TOAD

[Kappy]

Not sure if this belongs here?

Now that I back at home reassessing the future until there is some more certainty re this Covid, I've given thought again to a TOAD, rather than my huge trailer.

Streamlining.

My thought are to getting hold of van e.g HiAce, Mazda, long enough and high enough to fit my Motorcycle.

I had planned to do the same with my Sprinter van, but being Auto presented a few issues.
The peanut that sold A frames, made is sound real difficult with air bags etc and attachment of A frame to chassis, turned me right off.

But surely there are people out there towing Vitara's etc, all with airbags.

I'm thinking of anything half decent with manual tranny, carry the bike and have a driver when needed. Figure the tare around 1500 and gross about 2500. shouldn't be too hard to tow. as long as it stay around 7metres or less.

I had thought about putting a Jimny in the trailer, but they want a kidney for them and I'm then getting close to over weight on the trailer.

Any guidance appreciated.

[T1 Terry]

If you get an auto van, you need to have the transmission modified to fit an electric pump to supply the lubrication oil required to stop it from seizing up. The oil is normally pumped by the engine turning the torque converter and it has a drive section that fits into the transmission gear pump that supplies oil at high pressure for the whole box to function. The lubrication part doesn't need the high pressure, just a flow of oil at around 30psi.
A manual transmission has its own problems, the bearing and gears are splash fed by the gearsets rotating in the oil bath that fills the lower half of the gearbox. The gears only turn when the engine is turning, in neutral without the engine turning, the main shaft (connected to the tailshaft) spins inside the gears and without oil being splashed over the gears to feed the bearings, they will break up and destroy the gearbox.
You can leave the toad motor idling in neutral, but that leaves a few eyebrows raised as far as legal issues as well as glazing the bore because the engine is left running with no real load applied.
Another alternative is to tow in 5th gear, throttle held partly open so air actually pumps through the engine, the engine spins at a much lower speed but that can still have its own problems with oil pumping past the rings etc
Ideally, a disconnecting tailshaft or free wheeling hubs, then the type of transmission is not critical. There is an Amarican mob that makes kits to adapt vehicles to make suitable "toads" a Google search should find them cause I can't remember the name at the moment.
You could always modify a van to electric drive, then it can spin the motor as much as it likes with zero damage to any components .... then a bit of sneaky wiring and you can remote control the van to assist going up hill and add a bit of braking down hill using the electric motor for regen ....

T1 Terry

T1 Terry

[jon_d]

Kappy,

I thought I read that you're a fitter and turner by trade. Is that correct?

You can make your own. It just needs to be signed off by an engineer.


Bruce; just make a cradle that holds the bike. Then the cradle can be rolled out on rails.... think of the kitchen draws roller concept.

[native pepper]

You could always modify a van to electric drive, then it can spin the motor as much as it likes with zero damage to any components .... then a bit of sneaky wiring and you can remote control the van to assist going up hill and add a bit of braking down hill using the electric motor for regen ....
T1 Terry T1 Terry

Think you could turn a landcruiser into a EV toad over a long weekend, would love to turn my cruiser into an EV. GMH is bringing out an EV crate motor next year. Supposedly almost drop in add batteries and off you go, maybe a bit of wiring or a lot, but would be nice. There are already EV battery packs available that I read about a year or so ago.

[T1 Terry]

You could always modify a van to electric drive, then it can spin the motor as much as it likes with zero damage to any components .... then a bit of sneaky wiring and you can remote control the van to assist going up hill and add a bit of braking down hill using the electric motor for regen ....
T1 Terry T1 Terry

Think you could turn a landcruiser into a EV toad over a long weekend, would love to turn my cruiser into an EV. GMH is bringing out an EV crate motor next year. Supposedly almost drop in add batteries and off you go, maybe a bit of wiring or a lot, but would be nice. There are already EV battery packs available that I read about a year or so ago.

I'd be flat out getting the old motor out and all the rubbish that went with it like fuel tank, exhaust, radiator etc in a 3 day week end. At least a mth to get the electric motor set up on suitable mounts and a drive coupling to the gearbox input shaft or modifying a flywheel clutch set up, then making an adapting a plate to fit all that in and get the electric motor the correct distance from the bellhousing to mate the input shaft with either the flywheel centre brg to support the input shaft with a clutch plate hanging off it .... or supporting the input shaft in the adaptor designed to couple the electric motor to the gearbox input shaft .......
Now you need to think about motor cooling, controller/inverter/VFD cooling, heater for the demister and cabin heat, cabling with all the safety contactors along the way, precharge circuits so the VFD capacitors recharge at a controlled rate so they don't explode or weld the contactor faces together ..... then you need to get the battery boxes engineered to withstand a 5G force from all directions to allow for a crash/roll over etc and the cells remain in their boxes safe from creating a dead short that would be worse than the actual crash in many cases.

The fastest I've seen was 6 mths, but with a heap of people working on it who all knew what they were doing, maybe halve that, but you won't get the compliances through much faster than that ..... so a very long week end
As far as the GMH crate motor drop in ...... I'll wait to see it in real life maybe a Tesla power plant front and back, battery pack and the after market inverters that have been developed to power the things ...... now that would be one mean cruiser
Check this project out to get an idea of just how committed some people get when trying to convert a 4 X 4 to full electric https://forums.aeva.asn.au/viewtopic.php?f=33&t=5721 but at the end he will have developed off the shelf (well bits he can manufacture ready to go) kits to do your own conversion ...... I love the commitment these people have .....

T1 Terry

[Greynomad]

T1,
That’s one helluva side-trip!
Interesting, though.
Read the first coupla pages, then skipped to the last page.
TL:DR...
Can you give us the Readers Digest version?

[native pepper]

Got through that lot of reading, think I'll buy a lotto ticket and wait for the Rivian or something similar to hit Aus, after winning lotto By the time I built the required workshop, fitted it out and then built the system, the Rivian price looks much more amiable.

[jon_d]

Ray,

You're talking about Terry's essays.
That was the Readers Digest condensed version.


Rumour has it that Margaret is able to mix, bake and ice a triple layer chocolate cake between asking Terry how his day was at the shed and then saying "that's nice dear."

[Greynomad]

[T1 Terry]

Ray,

You're talking about Terry's essays.
That was the Readers Digest condensed version.


Rumour has it that Margaret is able to mix, bake and ice a triple layer chocolate cake between asking Terry how his day was at the shed and then saying "that's nice dear."

As if Margaret would make me a triple layer chocolate cake Margaret does all the control box building (cause I shake so much and/or I can't see the bits I'm trying to solder) and has now started doing the end plate bending and drill/tapping screw holes and assembling the battery packs (cause some old bloke popped a gasket) as well as doing all the quotes (cause I get it wrong every time) does the invoices, the purchases, the record keeping, BAS statements, her self managed superfund ... and makes me coffee if I ask real nice

I get to do the installs at the moment (accept for the heavy lifting bits) with all the wiring, I'm sometimes allowed on the RV roof to do the solar and do the R&D as we develop the system into the next level where everything (as far as system operations) is sent to the phone for easy reading.
The next step is developing a back to base reporting system for each off grid install so we can monitor and record the system health and fix things before they become an issue.
So I still do something

T1 Terry