Solar Car Club » Batteries

Update on Batteries

Dustin Sanders — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 15:49:10 +0000

The 404 group meet with Dr. Lozowski yesterday to talk about the direction we should take with the battery pack and made great progress. Here’s some bullets that will also be covered in our 404 presentation Monday @ 12 (for those who wish to come watch it, not sure if you can but I don’t see why not)

Instead of building multiple “packs” we will now make a modular design where rows of batteries can be removed from the “pack”, this is good for several reasons: 1. makes it easy to remove and store the batteries during the race. 2. if we find a dead battery the module can be removed from the pack and replaced quickly and the bad module can be fixed when time allows. 3. Allows us to make a pack utilizing all 30kg of batteries allowed by NASC.
The solar cells will be arranged in a 3 x 2 arrangement, 2 parallel combination of 3 in series. This gives us ~ 60 volts of power which is close to the 71 volts lowest voltage the pack will provide, this gives us the best efficiency with the dc to dc converter.
We have a direction to go in monitoring the pack as well as balancing the charge across the batteries, more info will be provided when we are finished designing/researching it.

Everything seems to be moving along quite well, hopefully the body will be ready for the pack when we finish it *wink wink nudge nudge*

Also, talked to Steve Muren yesterday, he told me that we have a guy that will make a mold for the carbon fiber, we just have to provide the design. If anyone wants to get the dimensions of the car and start tinkering with designs maybe something with some aerodynamics (jake???) that’d be awesome.

microcontroller made for charging li-ion

Dustin Sanders — Wed, 20 May 2009 00:34:10 +0000

http://www.atmel.com/products/avr/bm/default.asp?family_id=607

Meeting Notes from Friday 4/17

zacko — Tue, 21 Apr 2009 17:00:56 +0000

1. As you can see, the new website is UP AND RUNNING!! THANK YOU DUSTIN!!!!!
2. The weights are in:
LF 95lbs (34.0%) RF 46lbs (16.4%)
LR 33lbs (11.8%) RR 105lbs (37.6%)
TOTAL WEIGHT: 280lbs

BATTERIES:
Lead Acid—45.0 lbs each * 8 batteries = 360lbs.
(this is the weight of BATTERIES ONLY in the 8-battery pack)
Lithium-Ion –62.41g each (0.13759 lb each)
If we build a pack with 416 cells, 416*0.13759 = 57.24 lbs.
360 -57.24 = 300.76 lbs WEIGHT SAVINGS
**this is the weight of the actual batteries, NOT including the weight of the materials/equipment used in the packs.

SOLAR PANELS:
27lbs each. 27*6 panels = 162lbs for the solar panels.

A special THANKS to Shawn and Grant for weighing the car!!!!

3. The microcontroller design(s) is/are coming along well. LOTS of work left to be done. We’re hoping to have two battery packs designed, built, and installed by the end of summer. Anyone (ECE or otherwise) who wants to volunteer time to this project and has not already spoken up, please LET ME KNOW! I will be happy to have (more) assistance!
4. The body design is coming along well. I will have pics of the progress up shortly! . ANYONE who wants to volunteer time to this project and has not already spoken up, please CONTACT MIKE (migraha@siue.edu) OR ME ( Zack zoester@siue.edu). We will be happy to have (more) assistance!
5. We need someone with a little extra time to sort through some paperwork, scan it into .pdf format, and upload it to the server. This will be an easy task / learning opportunity. Any volunteers?? Contact me (zoester@siue.edu).
6. The Body Mock-Up is not done yet, so our goal for this week and next week is to FINISH IT!!! It’s an easy project, it just takes some time! This week I will be at an IEEE event on Friday, April 24, and thus cannot host a meeting. But (of course), that doesn’t mean everyone else can’t meet to work on the car!! I’ll be at the plant working on it Tuesday evening (April 21). Anyone/everyone else can join me Tuesday, or come on Friday, or feel free to work on it WHENEVER YOU HAVE TIME!!!! If you would like to borrow my CD player/stereo, let me know.
7. Please pay special attention to the tab on this webpage titled “the team.” If anyone wants their name and details added or removed, please contact me (zoester@siue.edu) or Dustin (wedge@ageek.net). This page lists team members and tasks, please let us know if we need to update it for anything we may have forgotten! Thanks!

Meeting Notes From Friday 4/10

Dustin Sanders — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 14:11:43 +0000

MEETING THIS FRIDAY, 4/17/09, 2PM at the cooling plant!!!! This week should be exciting, as we have decided to have play-time with some cardboard! We’re going to make a full scale Moch-Up of a body, just to see what it looks like. Feel free to bring CD’s, I’m going to bring a CD-player so we can listen to some music while we work/play.
If the body Moch-Up goes well, maybe we can BUILD it (an actual body) using existing materials. What then?? We ADVERTISE!!!
–Advertising brings FUNDING. Funding buys a new motor. With a new motor, we can RACE.
–Advertising also brings new members! (Fall recruitment, etc.)
The NEW webpage is almost ready!!! Hoping to have it up and running, perhaps sometime this week. More to come…
The BATTERY PACK is a big undertaking. The microcontroller design will be started today (Tuesday). The design will be underway and partially or mostly finished by the end of semester. Hoping to have the new PACKS built and car re-wired by the end of summer.
Shawn Ryon will be bringing automotive SCALES (perhaps this Friday??) so we can get some preliminary Weight Measurements!!!
Jordan and Meghan are working on the Solar Panel test. BEFORE FRIDAY, feel free to look at the 2008 RULES on the body. www.ee.siue.edu follow “faculty” to Dr. Muren’s homepage. –>click the link to his WORK page, and then on to the rules!! (also, wear clothes you don’t mind getting DIRTY.)