Today was a glorious day -- sunny and in the low to mid 70's; and better yet I had finished my drafting work and was able to glue 10" onto the chassis. The main piece is now a bit over 7 feet long, and with the 2 foot long nose piece -- it is now about 2/3 glued up!

Here's pictures -- it is sitting on its nose:



The side battery bays are complete, and the first 4" of the rear suspension bays have begun; as are the rear wheel strakes. You can see the chines on the sides more easily, as well. The 'C' pillar is mostly in place, and the main hatch opening is tapering narrower.

My 5' & 6' step ladders are not going to be useful much longer... I've got a 7' and two 8' and I can borrow my brother's 9 footer.

 

I have now glued another 16" onto the main chassis piece, making it ~8'-6" long and the total glued together is ~10'-6" long. Only about 3 feet left to glue! It now includes about 1/3 of the rear wheels:



The last picture shows the rear bumper and the trailing piece of the main hatch door. The bumper is only a bit wider than the PhlatPrinter 3 -- it is a little over 3'-6" wide.

I've purchased the *last* 16 sheets of foam that I need and I am cutting them as rapidly as I can, to stay ahead of what I need to continue the gluing. I also bought two bundles (10 pieces each) of 16' strapping and a box of galvanized screws to construct the frame from the tarp to keep things dry without having to cover and uncover it all the time -- the taller it gets, the harder this gets.

 

Just amazing!!! Simply awesome!!!!

 

Thanks folks -- I do like working on it!

I'm having a g-code issue: the CNC USB Controller program says

"Error in GCode! Arc radius too small to reach end point (91) Line:677 - G17 G3 X10.3717 Y2.1902 Z-1.33 R0.6408 F48"

I'm trying to debug this by guessing where it is and redrafting it and then going through the DWG export and import into SU, redo the edges and tabs, etc. -- and I'm no having any luck. How do I find out which bit has the problem? And how might I fix it?

 

Thanks, I do usually flatten everything in DataCAD -- I'll check it.

 

I found the g-code problem at long last (about 6 hours of trial and error!) -- there were 6 stray entities so tiny I could not see them... I got rid of them by turning all the cut shapes on the R18 sheet into polylines (an automatic function in DataCAD) and then erasing all other entity types using Mask - whew!! Then re-export the DWG file (for the umpteenth time!) and import that into SU, redo all the outer and inner cuts and all the tabs (again!) and then it the g-code was clean and glitch-free.

Big relief. The PhlatPrinter 3 is now cutting the first copy of sheet R18, thankfully.

 

A real bummer at the end of the day today -- I was cutting the 5th from the last sheet of foam (which is good!) -- and the last remaining working USB port on our ~8 year old laptop died. :-(

The computer still runs (several replacement hard drives, and a new power supply) but now I'll have to lug my iMac down and set it up to cut the ~5 remaining sheets. Oh well.

 

:wacko1: I LOVE THIS CAR
:charge: ITS REALLY ONE OF THE MOST PAIN :usa: STACKED PROJECT TO DATE :supermanlogo: YOUR DOING A REALLY GREAT JOB
:alien: KEEP UP THE GREAT WORK
:bike: I WILL BE FOLLOWING YOU ALL THE WAY THROW THE WHOLE PROJECT :moil:
PAULE

 

TWO foam sheets to go... I should be done tomorrow morning! I'll be able to store the PhlatPrinter 3 pretty soon.

 

Someone on the EcoModder.com form did a really quick CFD test (computational fluid dynamics) on CarBEN EV5 last night in a program called Falcon. Even just this brief glimpse is really cool! More to come...

http://www.flickr.com/photos/60376566@N00/8088925091



It uses a 3DS file which I was able to export directly from SketchUp.

 

HELLO AGAIN-
I WAS WALKING THROUGH A PARKING LOT WITH MY BROTHER MATTHEW-
AND WE NOTICE A CAR THAT LOOK :questions: ED LIKE A VET-MY BROTHER BEING A CAR-SALES-MAN -SAID NOWAY THAT CANT BE A VET-SO WE WENT OVER TO TAKE A LOOK-NOPE -HE WAS RIGHT IT WAS A -FISHER-AS WE WHERE LOOKING I NOTICED THAT THIS FISHER HAD A SOLAR PANEL
ON IT -FOR A ROOF
AND JUST THE THE -CARBEN- EV CAME TO MIND :smart: -SO I CAME BACK TO YOUR SITE AND I NOTICED
:nervous: THAT THIS CAR HAS NO SOLAR PANEL ROOF :nervous:
YOU MIGHT :windowtongue: WANT TO THINK ABOUT PUTTING A :charge: SOLAR PANEL IN THE ROOF
:think: JUST A THOUGHT :think:
PAULE

 

A Fisker? That car is not very efficient, and the PV panel probably is just for help with the accessories or cabin ventilation while parked.

A solar panel on the roof would help a very small amount, but not as much as you might think.

 

Okay, today was decidedly mixed -- I cut the last two sheets of foam! Woohhoo!! BUT, the toothed timing belt on the X-axis (which has the big job of moving the entire sheet of foam along the 8' length) started to tighten up, and then to "climb" off the side of the pulleys on the main rollers... It stretched and frayed, but it did not break, at least. What it did do though was skip a number of steps, which caused several parts to be cut incorrectly and one part to be totally messed up. :-(

I'll try to cut that one by hand (I have the mirror piece to trace) and I'll try to repair the 3 or 4 damaged pieces. That and my computer was pausing, which made me catch my breath every time. It did not go smoothly... Worst case, I buy a replacement belt and cut that one sheet again.

I may have caused this by not vacuuming out the dust underneath the rollers, and it may have packed itself on the pulley causing it to over tighten. Or maybe the idler bearings came loose and then got out of alignment? I'll look at it as soon as I can.

I also had thoughts about splitting the vacuum and pulling air down through the X rollers to evacuate the dust out of there. This probably would take a second shop vacuum since it is a large intake area.

Pictures from yesterday:


Here are the stacks of the last three 2" layers ready to be glued (portions of the rear wheels are on the right). There are five 1" layers then to be glued (because the tapers are much more abrupt). Those are on the 2 sheets I (tried to) cut today.


Here is (about) the 10th large bag of broken up scraps sitting next to enough foam sheet leftovers to fill an 11th:

I snap this all into 1-2" pieces so it fits more into each bag, and luckily they can be put out with the regular trash pick up; costing just $2/bag. Before I got into this process, I thought I would have to truck things away and pay a lot more than that.

I will likely finish the gluing on the main chassis over the weekend. Then the hatch door and the wheel skirts will need to be glued. And then the shaping begins...

 

I've had a look at the X-axis belt now and it is riding up on the outside end of the motor pulley. I guess I need to re-align the roller pulleys to the right then, correct? All the bolts on the motor and the ball bearing idlers look to be tight - I used stronger machine bolts and nylon lock nuts and Loctite blue, as well.

The belt I have may hold up to cutting one more sheet.

 

Man this thing is looking awesome. Great job cant wait to see this thing drive out of your yard for the first time

 

I have finished cutting all the foam sheets for this project! The x-axis belt has just about come to the end of it's usable life, but it hung on long enough to re-cut the last sheet. I got to show the cutting process to a friend, and needless to say, he was impressed.

And I only have 3 inches more to glue onto the main chassis! So, pictures of it sitting on it's "wheels" will be happening later this week. I'll be gluing the hatch door and the wheels skirts soon, as well.

 

I finished cutting the last sheet of foam yesterday, and I finished gluing the main chassis today! Woohoo!

Here are pictures - the last inch to be glued:


The rear bumper ready to be glued in place:


The Chassis with the pieces drying in place:


Later this week, I'll be able to take it off the platform and set it on its "wheels".

 

Okay, I moved down into it's proper position, with the help of my son Nicolas!



Now I can glue up the hatch door, finish the rear wheels, the wheel skirts. I made a litter frame (you can see it in the last photo) so two people can easily carry it. I've got to batten down the shelter before Sandy gets here...

Edit: this forum is truncating the wider pictures, so you can go here:

http://smg.beta.photobucket.com/user/NeilBlanchard/media/CarBEN%20EV%20Concept/DSC_9965_zps451def81.jpg.html?sort=3&o=41

...and scroll to the left to see them in full.