The electrified Mustang Ford should have made… S550 Mach-E build project

[jheissjr]

The section in the picture came factory painted. Did the owner sandblast it?
What will you use to between the battery and motors for motor control? Are you keeping any OEM modules and if so how will you make them functional from being disconnected from other modules and the CAN bus? How about the electronic power steering?

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[zackmd1]

The section in the picture came factory painted. Did the owner sandblast it?
What will you use to between the battery and motors for motor control? Are you keeping any OEM modules and if so how will you make them functional from being disconnected from other modules and the CAN bus? How about the electronic power steering?

Either it was dipped or never painted.

The low voltage system will remain stock s550 for the most part. Current plan for the motor controller is the Dynam VCU+. This VCU has 3 CAN Bus networks and allows for custom CAN messages and custom gauge outputs. Initial idea is to wire the VCU “inline” with the OEM PCM which would allow for filtering of the messages from the PCM without having to outright replicate all messages. I have a partial CAN database but not a complete one…

So basically, entire car will be a stock S550 including PCM, BCM, ABS, and power steering. High voltage system will be separate and interface with the stock PCM when necessary for vehicle functions and gauges.

 

[WItoTX]

That’s the question! Stuck on tablet style dash which fits the electric build or S550 retro dash with digital gauges and larger screen…

I was thinking M1 gauges, but you'll need to find a use for the tach section of the screen. I'm sure there's some cool dash you could run with.

 

[zackmd1]

I was thinking M1 gauges, but you'll need to find a use for the tach section of the screen. I'm sure there's some cool dash you could run with.

Thinking about using RPM to show current flow. I should be pulling around 900a at full throttle so a 9k RPM gauge would work well to show that.

 

[HoosierDaddy]

I was thinking M1 gauges, but you'll need to find a use for the tach section of the screen. I'm sure there's some cool dash you could run with.

As I mentioned, electric motor RPM isn't very useful information due to power curve line. BUT for passengers, car show attendees, etc. the 18,000 RPM Tesla motor redline might be cool.

 

[Mike Pfeifer]

Thinking about using RPM to show current flow. I should be pulling around 900a at full throttle so a 9k RPM gauge would work well to show that.

I like the idea of 900.0 amps being redline.

 

[BrakeFade]

Definitely excited for this build!

 

[SnowFox]

Iunless I missed it so you have a timeline for the project. Certainly gonna be fun to read updates.

 

[zackmd1]

No way to really predict a timeline but I plan to work on it as much as time allows! I’m hoping to have a rollable and painted chassis within the next few months.

The hardware side should actually be the easiest part of this. The software and integration is going to be what takes time.

 

[junits15]

I don’t think I saw it mentioned but I’m curious. Where are you planning to put the battery? I know a lot of EVs fit the pack under the floor but I’m sure that would eat into nearly all your ground clearance without some serious fab work.
Curious what your ideas are on that

 

[zackmd1]

I don’t think I saw it mentioned but I’m curious. Where are you planning to put the battery? I know a lot of EVs fit the pack under the floor but I’m sure that would eat into nearly all your ground clearance without some serious fab work.
Curious what your ideas are on that

Plan is to mount under the floor like OEM EVs. Floor pans will be cut out and modified to accommodate.

Still trying to decide on which pack to go with though. The options currently are Model S modules or VW ID4 modules. Both have there advantages and disadvantages… S modules are 3” thick where as the ID4 modules are 4.25” thick plus a required cooling plate. Model S cooling is integrated into the module. A pack made of S modules will be 75kwh and have a lower nominal voltage where the ID4 pack will have a higher nominal voltage and 82kwh.

As you stated though, thickness is a concern. I need to fit the battery between the rear tire and the front torque boxes which is a challenge with Model S modules. ID4 would fit well but the thickness means the floor will have to raise quite a bit in the rear which I have concerns about… Goal would be to not extend more than 1” past the bottom of the pinch weld on either side to avoid ground clearance issues. Got to do a bit more investigating before picking a module.

 

[HoosierDaddy]

Plan is to mount under the floor like OEM EVs. Floor pans will be cut out and modified to accommodate.

Still trying to decide on which pack to go with though. The options currently are Model S modules or VW ID4 modules. Both have there advantages and disadvantages… S modules are 3” thick where as the ID4 modules are 4.25” thick plus a required cooling plate. Model S cooling is integrated into the module. A pack made of S modules will be 75kwh and have a lower nominal voltage where the ID4 pack will have a higher nominal voltage and 82kwh.

As you stated though, thickness is a concern. I need to fit the battery between the rear tire and the front torque boxes which is a challenge with Model S modules. ID4 would fit well but the thickness means the floor will have to raise quite a bit in the rear which I have concerns about… Goal would be to not extend more than 1” past the bottom of the pinch weld on either side to avoid ground clearance issues. Got to do a bit more investigating before picking a module.

Have you considered less kwh capacity? If you can charge at home, optimum would be enough for 90+% of days needs. There is little to no advantage of longer range. The only advantage of more capacity is how often you charge. But total charging time if you use that extra range can actually be worse on road trips. In other words, total trip time may not be improved by more capacity. And the extra battery weight hurts performance/handling. Since this is a personal vehicle which I suspect will not see high mileage use, I would choose capacity that matches your unique range needs, if that is an option.

 

[zackmd1]

Have you considered less kwh capacity? If you can charge at home, optimum would be enough for 90+% of days needs. There is little to no advantage of longer range. The only advantage of more capacity is how often you charge. But total charging time if you use that extra range can actually be worse on road trips. In other words, total trip time may not be improved by more capacity. And the extra battery weight hurts performance/handling. Since this is a personal vehicle which I suspect will not see high mileage use, I would choose capacity that matches your unique range needs, if that is an option.

I have but the issue is that you need a certain number of modules to achieve a desired voltage due to the module series/parallel config. I need 14 Model S modules to achieve ~320v nominal. 12 ID4 modules to achieve ~355v nominal. If I were going down to the cell level I could configure it exactly the way I want but trying to keep this at OEM level.

The ID4 does have a short range version that uses only 9 modules with a slightly different series/parallel layout to achieve 395v nominal and 62kwh. This would be near perfect but they are incredibly hard to find… The long range version is the most common.

 

[sukhoi_584th]

I'm curious why only Model S and ID4 are options. Something to do with how to interface with them?

 

[Mach VII]

Fill the trunk and where the fuel tank lives with batteries then create a frunk where the engine now lives!

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