Dot Map

Really a borderless proportional symbol map I put together after the election. I wanted to show the organic nature of the electoral process. After I had laid out the state locations it looked more like a petri dish than a map, so I added the oblique border to finish off the look.

Monday Night Movie

I popped in a DVD tonight, since the recent reduction in our television channels has left things excruciatingly dull.

Guess what it was. Go ahead. Guess.

KHAAAAAN!!!

Tearing up the Carpet

I cleaned up the underside this last weekend and now the carpet is pulled out. I think I clean up the motor compartment some more, as I have been distracted lately with rust. As long as the motor and controller have a clean new home, I can continue with restoring the rest of the car. It sure felt good to tear up that carpet.

Automatic Transmissions

The problem with converting an automatic transmission vehicle to Electric is that the automatic transmission is designed to shift based on the needs of the internal combustion engine - not an electric motor. Also because the automatic transmission needs to keep moving automatic transmission fluid (ATF) to shift gears, the transmission shaft must keep spinning, even in idle. This inefficiency leads EV purists to only convert standard transmission cars. There is even a bit of snobbery with some groups providing conversion kits or maybe just laziness because they only want to deal with what they know. The fact of the matter is, an EV conversion from an automatic transmission vehicle WILL WORK. More time and money will be involved, but it can be done. Other people should know this, because at some point ONLY AUTOMATIC TRANSMISSION VEHICLES WILL BE AVAILABLE FOR CONVERSION! There.

The other thing that ticks me off is that a particular conversion company (mentioned earlier on this blog) only supplies an adapter plate for 6.7 inch motors to the VW transmission (same bolts on standard as on automatic). And it's relatively cheap - under $300. But, what if I want to put on a 9" motor? Do I pay 'EV Parts' in Canada $1100 for a custom 9" to VW adapter plate made of aluminum? I either dish out the cash for a custom plate or... make my own adapter plate?

1.21 Gigawatts! 1.21 Gigawatts!

Tonight, I learned that the 'Back to the Future' movies revealed some oddly accurate findings in the real world.

1. FACT. The true pronunciation of the Greek prefix giga for n x 10⁹ (billions) is with a soft 'g' like in the movie script when Doc Brown pronounces it correctly - 'jiggawatt.' The SI acceptance of this prefix was not until 1960 (some 5 years after Doc Brown's famous outburst, but perhaps he deduced what his future-self meant when he heard the term in the video from the future.) My college professor in physics, the late Dr. Asim Barut, always pronounced it "jigga" - and he knew better than anyone else.

2. FACT. A bolt of lightning produces anywhere from 1 gigawatt to 100's of gigawatts of power in it's short life span.

3. FACT. If I took the literal translation of my name (Todd = Middle English for FOX, and Mitchell = Hebrew name MICHAEL) and flipped to MICHAEL FOX, who starred in the 'Back to the Future' movies, this is just plain eerie.

Aside from my name on different internet forums being variations of FastbackToTheFuture, I have no intention of turning my EV conversion into a time machine. If indeed 1.21 gigawatts of power is needed for time travel, then I would need more than 3000 times the battery voltage to resuscitate a Monty Python parrot. And that's more than I'm willing to fit under the back seat.

VW Script

The metal placard "automatic" under volkswagen on the fasty will be replaced with the word "electric." Now I just need to give the data to someone with a CNC router and I have a plastic or aluminum script which will look just like the original.

Engine Out!

My friend Tomo and I tackled the first task of the EV conversion yesterday - removing the ICE (internal combustion engine). Tomo had recently removed his Baja Bug engine, so he was used to easy extractions. This was more confusing, as the '69 Type 3 transmission is supported by the engine only, and it was an auto trans to boot. Tomo had a Chilton and I had the Bentley manual, and BOTH books told us to look for 4 bolts between the torque converter and drive plate. There were only 3 bolts on the torque converter - like there have always been. Err...

Despite the pains of getting to the final extract, we did have fun taking this monster out. I also had fun getting greasy.

The next step will be to clean out, prepare and paint the rear engine compartment to make a new home for the EV parts.