DCDC: Integrated in Controller (have this working at 13.5V possibly adjustable)
Heater: Not sure maybe a leaf heater because I have one
Power steering: Opel Corsa powered steering column
Power brakes: i-booster form a Toyota Yaris
Fast charging: 50kW CCS
So this is not a conversion but more and upgrade. The goal is for me to be able to sell the gasoline saxo I still have for the longer distance trips.
Over the last year I have bought all parts listed, connectors, pins and wire. At this moment I have the first version of the BMS pcb working on the E208 battery, the first version of the pcb with Openinverter running the XC90 controller and spinning the motor. Have a ZombieVerter VCU to control this mismatch of parts.
Currently designing the battery boxes. One in the back unter the car with 10 modules. It is a tight fit but I think it will fit. And one in the front with 8 modules.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Apr 21, 2024 8:48 am
by manny
Got two weeks off work. So i could make some progress.
First removed the motor, inverter, vacuumpomp, driveshafts, battery boxes, electronics box, 12V battery and the heater.
Next, see if the Volvo motor will fit. Happy to report that it does. I have flipped the motor around so that the mounting holes line up better.
At the rear of the motor I mounted two rubber mounts normally used for the lower control arm. used a length of 20mm round bar turned down the ends to fit in the rubbers and a M12 thread on the end. Cut a piece of steel box section to bolt to the motor and welded to the round bar.
rear mount
On the front of the motor another two lower control arm rubbers are mounted to the cross brace. Made a plate to mount the motor to the rubbers. The lower control arm rubbers have a 17mm bore that is not a standard bolt size so a made a set of bolts on the lathe with a M12 on the end.
lower control arm rubbers
frond mount
Of course the drive shaft do not fit. Got a set of drive shafts with the V60 motor. Ordered a pair of new SKF drive shafts for the Saxo. Cut them and welded them together. I am not sure if I run with the welded drive shafts or get a set made. The previous set up had welded drive shafts that lasted 50.000 km.
drive shafts
From top to bottom: Saxo drive shaft, my hack job, Volvo drive shaft.
It is a tight fit but it's in. I am very happy that it fits and I have enough space for the battery box.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun May 19, 2024 7:58 pm
by manny
Have made some good progres.
EPAS:
Originale I bought a Corsa power steering column. This is way to big, the column is to long and the motor is to big to fit under the dash. After some searching online I ordered a steering column out of a Renault Clio II which is much closer in size to the Saxo column.
Cut and welded the two steering columns to make one that will fit under the dash. Did loos the steering lock, but I think that it will be fine without. I did not get a universal joint with the steering column, ordered a random steering shaft that looked good. The two outer joins where to big, but the inner joint to change the length of the shaft fitted perfect. Hammered the joints apart, and mixed the old and the new. Luckily the bearing size and spacing are the same.
To resist the torque from the column, made a bracket to bolt the column to steering wheel supports.
Brakes:
I fitted the Ebooster a while ago. Had to order brake line and fittings to connect all the lines. The original master cylinder had 4 ports. The new cylinder has just 2 ports because all modern cars have ABS. The Saxo does not have ABS, to make the lines work I bought 2 T-pieces. The original brake lines are 5mm and have M10 nuts. The new cylinder has M12 thread for 8mm pipe. Found some M12 nuts for 5mm pipe.
Mounted the inverter to the firewall and cross brace.
Next batteries
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun May 19, 2024 8:05 pm
by mike77cos
I keep seeing these and wonder if they would make a good project, and you are showing that they do!
Busbars, cooling plates and drive shafts
Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2024 4:32 pm
by manny
Some time ago I ordered aluminium plates for the battery cooling. Its 3 plates glued and screwed together.
The battery modules bolt to this plate on 20mm standoffs like in the original battery box. There will be modules mounted on top and bottom. A set screw connects the standoffs together through the plates.
Because of space constandes all the modules in the back battery box have to face the same way because of the connectors for the bms wiring. I made 8 busbars from new copper bar to connect the modules. After bending them I covered them with heatsink. Most of the smaller busbars I made by reusing busbars from the e208 pack.
This battery box is 80% brackets and busbars
With the help of a friend designed a replacement insert for the charging port. After a lot of back and forth we got a 3D print that fit the complex shape of the fender. After this I had to mount the ccs port to the car. First I bolted the fender back on the car. Then held a piece from the charge port inplace and glued it to the car.
Cut, drill and bend a bracket. And mount it with 4 rivnuts.
After some fine tuning it fits.
The 3d print needs some fine tuning to get the hinge for the charger door to fit.
I decided to have the drive shafts made professionally. The company doing this needs a prototype shaft and the parts that mount to it. If you want to take apart a driveshaft from a citroen saxo you have a choice, destroy the shaft or the ball cage and the CV center. So I did both
Cut the shaft really short so you can spin the inner part of the CV joint further than than normal, and then remove the balls one by one.
With the center removed I drilled the shaft out to 14mm. biggest drill I have. Then in the lathe make the hole bigger until you hit the groove for the clip. Hammer out the remaining two pieces and remove the clip.
To get the shaft out of the CV joint in one piece. Cut the ball cage and remove the balls. then you have a shaft with a CV center on it. cut 3 slots in the centerpiece without cutting the shaft. with a hammer and chisel split the center in three pieces. This is the official way to replace the CV joint.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Mon Jul 01, 2024 8:08 pm
by nkiernan
Nice job on the pack and cooling
Front battery box
Posted: Sun Jul 14, 2024 9:15 pm
by manny
Did not know that the battery boxes take so much time to make.
This is the front box holding 8 modules. Did not take into account that the box needs to hold two contactors, HV connector, fuse and a LV connector when ordering the aluminum plates. So I addon so aluminium plate for the contactors and HV connector. And a box around the fuse that also holds the LV connector.
Next i'll make the rear box that will hold 10 modules. And I have a piece of aluminium square stock that I will turn into cooling hose fitting.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Wed Aug 28, 2024 7:19 pm
by manny
The modified driveshafts are in. Had to order a new shaft to take apart to get the outer CV joint. It looked a little different from the outside, the internals are probably the same right? Same part number for SKF. Well NO, the splines are bigger. F#ck. I ordered a new shaft from another supplier. And luckily it was the right one
So first reassemble the constant velocity joint and then carefully hammer the axle in. The first one worked fine, the second one not so well. The clip did not click into the groove in the constant velocity joint, but slid through. GRINDER TIME
Saved the modified axle by destroying the cv joint. I had a spare cv joint outer housing.
Succes
The battery boxes are ready. Made 6 mounting brackets for the rear box, just like the original box. Had to align the brackets and check the placement in the car. I will bolt the brackets through the battery cover to the steel angle inside. Temporarily bolted the brackets to the cover with m3 screws.
It fit perfectly so I welded them on. This warped the cover into a double banana Lots of hammering and bending, I got it straight enough
Then it's time for the wiring. As you can see in the E208 battery threat, I ordered new pins and housings for the BMS connections. I reused most of the original wiring. The original wiring is all over the place so there's more than I needed.
tested the wiring with the BMS master unit. And it worked first time.
Next, test the cooling plates. And then the battery can be mounted under the car
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Thu Sep 05, 2024 12:59 pm
by CrAzY_DrIveR
In my previous project (peugeot 106) i used the original boxes + 1 instead of gas tank.
Now like you i will make new boxes and i never saw a cooling plate glued like that, what glue did you use?
I am sad i didn't get the 208 battery modules, my taycan modules were very hard and expensive to modify
Who made your axles?
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sat Sep 21, 2024 7:54 am
by manny
CrAzY_DrIveR wrote: ↑Thu Sep 05, 2024 12:59 pmwhat glue did you use?
Painted the strut and fitted new brake pads and rotors. mmm shiny
Also mounted the VW heater. First removed the old bracket for the gas heater by drilling the spot welds. Made a new bracket and bolted it to the cross brace. bought two cables one that fits the heater and one that fits the xc90 inverter. cut and splice and insulate. Cut the original hoses and coupled them with some other random hoses I had and a pomp to complete the heater loop.
After some struggling and help (from tom91) I got the LIN bus signal. Now I am waiting on the connector I ordered for the heater to complete the install and test the heater. Hooked the control wire from the original heater up the Zombie and now I can switch the HeatReq on and off. To control the VW heater with the HeatReq the Zombie code needs a little change. Currently is on constantly and the power can be changed through the web interface. Probably I will first just switch the heater on and off, later I might add a pot to the heater controls to vary the power.
To switch the inverter into reverse the car originally used a momentary button, Zombie/oi does not support this. I got some switches for the junkyard and start to figure out if I can use one of them. The person that decided this whas a logical numbering scheme needs to be jailed! luckily I spotted the numbering on the connector. By moving one wire I can use the rear window heater switch, the labeled caps can be easily switched. The light bulbs get quite crispy over time
Did some low voltage wiring and modified the Zombie code a bit to control the DCDC converter in the XC90 inverter. The inverter reports the low voltage reading to Zombie. Need to figure out the 12v current data and temp reading
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2024 9:51 pm
by johu
Rotors are a good way to introduce shinyness somewhere along your build
manny wrote: ↑Sun Dec 22, 2024 9:22 pm
To switch the inverter into reverse the car originally used a momentary button, Zombie/oi does not support this
OI does support push buttons for direction selection, maybe Zombie does, too
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2024 9:54 pm
by tom91
manny wrote: ↑Sun Dec 22, 2024 9:22 pm
Currently is on constantly
It is until you assign it to an input pin. Having better control of the heaters is another thing I am thinking of diving into as a subject.
Feel free to brainstorm and propose ideas/functions that can then be reviewed and implemented.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2024 10:03 pm
by tom91
johu wrote: ↑Sun Dec 22, 2024 9:51 pm
OI does support push buttons for direction selection, maybe Zombie does, too
Yes there is a button direction mode in Zombie. It should work same as the OI inverter firmware if no gear selector is selected on standard input pins.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2024 10:12 pm
by manny
johu wrote: ↑Sun Dec 22, 2024 9:51 pm
OI does support push buttons for direction selection, maybe Zombie does, too
A Yes. To be clear the car has one button. So replaced the button with a toggle switch. and set Zombie and OI to default forward.
tom91 wrote: ↑Sun Dec 22, 2024 9:54 pm
It is until you assign it to an input pin. Having better control of the heaters is another thing I am thinking of diving into as a subject.
Feel free to brainstorm and propose ideas/functions that can then be reviewed and implemented.
uint8_t lindata[4];
lindata[0] = Param::GetInt(Param::HeatPercnt);//VW heater uses a % setting as opposed to a set power val. Regulates its temps to this.
lindata[1] = 1;//Always on for test. Can use heatreq here.
lindata[2] = 0;
lindata[3] = 0;
lin->Request(28, lindata, sizeof(lindata));//0x1C hex address
I will set the power via the web interface. pick a good power level and switch it on and off with HeatReq.
For the more advanced control I whas thinking maybe use a ambient temp sensor. and control the power depending on the temperature delta. like most heat pump use. My car is old and basic so it does not have a temp sensor in the cabin. otherwise some PID controller can be nice.
I would just have an anolgue input, with max and min then you can rig it to your temp dial/rod/push cable and use a potentiometer.
It is what i am doing on other thermal projects, adjust the requested power/ target temp based on the position of the temperature slider. Alot of old vehicle just use an on off for the heater core anyway, some even only use a blend flap and always have the heater core on.
Could then have heatreq toggle based on tempdial/slider position if you rig in the analogue position feedback. With an optional temperature dial based power regulation.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2024 10:34 pm
by manny
tom91 wrote: ↑Sun Dec 22, 2024 10:22 pm
some even only use a blend flap and always have the heater core on.
Think my car is like that. In the conversion to electric citroen added a switch so that the heater comes on when the slide is not at completely cold.
it will be more efficient to keep the flap in the heat position and use the slide only to move a pot to set the power.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Dec 22, 2024 10:37 pm
by tom91
manny wrote: ↑Sun Dec 22, 2024 10:34 pm
it will be more efficient to keep the flap in the heat position and use the slide only to move a pot to set the power.
Yup, plus also only run the heater if the fan is on. things will spiral quickly if you want to do it the "right" engineering way on an old car.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Thu Jan 02, 2025 8:47 pm
by manny
Got my FOCCCI board a week ago. Ordered the housing from mouser. It took a 2 weeks to get from America to the Netherlands, probably the holiday season did not help the delivery time.
Solder time!
Ready to get mounted on the car.
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Jan 19, 2025 8:01 pm
by manny
Wired up the CCS port and RGB button. A lot of colored spaghetti but after some tape and corrugated tube in black and orange it looks nice.
Cut and folded a bracket for the Foccci and mounted it to the heater bracket. Because this is a factory electric car there are a couple of extra holes in the inner vender to pass wires through. Ordered a new pin crimp tool for the Foccci Deutsch connectors.
Ordered a new tool to roll a bead on aluminium cooling lines. this is a clean way to get the cooling to the right place. If/when I make cooling lines for the battery's this will come in handy.
Made brackets to mount the charger. It clamps to the cross brace, did not want to mount this permanent because I like to get a 11kw charger.
Did a lot of wiring clean up removing wago connector and replacing them with butt crimps and heatshrink. For programming and changing setting on the Open inverter, Zombie and the Foccci I wired the CANbus to the OBD port. By some miracle the pins from the Zombie enclosure fit the OBD connector And it's a renault part? on a citroen
Re: [WIP] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Mon Feb 17, 2025 10:30 pm
by manny
Two firsts this post.
First test drive Had some inverter trips because I had the 'ocurlim' still set at a 100A. Have it set to 400A for now. A friend of mine has a Volvo V60 hybrid, I want to measure the max motor current on his car and set the 'throtcur' and 'ocurlim' accordingly.
First charge. After some troubles with getting the Foccci and Zombie working together (see viewtopic.php?t=6124). I hooked up the MG ZS charger as per Damien notes on github. Power, Local CAN, temp sensor faked with two 100k resistors and CP spoof from zombie with 1K resistor in line(not sure if the resistor is necessary). By playing the 29c_can3.csv with savvycan to the charger it started charging as long as the file lasted.
Normally the AC connector has two small pins, one for the CP and one for a HVIL. I just have a 3 core cable for the AC, to get the CP signal from the AC connector to the low voltage connector I soldered the CP pin and HVIL together. The HVIL pin is basically a wire from the AC connector to the LV connector.
Will do some more testing and try to get Zombie to control the charger.
Re: Front battery box
Posted: Sat Feb 22, 2025 2:53 pm
by Sjanders
manny wrote: ↑Sun Jul 14, 2024 9:15 pm
Did not know that the battery boxes take so much time to make.
This is the front box holding 8 modules. Did not take into account that the box needs to hold two contactors, HV connector, fuse and a LV connector when ordering the aluminum plates. So I addon so aluminium plate for the contactors and HV connector. And a box around the fuse that also holds the LV connector.
Next i'll make the rear box that will hold 10 modules. And I have a piece of aluminium square stock that I will turn into cooling hose fitting.
Hey Manny,
I like your approach on the module cooling! I have some questions on your battery box fab work: what grade and thickness of aluminum did you use? By the looks of your welds you seem to have used a MIG welder, am I right?
I was also wondering how you made the connections to your cooling plate to recirculate your cooling liquid.
Thanks!
BR Sander
Re: [FIRST DRIVE] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Feb 23, 2025 7:17 pm
by manny
Hi Sander,
The cooling plates are 2mm and the center is 4mm. If I would do this again I'll probably go a bit thicker on the outer plates. But the 3 plates screwed and glued together it's reasonably stiff.
The covers were made out of 1mm steel folded and TIG welded. I only have a TIG welder so MIG will probably work fine to.
For the connections I copied the design for the volvo parts I use. From a square piece aluminum I made the coolant connectors on the lathe.
I wanted to use the coolant connectors for easy of "maintenance". I have tested the plates by pumping water through them and they did not leak. Have not yet connected the cooling plates up in the car. Will first test the car without battery cooling. When I add CCS I will add the cooling to. Probably using some valves to switch the cooling loop form the drive parts to the battery cooling.
Re: [FIRST DRIVE] Citroen Saxo Electrique
Posted: Sun Feb 23, 2025 9:23 pm
by arber333
Really nice solution for cooling plate. I may use your method of assembling the plates.
I think your lathe made terminal piece might be the best way to get coolant in. I like AliExpress quick fittings.
The cooling plates are 2mm and the center is 4mm. If I would do this again I'll probably go a bit thicker on the outer plates. But the 3 plates screwed and glued together it's reasonably stiff.
The covers were made out of 1mm steel folded and TIG welded. I only have a TIG welder so MIG will probably work fine to.
For the connections I copied the design for the volvo parts I use. From a square piece aluminum I made the coolant connectors on the lathe.
20240721_164703.jpg
20240721_174442.jpg
20240721_174434.jpg
I wanted to use the coolant connectors for easy of "maintenance". I have tested the plates by pumping water through them and they did not leak. Have not yet connected the cooling plates up in the car. Will first test the car without battery cooling. When I add CCS I will add the cooling to. Probably using some valves to switch the cooling loop form the drive parts to the battery cooling.
Thank you for your detailed explanation, great! Unfortunately I only have a DC TIG welder. If I decide to go for aluminum i'll to practice a bit on MIG welding aluminum sheet.
GRINDER TIME
Lots of hammering and bending, I got it straight enough
