EV Controller Installed

July 11, 2010 - I've installed the first EV Component, the controller. Woohoo!! This is a major milestone as I've been in restoration mode for almost two years. The controller is a proprietary design by Mark Hazen of EVHelp.com. Mark has a patent-pending on his design where instead of a straight bus of MOSFETs, they are arranged in a circle he calls the "Power Wheel". This arrangement allows the power to flow uniformly and heat to be transferred in the same way.

Due to the size of the controller, mounting plate, and heatsink, I had to alter the firewall by cutting out a piece of the shelf. I drilled a couple of holes at the bottom of the firewall and installed 1/4" rivnuts.



I had never heard of a rivnut before but I'm doing the majority of my install from ElectroAutomotive's VoltsPorsche installation manual and Mike Brown uses them whenever he can't get access to both sides of a mount point. I got my Rivnut kit from Harbor Freight for about $15.



Here's one of the bottom mount points with rivnut installed, both of them required rivnuts as I couldn't get access to the other side of the firewall.



Here's a shot of the controller installed, nicely snuggled into the lower right portion of the hellhole firewall. You can clearly see the controller terminals (B+, B-, and M-) and the control terminal which accepts connections from the Control Box. Mark's controller comes with a control box of his design which ensures that the parking brake is off, foot is off the accelerator, and foot is on the brake pedal before power is supplied to the controller.



Here's a closeup shot of the left lower mount point with standoff. I may have to use longer standoffs and bolts to allow enough room for air to flow between the firewall and heatsink. But I remember Mark saying he added the heatsink to ensure adequate cooling of the MOSFETs.



And a shot of the top of the controller showing the upper mount points and standoffs. I was able to install the bolts from the cockpit and use nylock nuts to fasten the controller's mount plate.



Another shot of the top of the controller but looking down into the hellhole from the outside.



And finally, a great shot of the entire firewall showing the nestled controller. You can also see the rear battery rack suspension mount posts mounted onto the control arm pivots aka suspension ears. I test fit the battery rack onto the mount posts to make sure that the controller would not interfere with the rack installation later. It's a tight fit but it works.



I'm going to try and mount the potbox assembly to the lower left portion of the firewall next weekend. Caio!