Crazy plan: A Tesla and chevy Volt powered EV hotrod S30

[primeral 0]

I've thought about the drivetrain from the RWD/AWD Lexus GS450h and LS600hL. We have a LS600hL and the power from the electric motor assisting the V8 5.0L is really nice, but I don't know how to feel about a CVT transmission in the Datsun. I suppose there won't be any gear shifting with a pure EV anyways.

[bawfuls 2]

Did you ever make progress on this? If so I'd love to see how you did it.  I did an EV conversion on an s30, but used a smaller motor which I mated to the stock transmission thus leaving the stock rear end unaltered. It was my first car project so I wanted to keep fabrication simple at the time. I'm thinking about upgrading though, and re-doing the car with different batteries and a small Tesla rear motor. Here's a mock up illustrating the fitment difficulty:

 

Another issue is vertical clearance, in order to avoid interference between the control arms and the motor, the motor will need to be high enough that it'll require some cutting of the trunk floor above it I believe. The distance from the underside of the trunk deck to the top of the control arm inboard mount is ~7.5 inches, while the small tesla motor requires about 10-11 inches of vertical space.

 

Edited April 4 by bawfuls

[grannyknot 29]

19 hours ago, bawfuls said:

Did you ever make progress on this? If so I'd love to see how you did it.  I did an EV conversion on an s30, but used a smaller motor which I mated to the stock transmission thus leaving the stock rear end unaltered. It was my first car project so I wanted to keep fabrication simple at the time. I'm thinking about upgrading though, and re-doing the car with different batteries and a small Tesla rear motor. Here's a mock up illustrating the fitment difficulty:

 

Another issue is vertical clearance, in order to avoid interference between the control arms and the motor, the motor will need to be high enough that it'll require some cutting of the trunk floor above it I believe. The distance from the underside of the trunk deck to the top of the control arm inboard mount is ~7.5 inches, while the small tesla motor requires about 10-11 inches of vertical space.

 

Did you ever do a build thread on the first EV conversion?  Let us know when you do the Tesla build. I haven't looked into very much yet but was also thinking about the next Z project being Tesla powered.  I guess the gear selection is all wires?  Mount all the batteries in the engine bay?

[bawfuls 2]

3 hours ago, grannyknot said:

Did you ever do a build thread on the first EV conversion?  Let us know when you do the Tesla build. I haven't looked into very much yet but was also thinking about the next Z project being Tesla powered.  I guess the gear selection is all wires?  Mount all the batteries in the engine bay?

I did a thread on another forum which you can read there, but not on HybridZ. The Tesla motors all have a single speed reduction gear (in the case of the small rear unit it's 9.34:1) so you select reverse by running the motor the other direction. The engine bay of the Z is pretty roomy for how small the car is, but you still have to select batteries carefully to get what you need into that space.

 

I'm kicking myself for not paying attention to this forum a couple years ago when the most recent 3D scan and CAD of the S30 was kicking around, it would be extremely useful for planning this build.