1971 GMCe Lexus GS450H BMW 530e Tesla Model S Electruck [Upgrade]

[PatrcioEV-ATX]

tell me you luv wiring without telling me you love wiring


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Well, this was me cutting apart my OEM wiring harness. Fortunately, I didn't lose the tip of my thumb, so yeah, love it!

[Gregski]

Well, this was me cutting apart my OEM wiring harness. Fortunately, I didn't lose the tip of my thumb, so yeah, love it!

Oh my gawd, two things:

1. I am so honored you are following this thread, your build is such an inspiration and we ban anyone from talking about it over at Good Enuff Garage, lol it's just too perfect

B. I see a stitch in there how many did that require? nothing like blood, sweat, and tears

[Gregski]

meanwhile on this episode of You Can't Make This Stuff Up ! YCMTSU

OUR throttle bracket is making it's way from California to California via Texas, and you wonder why this build is taking so long, well actually it drove by my house on it's way to Texas...

[PatrcioEV-ATX]

Oh my gawd, two things:

1. I am so honored you are following this thread, your build is such an inspiration and we ban anyone from talking about it over at Good Enuff Garage, lol it's just too perfect

B. I see a stitch in there how many did that require? nothing like blood, sweat, and tears

1. Thanks! The front battery box is disassembled at the moment fixing a wiring issue.
2. I don't remember, maybe 3 or four. the tip was hanging off as a flap so I'm really surprised it was saved.

[Gregski]

1. Thanks! The front battery box is disassembled at the moment fixing a wiring issue.
2. I don't remember, maybe 3 or four. the tip was hanging off as a flap so I'm really surprised it was saved.

glad you saved it, lol, I had a very similar injury in the great Table Saw vs Thumb Battle of 2006 ! everything was going great I was building furniture, I was making one cut after the other, when I realized I was not using my custom safety push stick thingie, you know so I don't get my hands too close to the blade, so I swear to the all mighty, I am making a cut, ripping a long piece, and I reach for the friggen safety stick to push it with and at that very moment, while reaching for the SAFETY STICK I cut my thumb on the blade, you can't make this stuff up, if I wasn't reaching for no safety stick I would have been fine cutting that piece like I did the other eleven or so. So I run into the kitchen screaming bloody murder, I cut my thumb off, I cut my thumb off, hey wifey can you drive me to the hospital, the love of my life goes, drive there yourself, so I run to the next door neighbors house, they are literally in the middle of an Open House, with tons of strangers there, I go excuse me, pardon me, if it aint too much trouble would you be so kind as to drive me to KAISER Emergency pretty please, the lady of the house hands me her guest towel so I stop dripping blood on her front porch and her husband drives me to the ER, he comes in there with me, takes me to the front desk, the Receptionist says, have a seat please, my buddy almost reaches through the glass opening and strangles her as I am bleeding profusely, as I sit down, she calls my name, my buddy nods with approval, I walk back up to the counter, and she hands me a clip board and says FILL THIS OUT !!! my friend nearly lost it, again I am bleeding in the ER there's blood drips on the floor ... and that my friends is US Health Care at it's finest !

but the drawers turned out amazing...

[Gregski]

I decided to replace my PVC Ts on the inverter with this orange bracket

[P.S.Mangelsdorf]

That's clean.

[Gregski]

well well well, look what decided to show up, as my friend, Patrick said "a world traveler" the bracket for our BMW E39, E46, E53 throttle pedal part # 6762481

[Gregski]

nothing like buying brand new parts and having to modify them straight away, I really wish GM and BMW engineers communicated more better

and what is this appendage ?

[Gregski]

[Gregski]

[Gregski]

some gentle persuasion was required

$4 bit coin bucks to the first person to tell us what them magnets are out of?

Fun Fact: if they ever go missing, flip your floor jack over... you're welcome !

[Gregski]

and job done! what's next

• 1. mount the BMW E46 throttle pedal ✔

• 2. Integrate Damien's BMW Safety Box control Arduino code into the VCU (the old pre Zombie version)

• 3. Wiretize all the low voltage wiring (VCU, Inverter, Throttle, Safety Neutral Switch, Resolvers, Water Pump, Oil Pump, Steering Module, CAN Bus, etc.)

• 4. Decide how to connect the second gen Chevy Volt battery charger high voltage orange wiring

• 5. Install some digital gauges (I am having our good forum friend Artur Kustusch - Jaguar XJR EV Conversion fandangle for me)

[Gregski]

finally time to do some softwearing

so I integrated Damien's BMW Safety Box code, you know the one that controls the contactors inside that box, with his ver 2 VCU (the older controller before Zombie Verter) commercial software or firmware version gs450h_v3_user


(the big black box below is called a Personal Computer and was all the rage back in the 1800s)

so this is what my custom combined menu looks like now

[Gregski]

THE LIST

• 1. mount the BMW E46 throttle pedal ✔

• 2. Integrate Damien's BMW Safety Box control Arduino code into the VCU (the old pre Zombie version) ✔

• 3. Wiretize all the low voltage wiring (VCU, Inverter, Throttle, Safety Neutral Switch, Resolvers, Water Pump, Oil Pump, Steering Module, CAN Bus, etc.)

• 4. Decide how to connect the second gen Chevy Volt battery charger high voltage orange wiring

• 5. Install some digital gauges (I am having our good forum friend Artur Kustusch - Jaguar XJR EV Conversion fandangle for me)

[Gregski]

then I recalled that I wasn't too keen on 351 volt power lines hanging off the inverter on two M6 bolts so I decided to reinforce them with a custom bracket

as always we source our metal from only the finest of scrap piles

[Gregski]

Fun fact the holes on the left are not at the same elevation as the ones on the right on the Inverter (but if I don't tell you, you will never know that I have a slanted bracket)

I'm very please with the way it turned out, and it's strong enuff to tow a boat

[Gregski]

so we were doing great until we wasn't, I recently discovered that my truck never had a hole in the floor for the transmission (gear box) and somewhere along the line one of the previous owners cut the hole out, this explains why I didn't find any of these U nuts around the perimeter holes as they were recessed way too far away from the edge (and had to recruit a family member to sit in the cab and hold a wrench whilst I crawled under with another wrench, any time I wanted to put on or remove that tortoise shell)

here's some pictures of an unmolested 1972 truck (mine is a 1971 so same thing(ish))

[Gregski]

bro thanks for that history lesson, but what does that have to do with the EV Conversion and when are we gonna see them wheels spin?

well, because the previous owner was rather conservative in the opening she cut, it made access to the emgeez difficult (MG1 & MG2) and since my Lexus transmotor came with only one MG safety cover thingie, The Greg had to figure out how to get to the other one, one had better access than the other, can you guess which side needed the cover, lol?

before pics of access to MG1 or should I say lack of, plus the orange high voltage cable ran way to close to the sheet metal and on these old trucks there are a million sharp edges or all sorts of pointy screws protruding below deck, just waiting to nick that cable

access to MG2 was gooder but also too close for my taste

and here's what the MG covers look like I hope they are identical cause I just ordered a new one ($25 bucks plus another $20 to have it shipped, but I justified it as a much needed safety item)

Part # 82821-30710

[Gregski]

before commiittiing (how do you even spell that word? it's the Mississippi of verbs) blade to sheet metal, I made this fancy shield, to protect me... [wait for it] from me !!!

and couple angle grinder cutting wheels later and dust once again all over my beautiful shop and in my nostrils we had gorgeous access and clearance for MG2 and had to use an adjustable hammer to improve access to MG1

[Gregski]

so while I was standing in line at the Lexus parts counter the two dudes in front of me were buying OEM Lexus floor mats each, and one of them asked the parts guy behind the counter how do you install them [you can't make this stuff up people]

I am way more handsum than this, the sun was in my eyes, and the WS stands for World Standard (that's sum next level made up sh!et right there)

[Gregski]

Me: "I need to stop procrastinating and figure out how to add more transmission fluid to that Lexus GS450 haytch !"

also Me: "Can you vacuum a shop-vac with another shop-vac ?"

vacs.jpg (13.39 KiB) Viewed 4257 times

[johu]

Equally silly question from my side: has there always been a cutout?

How are you gonna cover it? Lexus floor mat? How do you... Alright alright

[Gregski]

you know the saying: "Good converter borrow, great converters steal!"

so here I am using the Align, Reorder, Tetris, Unpack, Reorder again Method to reformat the BMW 530e battery pack!

Note: I cheat a little by using 2 cables from a second battery pack (one of them being the #6 module main negative lead to the Safety Box) in the pic below both the Safety Box leads are the #6 negative ones, I just flipped one around and am using it as the positive lead off of module #1 (I did this cause the original #1 module cable is the length of a standard Olympic semi pro jump rope.

the numbers on the green tape on top are not the original module numbers these are what I call EV Firing Order and just a reference for me to make it easier to install them in the truck and not have to subject myself to Common Core Math again to re figure it out

3-6
2-5
1-4

the modules are presented on a 2'x4' canvas or Oregon Green Pine plywood

[Gregski]

so back to that transmission oil top off which I have been avoiding doing, and here's why

Lexus claims for this to be a Maintenance Free Transmission (pronounced: good for 100k miles before you have to do anything to it) I recall this being attempted by automobile manufacturers in the past and it just takes simple tasks like checking the fluid levels and or topping off the fluid and makes them impossible to do later!

For instance this transmission does not have a dip stick, [unless you consider it's owner] and what appears to be metal dip stick tube, is actually an inlet for the coolant aka water cooling. and the best thing about that tube is that it is joined to the pressed in actual inlet on the body of the trans with a flexible rubber hose, so you can easily remove it / delete it as it is almost guaranteed it will interfere with the firewall in your conversion vehicle, and then you just run a rubber hose directly to that short stub on the transmission

Second, this transmission does not have a filler hole. That's right there is no unscrew this bolt and pour some delicious trans fluid in.