Project: "Fox-E-Lady" or "How to ruin a running Fox for no good reason" by meiermat

3 minute(s) of a 19 minute read

I got some springs for $70 plus shipping. I didn't have the time to go poking through junkyard after junkyard looking for springs that were the right size, only to have to guess at the spring constant, etc. I found these on Summit's site. They're coilover springs. They measure one inch longer than stock, and have triple the spring rate. They should give me the original ride height back when it's all finished.

I might need to replace the struts at some point, but for now I'm going to leave them be until I have the batteries in place.

This is how it sits now, with the trunk cut out and the longer, stiffer springs in the back. I haven't reinforced the mounting points yet. I just wanted to make sure it all fit first.

The trailing arm/twist beam doesn't allow for much in the way of alignment, so I guess I just have to hope everything sits OK in the end.

5-12-2010

It's resurrected! Kind of. Monday the motor was set up with a prototype drive, and the real power devices. Instead of a battery pack, I'm just using a little 3-phase rectifier running off our 240V supply. It ran poorly, but I had a lot of noise on the current sensors. It'll be easy enough to fix in the final version, once I make the real board.

Then came yesterday. The shop was a constant mushroom cloud of burning phenolic all day during work hours, and to cap it off, I forgot to isolate my computer from the power system before I plugged it in last night. BOOM! No more DSP, and no more driver chips. Probably no more buffer chips, either. Funny. It's not as distressing when we blow up $150 worth of electronics when they're paid for by a contract. When it's personal money...

So, now I'm stuck with this alternate drive that can't do sensorless control without some hefty modification, but it'll be enough to finish testing the motor before I stick it in the car.

Progress! Next step: figuring out how in the eff I'm going to wedge this into the engine bay, mate it to the transmission, and tie it down.

V/Hz (crappy, but operable) drive:

Larger view, with power devices (center) and baby rectifier (bottom left):

I'll probably plug the motor in this afternoon, but you get the idea.