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I'm a retired Automotive and Truck mechanic, so everything you have done I understand, and can do if I wish.

However, I live 8 miles out of town, so a 16 mile round trip. Also part of the roads are very rough, and hilly - so I would need something with a longer range to be suitable.

Out of curiosity

Is that an old Mercedes in the foreground?



just wondering

CC

It's been partially restored for a hot rod, a family member of mine has an LT1 engine for it and all but has run out of money to finish it so it got to primer and got put aside until finances allow which may be a while longer.

Since I put that post up I've made a different battery at 48V and a little over 8Ah and the speed and range have both increased somewhat. I just got back from about a twenty mile ride and I still had roughly 3 Ah left in the battery but I pedal a lot, particularly uphill.

Really the battery is the biggest single cost by a considerable margin, I want 48V about 20-25 Ah when I finish my pack but I'm doing it a bit at a time. There's an seller on Ebay that has salvaged Samsung laptop cells that are about as cheap a source of battery storage as you're going to find but you need nearly $250 worth with shipping to make a really strong 48V pack and you have to put it together yourself and you'd need about a $100 charger. The main thing about doing yourself is you end up with a maintainable pack, if a single cell (out of 96) goes bad it's easily replaced. The purchased packs unless you spend about twice that money are not particularly reliable and not always maintainable if you have a bad cell.

I've got over a thousand miles on the drive with the new battery now and other than a couple of loose connections before I redid the entire electrical system I haven't had any problems with it.

For rough and hilly roads I'd go with something with a 24" or smaller wheel (for climbing torque) and a decent suspension as well as balloon tires. The more hills you have to deal with the smaller the drive wheel should be for good hill climbing but it cuts your top speed. The "gearing" is fixed with a hub motor so varying the wheel diameter is the only way of changing effective gearing. My rear wheel is 21" in diameter with the balloon tire on the rear, I have about a quarter mile long steep dirt/rock driveway to negotiate going in and out and it handles that quite well at about 8 or 9 mph and half throttle or so.

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LT1's ranged from 265 to 400 CID

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/GM_Small-Block_engine#LT-1

I had a 283, put a 4bbl on it and dual exhaust - 2" pipes in my 66 Chev Impala convertible.

took the "slush bucket" 2- speed auto out of it and replaced it with a 3-speed 400 turbo-hydramatic.

That thing would rock! - and corner real well; being a convertible - it had a stronger frame, and a low centre of gravity.

Bought a 67 Pontiac 2+2 hardtop shortly afterwards, 283 - but that thing drove like a dog - wouldn't corner worth a damm - nearly lost it once - centre of gravity being so different.

Yeah, I like cars.

CC