132: Tuesday 16th March 2010

I got 26.6 miles today from a single charge. I have been driving really carefully in 3rd gear only. My next plan to increase mileage is to use the cutback to set up a switch for “sport / economy” so I can limit the throttle amount in economy mode and give it full beans in sport mode. I am also going to rig up some slave relays to my brake and clutch pedal switches so I can introduce the braking regen (loads of charging amps) and disable regen when I touch the clutch pedal. I had it confirmed that the release regen (200A charging) is triggered by the throttle micro switch, so I can use the same feed to the throttle and brake inputs and break the connections with the clutch relay. Then I can select economy mode and use the gears. It will be much easier to maintain a top speed. Also in sport mode I can go through the gears and do some 0-60 runs and find the top speed etc. I am hoping I can borrow the test track at work for this.

I had a disaster this morning, I did not know what had happened for sure until I got home from work, but when I plugged in last night it started charging o.k. When I came out in the morning there was no noise from the fans on the charger so I automatically assumed that the charge was complete. I just about made the 7 mile trip to work and I started worrying about duff batteries and other stuff. I tested the batteries after 90 minutes of charge and everything was fine. Then I remembered that I had a new caravan adapter for the charge lead and assumed that it must have had a 10A fuse in it and the car only got about 1 hr of charge before it blew. When I got home I found that the short extension I had on the end of another extension had blown its fuse and was arcing on the live wire connection. The plug was quite badly burned. So tonight I reversed up the drive so I had plenty of cable and did not need the short extension.