Friday, March 25, 2011

Triac update

Well I have not posted in a long time, but I will try and do better.

Mac is doing fine, I have noticed about a 10% loss in range during the cold winter with the heater on. On the couple of warmer days we had ( mid 50's )it was back to normal. I have about 10.000 miles on him so far. I say about because I had the speedometer replaced a couple of times and I did not write down the mileage before replacing it.
I had the clutch break on me, but not the fault of the Triac. I am in the habit of stopping with the clutch out, and down shifting to 2nd (The gear I start out in). Every once in a while it does not go all the way into gear, and when I step on the accelerator the motor just spins. I quickly realize the problem, and put the clutch in and shift. The problem is I do not hear the motor spinning, and I just let the clutch out fast. Needless to say the motor is spinning very fast, and instantly engages the clutch with a bang! After doing this about 5 times one of the clutch springs broke. Green Vehicles paid to have it repaired locally, and sent a much heavier duty clutch with dual springs. Mac is much happier now.

I have almost completed my design for a trailer hitch and am getting excited to get it installed.

The weather is finally getting better here so I will try and get more pictures.

3 comments:

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  2. Hey Randy, Good to Hear from You,

    I also just turned over 10,000 miles on my Vectrix! It's fun to fly by the gas stations and laugh at the prices ;-)

    However, I'm currently making arrangements to upgrade to Li-ion (from NiMH), so that I'll have a longer range.

    Are you getting a trailer hitch on the Triac? What will you tow?

    Looking forward to the new pictures.

    Do you know if anyone else is driving around a Triac? Is your Triac going to be in the new movie, "The Revenge of the Electric Car"?

    Take care,
    David

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  3. Hi David, Lithium is awesome. I am sure you will be very pleased.
    I am going to pull a small motorcycle trailer. I may even look into the small tent trailers for motorcycles. I am hopping that when the charging stations start being installed that I can go to the ocean and camp out. Unfortunately I am so busy I have not had much time to get the design completed. At least I finally found a good place to get the welding done. Every place seams to think I am going to pull a yacht or something and insist on some god awful monstrosity of a trailer hitch. All I am looking at is a tongue weight of about 25-30 lbs and a trailer about 300 lbs. I think Mac will handle that fine.
    I will try and get some new pics soon. I just can not get motivated when it is raining. The weather forecast for the next 10 days is pretty much rain :(
    I wish I could get in touch with someone else with a Triac. I think there are only a few around until they come out with the next version. The problem they are having is finding a good AC controller. I think they are making a big mistake in sticking with AC. DC controllers are a fraction of the cost and do just as good of a job. There are several very reliable ones out there to choose from so they could get there production up and running.
    No Mac is not in the movie. That would have been way cool though. I can hardly wait to see it.
    Thanks for the update on your Vetrix. Keep me informed on how it turns out

    Have fun
    Randy & Mac

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