6 to 7 hours that would of got us home .
well with ev we love them and we bend our selfs to shape them ..
would you agre .kev
lurn
my commute a day was 30 per day no plug in points ...
A 30 mile regular commute is pretty long. What's your SOC at the end of a ride?
I only got a glimpse of the scoot in the vid. How about posting some pictures here of the installation..
Were you able to get significant power just from those solar cells wrapped on the body and nose? I would have thought that solar "wings" would be the only way to get adequate power.
hi what soc.??
Kevin Smith: Hee hee, I wasn't following the thread. In case you're still reading this, "SOC" is "State Of Charge" of the pack. If you have drawn 15AH out of a pack that holds an effective 16AH at your power drain level, your SOC is actually about 5%. At this point, you are getting close to permanently damaging the batteries from putting some of the cells into reverse voltage. For long life, a pack needs to be kept above 50% SOC and quickly recharged.
(The pack may have a 20AH nominal rating, but that is at a 20 hour rate, and your usage will be at a far higher rate, reducing the effective energy storage to ~75% of nominal.)