- Made a schematic for the heating and air conditioning systems.
- Scanned and imported 3 different drawings to make the schematic.
- Used it to repair the AC and heater systems.
- The AC and heater never worked per the original owner.
- Air conditioning now working!!
- Heater has upgraded element and gets hot very fast.
- #1 truck will be getting an upgraded heater asap.
- AC had corrosion on the black box control connectors.
- Bad crimp too.
- AC works but connector is still intermittent.
- May have to solder crimped wires.
- AC increases output by the compressor running faster based on positon of temperature knob.
- The blower was on all of the time.
- Found wiring issue and rewired to correct blower issue.
- Factory had made some bad choices for wiring the heater and ac.

Heater works now as it was a pot that was trying to supply current to two relays at the same time.
- Only one relay would energize at a time and cause the heater element to smoke before the water pump was running.
- Now it turns on with a button.

The precharge board schematic looks to be finished.
- This will take the place of the precharge relay that does not last that long.

Heater temperature controller idea.
- Can use part of the precharge circuit to control heater temperature!
- Could run with any voltage EV heater up to 500 volts.
- PWM to the heater from zero to about 5 khz or so.
- Led and temp would be mounted on the dash.
- Opto isolated from dash.

The lithium cells were removed as I overcharged them and they now have a reduced capacity of 10%.
- When I can get a data cable fished from the box to the cabin, I will reinstall the lithium cells.
- 3 New 50ah Hi Power Lithium cells are due to arrive next week for evaluation.
- The good news is that the cells went many hundreds of miles without issue.

Lanny is putting some Lithium cells into one of his Rangers as we speak.
- http://southtownelanes.com/ranger_lifepo4.html
- NIMH Ranger hardware used for the BMS.
- Only monitors every 4th cell.
- 100ah pack of what looks like Hi Power cells (from Thunderstruck Motors).

Had some cells that appeared to be low on electrolyte only to discover they were just very undercharged.
- They spewed KOH and had to be removed and cleaned up with vinegar.

Pack was ground faulting during the last rain.
- 3 sides of the lid had new weather stripping. The 4th side that leaked had a different and softer material.
- The 4th side now has the better material like the other 3 sides.
- Also cheated by tweaking the software so the truck is not so sensitive to ground faults, until I get the battery box water tight.
- With 500 terminals, 5 times more than a lead acid pack, it’s easy to get a ground fault.

Nicad pack now has 12k miles on it as of this week.

The tilt bed on both trucks now has two gas struts per side.
- Makes lifting the bed easier.
- Holds bed up without a prop rod.
- Sometimes in the garage the bed needs to be held down. Prop cable?
- Can demonstrate outside.

The #2 truck has an unpainted roll pan that needs to be finished and installed.

Blog is http://rotordesign.com/blog

I’m down 38 lbs.