My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Dedicated to the conversion sold by the now defunct Electric Car Company

Moderator: mattcarr

mattcarr
Posts: 389
Joined: Sat May 12, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Hampshire

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby mattcarr » Wed Mar 06, 2013 10:11 pm

My, how the weeks seem to slip by. I have finally gotten around to replacing the 16 amp plug on the end of my original charging lead and it is back in use, and I now have the other one back in the boot as my spare for any opportuinty charging if I am out and about.

I am still slowly putting on the miles in my car and last week had a couple of days where I did 50+ miles. One of these was with only a short charge in between journeys. With the colder weather we had last week I was a little concerned about doing the trip, but i think the small charge that I did get made all the difference. Not only with putting some charge back in to the pack - but simply that it also warmed up the pack a little as well which helped in keeping the voltage a bit stiffer. It did help with me taking the back roads on the final leg home and keeping the speed down for a lower power draw.

The mileage is now just over 15,200.

mattcarr
Posts: 389
Joined: Sat May 12, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Hampshire

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby mattcarr » Thu Mar 14, 2013 11:15 pm

Well my car failed on me tonight, as I was on my way to the southern BVS meet. Looks like my 12 volt battery has failed. I think the DC-DC converter is not charging it up. Terry kindly offered to let me get the car to his place as it is just around the corner from the meet. We had the battery on charge for some time but it just seemed to not hold a charge. So tomorrow I will get the a new battery fitted and see if the DC-DC likes the new battery.

Many thanks to Terry and John for helping with looking at the problem and to Terry for giving me a lift home.

I will give more details here on how it all goes.

mattcarr
Posts: 389
Joined: Sat May 12, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Hampshire

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby mattcarr » Sat Mar 16, 2013 10:13 pm

Well, the following day I went back to collect my car. Terry kindly let me charge the car for a while and to also put the cars 12 volt battery on charge as well. We noticed that the 12 volt battery voltage went from 11 volts up to 13.5 in a matter of minutes - not a good sign. So with Terry's help we managed to hook up another 12 volt battery via the cigarette socket and a 12 volt "jump" lead I had that connected them via the 12 volt socket. This was enough to help support the 12 volt battery under the bonnet and let me drive the car home.
When I got it home I decided to test the 12 volt battery. Even with a small load on it the voltage would crumble below 11 volts and when put back on charge it would quickly climb to 13.5 volts. Not so good - so I nipped off to halfords and purchased a replacement battery.
I managed to get this replacement fitted - bit of a tight squeeze, but got it in there and all connected back up. I turned on the ignition and went to check the voltage and it was still at 12.56 - it had not changed at all - so the DC - DC most definitly wasn't working.

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mattcarr
Posts: 389
Joined: Sat May 12, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Hampshire

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby mattcarr » Sat Mar 16, 2013 10:45 pm

Right, time to strip down the car and see if I can get it fixed. So with the weather being a bit rubbish I had to clear out the garage to make room to get the car in so I could wouk in the dry. First job was to disconnect the 12 volt battery to disable to car.

Didn't take to long to get the front off the car and the black box of magic open.

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I have to say that the DC -DC converter was a real pain to get out. But you can see it stood on end in the bottom right of the picture below.

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After fishing around to free up the wiring I discovered that there was a fuse on the high voltage input to the DC -DC. I whipped open the fuse holder and discovered a blown fuse !!!!

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So after lots of rummaging around I managed to find a replacement fuse - got it fitted and then managed to get the DC - DC fitted back in to the black box. I connected the 12 volt battery back up and was ready to test.
I jumped in to the car and turned on the ignition.....

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Hurrah, the 12 volt battery was showing a nice healthy 13.63 volts. The DC - DC was working. I turned on the lights, rear window demister and everything else in the car to make sure that the DC - DC was definitly working. The voltage only dropped 0.2 volts - result. So all that was left now was to put it all back together. My car is now back in working order.

mattcarr
Posts: 389
Joined: Sat May 12, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Hampshire

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby mattcarr » Fri May 10, 2013 12:47 pm

Well, since being repaired my car has been slowly clocking up the miles. I got it in the other day to take my son to school - turned on the heater and all seemed well. When we got near to our destination I noticed that the heat had gone - it appears that the heater is no longer working. Another job for me to look at - but this will have to wait for now as I have other priorities eating up my spare time.

Mileage is 16140

mattcarr
Posts: 389
Joined: Sat May 12, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Hampshire

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby mattcarr » Fri Jul 05, 2013 7:33 am

I had one of the free home charger fitted at my house by Polar. Such a shame that I cannot use it !!!! It has got a type 1 J1772 lead hard wired in to it, where as my car has got a 16 amp type plug. I have not been able to find an adaptor or converter plug anywhere - so if anyone knows of one, please let me know. Or my Grumpy-b - if you get your conversion thingy done on the cars you may well have another customer wanting one fitted to their car.

The warm weather has made a real change to the cars performance. The battery pack is holding up really well and I am can feel the performance difference as well. Done a few 50 mile trips in the car as well - some days more with opportunity charging thrown in.

I live near Whitely village - which has recently been redeveloped and reopened - and they have got several Pod Point chargers around the car parks. I tried to use one but I need to get my access sorted out.

The heater in my car is knackered and I have not been able to source a direct replacement, but I have found another similar heater that will require a little bit of work to get fitted.

The big diesel car is poorly at the moment - so my car has been getting a bit more use lately.

Mileage is 17040.

Matt

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timpootle
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Location: Chorlton-cum-Hardy, UK

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby timpootle » Sat Jul 06, 2013 9:01 am

mattcarr wrote:I had one of the free home charger fitted at my house by Polar. Such a shame that I cannot use it !!!! It has got a type 1 J1772 lead hard wired in to it, where as my car has got a 16 amp type plug. I have not been able to find an adaptor or converter plug anywhere - so if anyone knows of one, please let me know. Or my Grumpy-b - if you get your conversion thingy done on the cars you may well have another customer wanting one fitted to their car.


This is going to be a common problem soon. You have several options:

1) Put a J1772 socket on the car. This is the neatest solution for your "fixed lead" charger but means you will also need a Type2 - Type1 lead to be able to use the IEC62196-2 "Mennekes" charge points.

2) Find or make a convertor box like aminorjourney uses. Same advantages and disadvantages as the fitted socket but less invasive to the car AND you can offer it to your friends when they need it.

3) A new solution seen on eBay recently - a convertor lead with a Type2 "Mennekes" plug on one end and a 16A commando plug on the other, with appropriate electronics in the Mennekes plug to make it work.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/231002766047
Neat, but not safe as it defeats the safety precautions given by IEC62196 i.e. driveaway protection, socket live while not plugged it to anything. You would also need to convert Type2 back to Type1 for your installation, which makes it an expensive way of going about the job.

Having written this, (2) looks like the best option. I was writing an article on this problem for the Review (BVS hard-copy newsletter) and this post has cleared my thoughts. Thank you :-)

I am still yet to be persuaded that a fixed lead charger has any advantage over a socket. There is some legislation, I think, but as all the public charge points are sockets (and Type2), tying people to a Type1 floating lead makes no sense to me.
Tim Crumpton

mattcarr
Posts: 389
Joined: Sat May 12, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Hampshire

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby mattcarr » Sat Jul 06, 2013 10:49 am

Hi Tim,

I also think option #2 is the best for myself at the moment. I can envisage a 16 amp commando socket with a J1772 adaptor, that will plug in to the car creating a J1772 socket for me to put the charging lead in to. A nice neat, inline adaptor. I think I will have to take the time to draw up what I an imagining and then seeing if I can get anyone to make them.

Perhaps even see if people are interested in doing a group purchase. Heck, I would even go as far as stumping up the development costs so that the others only pay for the parts.

Must start a separate thread on this to see if there are any takers - and I must track down the GWIZ forum and get the few members left to come over to this forum as well.

I do like the ebay item - such a nice neat lead - might have to invest in one for my car so that it can sit in the boot. Be handy for the Nissan dealers that only have the charging post with only type 2 sockets on them.

Matt

dpeilow
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Joined: Sat Nov 10, 2012 5:21 pm

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby dpeilow » Sat Jul 06, 2013 2:38 pm

Matt, if you come to the Whiteley meet up next week I will show you what a J1772 converter consists of. You won't believe it :D

mattcarr
Posts: 389
Joined: Sat May 12, 2007 2:27 pm
Location: Hampshire

Re: My Citroen C1 Ev'ie blog

Postby mattcarr » Sat Jul 13, 2013 3:57 pm

We will hope fully be there tomorrow.

Matt


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