My big boat convered to electric drive

[peterboat]

So this week we had the first trip on Joyce under electric power, for the technical mined-ed I have used a 48 volt DC series motor its 12 inch in diameter and about 14 inches long, it has a cooling fan, it used to live in a large forklift truck as the drive motor

I am running it at 70 volts with a curtis controller,  reverse is achieved by using a reverse contacter by albright [it reverses the field windings] these motors have huge torque from 1 rpm upwards, for safety it has a 300 amp cutoff if something goes wrong with wiring or my propeller gets fouled it trips.

The first trip was about 2 miles with maneuvering at each end, its very easy to drive the boat as the motor which is direct drive can spin at 30 rpm or right up to 1800 rpm. The boat is very quick off the mark and slows very well as well, at 3 MPH its drawing 50 amps ish 3.3KW on the meter which on its 280 AH batter bank gives it 5 hours ish on batteries. I also have 3.6 KW of solar so on sunny days it will run from the sun. The run lasted about an hour and was deemed a success, however I have to take it all to pieces to make it BSS proof and the rectify a couple of issues. The motor was at 72 degrees after an hour so I am also adding a blower to force more air through the motor for cooling, and the flange I turned is a fraction off center which causes a slight vibration, the mounts and center flex take these out, but I would rather sort it out properly.

 

As yet I am still having problems with CRT over the license because it 25% cheaper but that should be sorted soon, a CRT lockie who saw me on the run was amazed, and thought because of the lack of noise and smoke that I had an engine problem., a quick gander in the motor bay made him smile.

 

Remember my boat weighs 30 odd tons and used to be pushed along by 50 hp now its done by 7.5 hp but lots of torque and is lovely and quiet perfik

 

Edited February 9, 2019 by peterboat

[Taslim]

Congrarads. Well done you.  Any chance of 'photos of 'the gubbins' at some stage?

[peterboat]

1 hour ago, Taslim said:

Congrarads. Well done you.  Any chance of 'photos of 'the gubbins' at some stage?

Yes I will I am taking it apart to BSS proof it! Though as they say they dont see many so no bare cables and make it look pretty

[ditchcrawler]

55 minutes ago, peterboat said:

Yes I will I am taking it apart to BSS proof it! Though as they say they dont see many so no bare cables and make it look pretty

Are you force ventilating the battery box

[peterboat]

57 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

Are you force ventilating the battery box

LifePo4s like to be at 25 degrees at the moment they are very cold and unhappy I will in use, measure the temps and sort them out

Edited February 9, 2019 by peterboat

[Dr Bob]

Well done  Peter!

Yes, please post some photos of the kit.

[CompairHolman]

Do you get the electric boat discount if you have an onboard generator to charge the batteries ?

 

 

[Boaty Jo]

Very interesting, good for you.

Presumably you re-charge via mains / genny if there's no solar available .

How does the system cost compared with a regular (50hp) engine?

[Bee]

Well done, I am particularly impressed by the use of the second hand forklift motor. Electric drive is expensive to fit but if its possible to get adapt preloved parts then it starts to get into the realms of possibility for the likes of many of us. Lots of boats have used old van and taxi diesels, maybe in the future that'll be old electric vehicle parts.

[peterboat]

2 hours ago, Bee said:

Well done, I am particularly impressed by the use of the second hand forklift motor. Electric drive is expensive to fit but if its possible to get adapt preloved parts then it starts to get into the realms of possibility for the likes of many of us. Lots of boats have used old van and taxi diesels, maybe in the future that'll be old electric vehicle parts.

300 squids for a nearly new motor, if I had been doing a narrowboat I could have used a smaller motor out of a forklift truck.

Some of the newer models have PWM controllers so the scope to do a conversion gets cheaper again. Having said that I bought a Curtis controller for 150 squids new, so ebay is your friend for these things.

[ditchcrawler]

2 minutes ago, peterboat said:

300 squids for a nearly new motor, if I had been doing a narrowboat I could have used a smaller motor out of a forklift truck.

Some of the newer models have PWM controllers so the scope to do a conversion gets cheaper again. Having said that I bought a Curtis controller for 150 squids new, so ebay is your friend for these things.

Its over 45 years since I have had anything to do with electric forklift trucks, I take it everything is solid state now.

[peterboat]

4 hours ago, Boaty Jo said:

Very interesting, good for you.

Presumably you re-charge via mains / genny if there's no solar available .

How does the system cost compared with a regular (50hp) engine?

My drive system at the moment is pure solar, my leisure system has a whispergen to charge it as well as solar and land line battery charger.

If I had a day without sun I wouldnt bother moving, but then again I do have batteries for 5 hours, so I am sure I could get somewhere if I had to.

Cost wise for me wasnt that expensive, the batteries at over 300 squids each x 14 was the biggest purchase, I suspect that I have done it for less than a new 50hp installation

3 minutes ago, ditchcrawler said:

Its over 45 years since I have had anything to do with electric forklift trucks, I take it everything is solid state now.

Yes in a word, new ones use AC motors now, they really have moved on

[Alan de Enfield]

5 minutes ago, peterboat said:

Cost wise for me wasnt that expensive,

I realise that its not 'all about the cost' but it would be interesting (and a useful guide for others with similar plans) if you could find time to do a complete project costs, you have said that your batteries were £4200, your 3.6Kw of panels and ancillaries must have added up to a fair 'chunk' as well.

[TheBiscuits]

On 09/02/2019 at 11:15, peterboat said:

I have used a 48 volt DC series motor its 12 inch in diameter and about 14 inches long, it has a cooling fan, it used to live in a large forklift truck as the drive motor

I am running it at 70 volts with a curtis controller,

Is this why the motor runs hot?  I'm sure you have a good reason for doing this, but what is it?

 

[Laurie Booth]

Well done, any chance of a video etc...

[peterboat]

28 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

Is this why the motor runs hot?  I'm sure you have a good reason for doing this, but what is it?

 

Power! more of it for short bursts, I might have to repitch my prop after further testing, so I wanted the ability for the motor to develop more revs  if needed and that requires more volts

[TheBiscuits]

3 minutes ago, peterboat said:

Power! more of it for short bursts, I might have to repitch my prop after further testing, so I wanted the ability for the motor to develop more revs  if needed and that requires more volts

Makes sense.  Does that mean that in normal cruising the controller keeps it at 48V but you have an extra burst if you need it?

[peterboat]

10 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

Makes sense.  Does that mean that in normal cruising the controller keeps it at 48V but you have an extra burst if you need it?

No, all I can see on the control panel is amps and KWs, but because its Pulse wave modulation,  it will fire whatever is in the battery in bursts to achieve motor speed, pretty much like pwm in solar panels charging the batteries, if that makes sense?

Forgot to say when I started the test my batteries were at 67 .2 volts at the end they were at 66.6 volts, charger is disconnected because LifePo4s like to sit at 60% charge when not in use

[peterboat]

So today we had a 1.5 hour run in the boat we averaged 3 mph, had two turnings around, and a couple of burst of full throttle. I chose a non sunny day so I could get an idea of range on batteries, it loos like after the 1.5 hours I had used 15% of my batteries up, I only charge my LifePo4s batteries to 80% and will take them down to 20% so I suspect I have about a 5 hour range on batteries alone, bring in the solar and I think 8 hours is achievable in the sun without any problems.

In the end I have butched adjusted my prop to 16 x 10 which with the addition of an electric fan means that both the controller and the motor run very cool, so it cant be under any strain, full power seems to get to just over 7mph which is better than I expected.

I have also added Hydraulic steering which was entertaining for the first hour!! On Friday its the big test we are off to Sheffield, so its about a five hour run with a lot of locks, so I will post how much I had left in the batteries at that point, and if I can post a video of the occasion.

[TheBiscuits]

3 minutes ago, peterboat said:

On Friday its the big test we are off to Sheffield, so its about a five hour run with a lot of locks, so I will post how much I had left in the batteries at that point, and if I can post a video of the occasion.

Excellent! I look forward to seeing the electric bathtub under way  

[peterboat]

3 minutes ago, TheBiscuits said:

Excellent! I look forward to seeing the electric bathtub under way  

This isnt the bathtub! this is my 57 x 12 semi dutch barge!! 30 odd tons of it, its a totally different experience to boating with a diesel

Edited April 16, 2019 by peterboat

[ditchcrawler]

Its good to see a posing with all the warts and all. unlike some that say I have a marvellous system and then nothing.

[reg]

1 hour ago, ditchcrawler said:

Its good to see a posing with all the warts and all. unlike some that say I have a marvellous system and then nothing.

I'm sure splckr has a built in sense of humour. 

 

Happy to endorse your comment when corrected. 

[Dr Bob]

Yes, well done.

Look forward to seeing the video.

[ditchcrawler]

2 hours ago, reg said:

I'm sure spil chucker has a built in sense of humour. 

 

Happy to endorse your comment when corrected. 

My spill chucker doesn't know watt word I want two use