Rear Battery Pack

We left you last year fitting the rear battery pack and finally figuring out the pins for the BMS.

Since then we had a dead 2001 GTI  with 200,000+ miles donated to the cause for parts as it is the same body.  The GTI is currently running errands around town until parts are needed.  We also paused for the push of several students completing formal education.

 Getting restarted.  A nearby lift was donated for a couple of hours, checked the fit again and finalized the installation points.


Hurrah for folks that work on car restoration more often, they had a better idea on holding the pack in place.


Perfect fit, front of rear battery box to frame rise for original fuel tank.  Original fuel tank mounting bolt holes to be reused.


Battery box pigtail s will exit directly into old exhaust tunnel.  Bottom of tunnel will be closed for protection.  Large hole is for the sensing wires.  Small holes are for the pos and neg leads.


Added brackets to hold rear of box to floor pan just fore and aft of rear frame beam.  Some days my welds are prettier than others.  Thank again to friends for the lessons and equipment usage.


The above picture of the welded brackets straddle the frame here.


Battery box complete.  Steel tubes will be placed between the brackets and the frame to allow for proper bolt tightening without air-gap.


Reconfiguration of safety plastic


Rear 6 pack installed in box with safety plastic


Rear main pack 20 modules with safety plastic and lifting brackets


Reminder of what it is supposed to look like.

Next stop, wiring all the sensor wires in the long pig-tails that go up to the BMS in the engine bay.

No Really we have not given up.

We have proceeded with the plan to place long pigtails from the rear battery box to the front BMS and power connection locations. It appears that Nissan used partially proprietary connectors for their BMS, BUT we figured out TODAY that they used standard headers on their circuit board. So rather than try to find the proper pin to refill the connector from Nissan (9 months lost), we figured out that we can use a standard connector and standard pins as the headers are standard. For us that means using connectors: TE Connectivity 1318747-1 025 ECU PLUG HSG ASSY 32P 1379668-1 24W PLUG HSG ASSY BLACK 1123343-1 CONTACT SOCKET The parts arrived today and fit. Moving forward...

No, We did not give up.

Car work did not stop entirely, I believe we left you at taking scans of the undercarriage so we could make the rear battery box.

David Scanner System

 We did finish scanning, and found the results to be within  6mm of accurate.  Close enough that we were confident our battery box dimensions would fit in the car.  We think the system would have worked MUCH better if we had been able to put the car on a lift and get the camera several feet away from the undercarriage instead of 8 inches.  In the end it took almost two weeks to stitch all the images together but if the distance to the camera had been several feet the system would have likely stitched itself.

Fuel Tank Bay

Note all the stars we added to the bay to help the computer and use manually align the images.

Battery Box installed

We made the battery box and got it up into the bay.  SEE it fits with zero clearance, but no "adjustment" was needed either.

Battery Box installed

The 4x4's will be replaced by the original battery box rails off of the Nissan Leaf battery pack. Since our pack is distributed front and rear the load here will be significantly less, so structural failure is less of a concern.

Battery Box from above

OK, the box did not quite fit.  The two corners stick up through the floor about 20mm.  A modified rear seat pan will be put in and the rear seat will be fully functional when we are done.

We have spent quite a bit of time looking at how we want to pass the wires in and out of the battery box.  Originally we were going to install multiple bulkhead pin connections, after much discussion, and a visit to see a friends Mini project, we have decided to use flexible conduit and really long pigtails running all the way up to the front of the car.  This reduces the number of pin crimps and connections by over 200 and hopefully increases reliability of the rear pack substantially.

Vacuum sensor

We got a vacuum sensor today.  The MAP sensor from a 1.8T VW can output analog for both pressure and vacuum.  This one came off the top of an intercooler.  Voltage output seems to go from 0.33 to 4.5V.  0.33-1.94V is vacuum.  We will read this into the DMOC controller and hopefully it can output a CAN code to the dashboard for an idiot light.

Charger cables

We have the Brusa NLG513 charger, but the charging cable that came with it has the wrong connector on it.

I have the J1772 to the charger.

I need the upper connector with the male pins.

This is the cable that came with the charger, but it obviously has the wrong end on it.  Anyone have the right cable for sale or willing to swap?

Rear battery box out for review

We have stumbled on the design of the rear battery box for almost a year now.  The configuration has not changed much in that time, just overall size nudges.

The plan is to slide the 6 modules into place and place threaded rods through the pack to hold them in place clamped.  The bus bars can then be installed on them with two wire leads protruding for connection to the 20 pack or the main output relay.  The two 10 packs are on the original Leaf plates and will have the bus bars applied to them again with a couple of leads extending.  The two packs will then be lowered into the box, secured with threaded rods, and the wiring connections completed.  A 5/8" plexiglass plate will be secured and sealed to the opening above the 20 pack.  The entire pack will be flipped upside down with the threaded rods now protruding from the top it will be lifted/the car may be lowered onto it with the rods passing through the floor pan for securing to the pack to the frame.  An independent skid plate will then be installed under the pack for debris protection.

We could use a little help figuring out the best wiring pattern. We have tried to upload both an excel worksheet we have been using to visualize the wiring in both xlsx and csv format.  They are plain sheets there should be no macros in them.  Anyone know how to upload them here?

This is the rear battery pack for the golf.  There are 26 modules in the pack, 4 stacks of 5, and 3 stacks of 2 as shown in the 3D images.  Note that the shorter stack is inline with the lowest rows in the 5 stacks.  Physical arrangement is FINAL, no moving modules...Each of the 3 boxes represents a connection on each battery module.  The middle connection is for sensing and may not be used for a power connection.  The outer connections represent + and -.  The entire set of 26 must be connected in series, + - + - +-......  Due to space constraints the outer gray set of connections should not be end points for the entire pack or transition to the 6 pack, but should route up or down in the rows of the 20 pack using flat bus bars as shown in the front box pictures.

Suggestions please.

The winning suggestion

This pattern looks like the best option.  It will allow the sections deeper in the box to be pre-connected leaving only one connection to make near the top of the box between the 6 pack and the left 10 pack.  This arrangement requires 13 long bus bar connections.  The original leaf pack only had 10.  So we are short 3.  It is simple enough to make the bus bars, but we would also like to reuse the Leaf orange safety housings like we did on the front boxes.  Anyone in the U.S. have some spare leaf protective covers we may use?

UPDATED:

Requires fewer long bus bars, and therefore we have enough parts.

Rear battery box scans and progress up front.

It took 3 days to for the scanning computer to crunch numbers.  It did not come anywhere close.  We did figure out that the save all scans button hand scrolled off screen, and we were able to save the 88 scans.  After almost two weeks of stitching scans together by hand, this is what we have.

You can see that we were able to get three larger sections completed in the scanner tool software.  The software loaded everything to memory, our 32 GB of memory was right at the edge and the system could not handle all three sections at once.  All the group scans were "fused" and then exported to .obj files that ProE could import.  Alignment in ProE is very difficult.  I am not convinced this effort will yield any usable results as we note many misaligned edges that appear to be out of place by 6 -10 mm.

In the mean time we also worked on the front batteries.  First thing, install a hoist...  We were given a free sling track usually used to hoist patients from a chair into a bath.  Rated at more than 500# and with 5' of travel this took an extra day to install, but we did not need to lift the completed pack.

Reaching up to install the bolts that tie the pack down to the frame.

This pack slid back to the other and was also bolted in.  The original Leaf wiring and bus bars were used.  The large orange loom at the right goes to the Leaf BMS.  The short orange is for the heaters one at the front of the packs and one at the rear.  The black loom is for the temp sensors.

Bus bars for front battery box and still working on the rear box

Front battery box bus bars and BMS monitoring harness.

We were able to reuse the bus bars and connectors from the Leaf pack.  These connectors came from the front Leaf packs so there is an intermediate harness between these and the BMS.  By moving only ONE pin in the intermediate harness and ONE wire in these harness we were able to duplicate the LEAF BMS connection Pattern.  YEAH!

Since the pack has 22 modules in the front and 26 in the rear we will need to splice ~4 wires with a connector from the rear harness into the front intermediate harness.  MUCH cleaner than we had hoped.  YEA!

Starting work on the rear battery box again.  It will be a tight fit and a friend had access to a DAVID scanner.  This system works by projecting a series of known patterns onto a surface and using the camera to image the pattern the computer can figure out the shapes... we'll see.



So far today we have taken ~100 scans of the undercarriage.  That is to say 50, what the... @#$%$#

Well plug the computer back in... and 50 more... The computer has been working on stitching it together for several hours now.

Scanning Lessons:
A. During a scan the save button is not available. Therefore if you do not finish a scan sequence successfully all scans of that session are lost.
B. It puts it ALL in RAM therefore stuff the machine with RAM or you will thrash the disk.
C. It is not meant to take scans of large objects in close proximity. The depth of field generated by the projector blurs within inches at close distance. This would have worked much better if we were able to place the car on a lift at 5 ft. from the projector so the variation in depth of the pan by 6 inches would be small compared to the distance, but we are 13" from the pan varying by 6" and therefore significantly pushing the limit of the projection resolution.
D. Markers with slight depth are better than stickers.
E. When it is done scanning it should beep or have the projector flash so you know when to move to the next location if you cannot see the screen.
F. Power interrupted = lose everything. See [A] and [B]
Scans to be posted in a couple of days.
Day 2 still crunching

Productive week

Charger port connection.

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Hopefully installed the Z-bars for the last time.  Sprayed some WD-40  into it to prevent rust.  Beveled and capped the ends.

You can see that the gearshift has been reinstalled and the vacuum pump has been mounted under the center of the I-beam.  Joshua has given us a vacuum reservoir from a VW Scirocco that will likely go in the drivers side wheel well.  And the control plan for the vacuum pump is to find a CAN based MAP sensor that will be used to control the pump relay and to throw a dash light if the vacuum fails.

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Made a plate to cover the starter port on the transmission.

Removed an ear from the transmission as well next to the starter port for clearance to the I-beam.
You can see the vacuum pump clamped to the I-beam, it has rubber pads above and below the I-beam to isolate it from the frame.

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Stuffed the first battery box.

11 Modules laid out for test and installation

It has been 1.5 years since these were charged.
They seem to be holding very evenly.

Perfect fit!
The heater and thermocouple wires are visible.

Just a wee overweight.  Original estimate was 100lbs,
A heavier gage metal was used to make the box,
and the cells with the brackets weigh more too...

The studs will be connected with rails to prevent movement near the bus bars.  The bottom of each studded module is bolted to the bottom of the box.  There are also 4 rods through the modules to transfer load from the non-studded modules to the studded modules.

Task list. This will be updated regularly.

Front Relay box

Will be mounted

Need to:

Create circuit diagram 

Create the BMS circuit connections diagram

Bus bars need to be reconfigured to fit. 

Plexiglas need to be cut to make box.

Rear Battery boxes

Will be mounted to the frame

Need to:

Create circuit diagram 

Create the BMS circuit connections diagram

Bus bars need to be reconfigured to fit. 

Lower battery frame needs to be cut to fit the box width.

Front Battery boxes

Will be mounted to the Z-bar

Need to:

Create circuit diagram 

Create the BMS circuit connections diagram

Bus bars have been reconfigured to fit. 

Top rails need to be cut and bolted down.

Water cooling pump

Will be mounted to the bottom of the I-beam

Need to:

Create circuit diagram 

Create hydraulic diagram

Create control program

Need to order:

Square U-bolts

Mounting plate 

Mounting bolts 

ø25mm id hose to/from pump 

Regulator switch 

Relay (check supply)

Reservoir tank (have) 

Vacuum Pump

Will be mounted to the front of the I-beam

Need to:

Create circuit diagram

Create Pneumatic diagram 

Create control program

Need to order:

Square U-bolts

Mounting plate 

Mounting bolts 

3/8 hose from pump, what to booster check valve?

Regulator switch, Looking for MAP sensor with CAN output

Relay (check supply)

Reservoir tank (check supply) 

Check valve (check car)

Steering pump

Will be mounted at a much later date after the car is operational.

Will be mounted to the top of the I-beam on the passenger side between the windshield wiper fluid reservoir and the DMOC.

CAN codes have been found and are on a page specific to the pump.

Will require new hoses and fitting to be made.

Reservoir is built in and part of the return loop. 

Need to:

Create circuit diagram 

Create hydraulic diagram

Create control program

A/C compressor

Will be mounted at a much later date after the car is operational.

Will be mounted under the I-Beam on the drivers side.

Will require new hoses and fitting to be made.

Will require finding the CAN codes

Need to:

Create circuit diagram 

Create hydraulic diagram

Create control program

Finding data on the pumps that need to be mounted to the I-beam [Steering Pump]

Part number :BG91-3K514-AB

From the DIYer site we have found some communications data:

Raising the control line high seems to power up the unit and it takes about 200mA. Pump does not rotate at all ...... would seem to need the CAN bus to enable and command speed. The unit announces itself on the CAN bus at power up as id 04f

BO_ 128 x80: 8 pas
SG_ SteeringWheelAngle_pas: 7|16@0- (0.1,0) [-1000|1000] "degrees" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringWheelRotSpeed_pas: 23|16@0- (0.1,0) [-3000|3000] "deg/sec" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehicleSpeed_pas: 38|15@0- (0.1,0) [0|327.67] "km/k" Vector__XXX
SG_ SensorInitialized: 53|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX
SG_ PumpEnable: 51|2@0- (1,0) [0|3] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ SWARstatus: 49|2@0- (1,0) [0|3] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringMessageNumber: 63|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "enum" Vector__XXX

BO_ 662 x296: 8 pas

SG_ VehicleSpeedCounter: 4|4@0+ (1,0) [0|15] "cnt" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehicleSpeed: 23|16@0+ (0.01,0) [0|320] "km/h" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehicleSpeedQF: 39|2@0+ (1,0) [0|3] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehicleSpeedUB: 35|1@0+ (1,0) [0|2] "Boolean" Vector__XXX

BO_ 644 x284: 8 pas
SG_ PowerModeUB: 5|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX
SG_ PowerModeQF: 9|2@0+ (1,0) [0|3] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ PowerMode: 38|5@0+ (1,0) [0|10] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ CarMode: 45|4@0+ (1,0) [0|15] "enum" Vector__XXX

BO_ 1195 x4AB: 8 pas
SG_ PowerModeExt_D_actlUB: 32|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX
SG_ PowerModeExt_D_act: 47|5@0+ (1,0) [0|11] "enum" Vector__XXX

BO_ 1024 x400: 8 pas
SG_ VehConfParamHS8: 7|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehConfParamHS7: 15|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehConfParamHS6: 23|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehConfParamHS5: 31|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehConfParamHS4: 39|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehConfParamHS3: 47|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehConfParamHS2: 55|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehConfParamHS1: 63|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX

BO_ 1029 x405: 8 pas
SG_ VehInfoParamHS8: 7|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehInfoParamHS7: 15|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehInfoParamHS6: 23|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehInfoParamHS5: 31|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehInfoParamHS4: 39|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehInfoParamHS3: 47|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehInfoParamHS2: 55|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehInfoParamHS1: 63|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "u8" Vector__XXX

BO_ 320 x140: 8 pas
SG_ EngineSpeedQF: 54|2@0+ (1,0) [0|3] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ EngineSpeed: 52|13@0+ (1,0) [0|8191] "rpm" Vector__XXX

BO_ 118 x76: 8 pas
SG_ SteeringAngleSign: 6|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringAngleStatus: 5|2@0+ (1,0) [0|3] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringAngleCounter: 3|4@0+ (1,0) [0|15] "cnt" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringAngleCS: 15|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringAngleCRSign: 23|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringAngleCRShortFilt: 22|15@0+ (0.06104,0) [0|2000.09768] "deg/s" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringAngleCR: 38|15@0+ (0.06104,0) [0|2000.09768] "deg/s" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringAngle: 54|15@0+ (0.04395,0) [0|1440.10965] "deg" Vector__XXX

BO_ 576 x240: 8 pas
SG_ EpasFailed: 15|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX
SG_ Ehpas_IDC_mode: 9|2@0+ (1,0) [0|2] "enum" Vector__XXX

BO_ 79 x4F: 8 pas
SG_ EngRun_D_ReqSte_UB: 63|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX
SG_ EngRun_D_ReqSte: 62|2@0+ (1,0) [0|3] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ EPSWarningEHPAS_UB: 57|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX
SG_ EPSWarningEHPAS: 56|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX

Reference:

BO_ 128 x80: 8 pas
ID in decimal xin hex: number of bytes in packet Subsystem (Power Assist Steering, pas)
SG_ SteeringWheelAngle_pas: 7|16@0- (0.1,0) [-1000|1000] "degrees" Vector__XXX
signal name: startbit l number of bits @sign (resolution, offset) [min value l max value] "units"

SG_ SteeringWheelRotSpeed_pas: 23|16@0- (0.1,0) [-3000|3000] "deg/sec" Vector__XXX
SG_ VehicleSpeed_pas: 38|15@0- (0.1,0) [0|327.67] "km/k" Vector__XXX
SG_ SensorInitialized: 53|1@0+ (1,0) [0|1] "Boolean" Vector__XXX
SG_ PumpEnable: 51|2@0- (1,0) [0|3] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ SWARstatus: 49|2@0- (1,0) [0|3] "enum" Vector__XXX
SG_ SteeringMessageNumber: 63|8@0+ (1,0) [0|255] "enum" Vector__XXX

UPDATE:
This pump will be mounted between the windshield washer fluid reservoir, and the DMOC.  The required orientation and height prevent it from being mounted under the I-beam as originally intended.  A plate will be made that will mount to the top of the I-beam and the side of the pump.