LEAF Charging at Autolib Stations - I finally ordered a J1772 extensioncable from Tucsonev.com

After looking for 2 weeks, I finally went back to my first idea and ordered a J1772 Extension Cable, from TucsonEV.com




Made by a person building EVs, attending Jack Rickard's EVCCON, it should be good

It looks like a quality strong build, with good components and these are not cheap: the plug, outlet, cable rated for 30A ...

Measures 22 feet long, 22 x 30cm = 6.6m, perfect from the end of the LEAF to the front charge port, and has the J1772 hole for the padlock (perfect)

I will plug the Autolib J1772 plug into one end and plug the other end into the LEAF charge port, with one padlock on each, nobody is going to unplug me now !  :-)

Here is the invoice


Not cheap, but in Euros it comes to right under 290, and it is about the only spending I had for the LEAF in 2 years of use, so it's OK


Here is the direct: linkhttp://tucsonev.com/J1772Extension.html

DIY ESS - Fan hole enlarged for more air flow

After monday night tests, last night I drilled a big hole to get the hot air out

I drilled many small 2.5mm holes next to each other and cut the metal

not perfect, but it is well opened now

and after testing at full blast, it really dissipates the heat geenrates by the 7 chargers or the 8 grid tie inverters; Now I will have to find a grid protection for this opening ...

DIY ESS - Fan holes drilled & spinning test

A bit noisy, all this drilling, but it is done !

First: markings

Second: small holes drilling (2.5mm, easier)

Third: bigger holes (7mm)

A little test with a 12V AGM battery: it blows well, enough to egt all the hot air out when charging or discharging I think; And it is very quiet :-) with or without the doors closed

Two extra holes to put screws to hold the shelf, otherwise it just falls (!)

I bent a little bit the base of the second shelf and put it on top of the bottom metal sheet

Bending on this corner side

DIY ESS - Charger Side last modifications

A little drilling on sunday morning to make a collector for the negative chargers leads

Note that all the positive chargers leads are already mounted onto the Tyco Kilovac EV200A1ANA (the one with the home made economizer)

6mm through hole in the board

A long 6mm bolt

popped from underneath and tightened with a nut and a washer 

All the negative chargers leads lugs are now in contact with the battery pack negative terminal, and this bolt is  not moving at all when I pull on this 10mm² battery cable

side view, note that the bolt head is protubing under the board so I added a rubber pad on each corner of the board

Thightened and secured with a second nut

Vectrix with a flat tire :-(

Yesterday, on my way back from work, at one point, the Vectrix felt a bit sluggish, something was wrong

So when I finally got home, I realized the rear tire pressure was low 

So I quickly went to a small gas station where they can fix tires which a kind of rubber plug (I had this done for Prius and LEAF (yes at 400 km, no luck))