Freelander 1 Wattson: Freelander EV Project

Yep, I actually used your findings to validate what I got. Let me put together my finding and solutions and share them with you.

Correct, I initially planned to have 32kWh total but found out I could have 16KWh at the back fuel tank space and 32kwh in the front bonnet space (which is basically empty at this point ) for 48kWh total.

So targeting to have the first drive using the 16kWh with the 32kwh for phase 2.

tensa4 said:

Yep, I actually used your findings to validate what I got. Let me put together my finding and solutions and share them with you.

Correct, I initially planned to have 32kWh total but found out I could have 16KWh at the back fuel tank space and 32kwh in the front bonnet space (which is basically empty at this point ) for 48kWh total.

So targeting to have the first drive using the 16kWh with the 32kwh for phase 2.

Click to expand...

That's a great strategy if you can make room for them. My eGolf modules are so big for the power they give I could only fit 4 large and two small modules in the space so 20 cells or 160V (at 4V per cell) in total.
Will you be cooling the batteries?

Yes, I will water-cool the batteries using the same loop with the charger and DC-DC converter. This is a separate loop from the one cooling the Tesla drive unit.

There is a custom double-sided double-pass water block that sits between the battery packs that I intend to order from China or build locally depending on cost that will be used for this.

tensa4 said:

Yes, I will water-cool the batteries using the same loop with the charger and DC-DC converter. This is a separate loop from the one cooling the Tesla drive unit.

There is a custom double-sided double-pass water block that sits between the battery packs that I ordered from China that will be used for this.

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Sounds good, If you are looking for a water pump I believe the Nissan ones I have are identical to Tesla pumps and it is really easy to control the speed they pump at using a PWM signal.

GrumpyGel said:

lol

You, and indeed @tensa4 , should also apologise for causing me, and probably others, to spend far to much time googling and looking at ways to repower a Freelander. Maybe

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I'm with you on this one Gerald. I've spent many an hour doing the same after reading updates on the two projects.

Both @Alibro and @tensa4 are doing absolutely stirling jobs. I'm finding it fascinating and am enjoying watching the two slightly different approaches. I'm very much willing them both on for successful outcomes, which by the look of the abilities demonstrated so far, seems assured.

kernowsvenski said:

I'm with you on this one Gerald. I've spent many an hour doing the same after reading updates on the two projects.

Both @Alibro and @tensa4 are doing absolutely stirling jobs. I'm finding it fascinating and am enjoying watching the two slightly different approaches. I'm very much willing them both on for successful outcomes, which by the look of the abilities demonstrated so far, seems assured.

Click to expand...

Its so complex and the parts expensive, so taking an interest in what others are doing is a great 2nd choice to doing it ourselves

Don't want to drag this thread away from its great content, but my current thinking is to electrify the back end of me Freelander. A hybrid battery pack is a low (relatively) cost intro to the world of repowering, even if its not a full repower.

With a push to put the dash back together, I built the replacement electric heater for the engine-driven one using a 1000W PTC heater capable of 500W and 1000W working modes.



I made a custom holder to match the original engine coolant-driven heater dimensions and it slides into the AC manifold as if it were stock.





This will be powered using 12V 60A from the DC-DC converter. I will share the relay-driven install in a later bit when I move into the engine compartment wiring. I will reuse the existing temp selection knob with a few tricks for triggering the main relays.

tensa4 said:

With a push to put the dash back together, I built the replacement electric heater for the engine-driven one using a 1000W PTC heater capable of 500W and 1000W working modes.

View attachment 285917

I made a custom holder to match the original engine coolant-driven heater dimensions and it slides into the AC manifold as if it were stock.

View attachment 285918

View attachment 285919

This will be powered using 12V 60A from the DC-DC converter. I will share the relay-driven install in a later bit when I move into the engine compartment wiring. I will reuse the existing temp selection knob with a few tricks for triggering the main relays.

Click to expand...

You need a heater in Kenya??? I guess maybe at night hence only needing 1kW.
Your installation is very neat but it may make sense to design an easy way to replace it without having to strip the dash just in case it doesn't last long.

Sorry if this is a stupid suggestion but Would it be possible to use a 1kW electric motor controller to drive the heater? They usually come with a POT to control them so you would have fine control of the heat output if it worked.
A while ago I bought a similar heater element only a 48V version with the idea of building an ebike style 48V battery to power it but I still haven't ruled out using the fuel burning heater that came with my car. I will be using the 48V battery anyway to drive the power steering.
I also have the Nissan Leaf 4kW heater which heats the water flowing through the heater matrix so I will use one or both of these initially and keep the electric heater as backup.

In my part of the UK / Ireland a heater is way more important than Aircon so I have already stripped out the AC pipework.

More updates on the build here;

I finished putting back the dash together and all wiring is done. These are the only errors I get on the dash.



Starting from the left:
1. The hand-brake light will go off once I reinstall the hand brake and loop the brake fluid level sensor.
2. The doors light is just that, doors open
3. The fuel level sensor will be driven using a signal from the EVMS. I am just thinking of a way to redo the dash icons for the fuel tank to the battery icon etc. That will be much later though.
4. HLD light will also be fixed by sending the right CAN message for gear selection to ABS. These will be provided by the Tesla motor based on gear selection and RPM to ABS. Still working the details out.
5. The SRS light has been on since I bought the car so I know it's not the EV conversion that caused it. Will definitely resolve it.
6. The TC and ABS lights will go off once the ABS gets the transmission CAN messages for gear selection and the car moves.
7. The temp light can be manipulated using CAN signals so will send those through an Arduino temperature/pump control system I have cooked up.

Took time off the car and started to work on the batteries.

Soldering all the 96 BMS sense wires and fuses took longer than I thought.







The plan here was to charge the modules to the same voltages and match them in pairs with at least a 100mV delta.



Over the next couple of days as these balanced, really, really slowly, I figured I jump on actual CAD design using SketchUp to design the water cooling block that will cool the batteries. This is the final design using 12.7mm T6061 aluminum.



I will be visiting my local CNC machine shop to have two plates machined. The two plates will then be sandwiched to form a 25.4mm thick, double-pass water cooling block that sits between the two battery banks and makes contact with the battery cooling plates.

While the batteries where charging, I figured I take the time to complete the brake lines and install all the new plumbing as well.



New brake lines to the ibooster fit well and the new reservoir as well. I guess bleeding the master cylinder is the logical next step.

tensa4 said:

More updates on the build here;

I finished putting back the dash together and all wiring is done. These are the only errors I get on the dash.

View attachment 288246

Starting from the left:
1. The hand-brake light will go off once I reinstall the hand brake and loop the brake fluid level sensor.
2. The doors light is just that, doors open
3. The fuel level sensor will be driven using a signal from the EVMS. I am just thinking of a way to redo the dash icons for the fuel tank to the battery icon etc. That will be much later though.
4. HLD light will also be fixed by sending the right CAN message for gear selection to ABS. These will be provided by the Tesla motor based on gear selection and RPM to ABS. Still working the details out.
5. The SRS light has been on since I bought the car so I know it's not the EV conversion that caused it. Will definitely resolve it.
6. The TC and ABS lights will go off once the ABS gets the transmission CAN messages for gear selection and the car moves.
7. The temp light can be manipulated using CAN signals so will send those through an Arduino temperature/pump control system I have cooked up.

Click to expand...

On page one of my EV thread I have a few of the CAN messages sorted but would appreciate any input you can add to it. At the time LR was owned by BMW so many of the CAN messages are similar to 3 series of the time.
The SRS light could be a broken clock spring. I had that with one Freelander but as it didn't have volume control buttons I used one of the tracks to fix the SRS.

LONG POST ALERT!!
So finally got some time to continue work on this EV conversion build.
Continued on the wiring pieces of work specifically completing the main harnesses.

Completed the main drive unit control harness.



Electric Brake iBooster harness



Electric Steering rack controller and power connections


I plan to do the complete wiring installation into the car some time beginning of August when I get some time off work.

I also started on the rear High Voltage Junction box; I plan to fix the HV +ve and -ve contactors, HV circuit breakers, and pre-charge system EVBMS here on two levels. Updates as I build along will follow.



Also got back the splined drive shafts from my local machine shop, I will be putting those together after I get new rear outer CV cups. These are original Tesla shafts that have been machined on one end to fit the rear outer Freelander CV joint as shown below. I plan to heat-treat them before putting them back together.






Aside from these, I also welded up the rear raised false floor frame that will hold the Tesla charger and provide space to store all the things meant to be in the small storage area that I deleted so as to fit the motor. Once the charger was fitted, I went on to making the storage box from malleable sheet metal.





After painting



Mock test fit of tray prior to the riveting and final spray





I will share final updates on the progress of these activities as I complete them.

Got time off work to get more work into the conversion

Finished and installed the rear tray



My phone was dying so took this poorly lit photos of it installed at the back. It is installed using rivet nuts on the frame into the rear floor, I will continue and complete this later with 1/4" ply board + floor carpet as the cover.

I got into laying and installing the custom wire harnesses as well. Started with the main Tesla drive unit harness, that runs under the car. Drilled an entry hole next to the brake lines' ingress ports.



Then I just ran the harness through it, without a grommet. I figured I will seal this with high temp sealant, since I will not be removing it.



The rest of the cable harness runs down the sides of the chassis along the brake line to the drive unit.




I will clean this up a little more once I install the battery box.

Once the main harness was done, I switched to the engine bay to complete the wiring for the iBooster brake system, electric steering, electric PTC heater and accessories wiring from the main fuse box. This is what I started with;



This is what I ended up with. I will be sealing the entry hole for the steering shortly as well.





A little more tidying up using these zip ties attached to the existing holes in the body;

I then measured up a new custom battery and DC-DC converter mount using card-board CAD. I ended up with the final mounting frame below to hold the 12v 80Ah Lithium accessories battery and 2.5Kw DC-DC converter that will charge it from the 400V main battery pack.






The battery goes to the top and the DC-DC charger to the side.






This gives me this final look for the front engine bay. I plan to use the space for a 30-34Kwh battery pack later.



I now have to run the cooling pipes, install the Tesla cooling pumps, seal the steering hole and then subject this bay to a thorough cleaning!
PS: I also spilled A LOT of brake fluid during the master cylinder and ABS brake system bleeding process.

The 19mm ID coolant pipes I need for the project are out of stock everywhere around me and my online order will take approximately 3 weeks to get here.

In the meantime, figured I busy myself with preparing the gear shifter mount off the original Freelander gear surround that will host a modified Ford Fusion MY2019 rotary gear shifter. Sanded down the raised parts in prep for sealing them off.



More updates to follow.

Alibro said:

On page one of my EV thread I have a few of the CAN messages sorted but would appreciate any input you can add to it. At the time LR was owned by BMW so many of the CAN messages are similar to 3 series of the time.
The SRS light could be a broken clock spring. I had that with one Freelander but as it didn't have volume control buttons I used one of the tracks to fix the SRS.

Click to expand...

I am circling back to this CAN stuff as I wait for the final parts to arrive. Thinking to build this data set out so that I can add to the pool of knowledge you already shared. I don't have an ECU so I will heavily rely on what I can manipulate and customize from the Tesla Drive unit together with an Arduino nano.

It's coming on great and looks very neat.
I'm more than a little jealous at your ability to drill holes wherever you need to. Ultimately I might be over cautious with my build but I won't know for sure until I've put the car in for inspection.
I love your charger, it's so slim compared to the outlander one and I guess more powerful. Mine is only 3kW.

Alibro said:

It's coming on great and looks very neat.
I'm more than a little jealous at your ability to drill holes wherever you need to. Ultimately I might be over cautious with my build but I won't know for sure until I've put the car in for inspection.
I love your charger, it's so slim compared to the outlander one and I guess more powerful. Mine is only 3kW.

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Thank you Alibro.

I understood your restrictions on chassis modifications. Hope the car passes.
And true, these Tesla parts are a work of art and awesome engineering.
Hopefully, I get it to work at the full 11kW.