Thanks for following along in our blog!

Right now, the best batteries from a cost effective standpoint are still the lead-acid ones. Sixteen U.S. Battery No. 2200’s were in the car when I bought it. The local members of our EV club (www.lveva.org) are recommending that I switch to Trojan T-125’s or T-145’s (the latter costs more but carries more juice – they’re physically the same size) and, I suspect, that’s what I’m going to do. The nice thing about owning these GTEs is that they’re basically lab experiments on wheels. I suspect that, in the not too distant future, the price of NiCad’s and lithium-polymer batteries will decrease dramatically. We already know that they’ll be manufactured in standard case sizes so that they can be sold to the golf cart industry. For you and me, it should be a drop-in replacement. If you’re serious about getting the Bradley going again, I’d recommend sticking with the lead acid cells for now – just to get the car back on the road. However, the next time you have to replace the batteries – say in 2-3 years – you may find that you have more options.

My Bradley never had a tachometer. The two large instruments were a speedometer/odometer and a motor volts meter. The three smaller ones were motor amps, accessory battery volts and state of charge for the main battery pack.

Keep me posted on your work and if there’s anything that I can do to help, don’t hesitate to e-mail or call me.

Tailwinds,

Jim

Many thanks for reading the blog. It’s nice to know that someone is getting something out of this!

I’ve been following the discussion on lithium batteries for some time now in the electric vehicle (EV) discussion list and have decided against it for several reasons. As you mentioned, the up-front cost is very high. While it might be possible to amortize this cost over more years, it’s not a risk that I’m willing to undertake right now. Rebuilding the car is tough enough. Rebuilding it with experimental technology would take even longer. My main goal right now is to get the car up and running. Using lead-acid “floodies” will allow me to do this as quickly as possible. That said, once the car is running reliably, I’ll certainly have my radar up for battery technologies that would improve the car’s performance. As I’ll probably have to change the batteries every 2-3 years, it shouldn’t be hard to upgrade to a better battery technology when they become more readily available and cost effective.

Have you considered Lithium batteries? We tend to think that the reason to use lithium is to get tremendous range without tremendous weight (spending a ton of money to do it). However, another approach is to get the same range you planned with lead acid, but with far less weight, which will improve performance and efficiency. There is a lot of discussion of this on diyelectriccar.com. It looks like the initial cost may be somewhere around 3 or 4 times as much, but they may last about 3 times as long, making it comparable. It is very complicated, with many issues, but maybe worth considering.