The BRB Big Red Button

Well it's time for the compulsory Big Red Button and as the Matiz has one small cup holder in the centre console seems like a good place to go. This is of course for isolating the main battery pack from the drive train components here I started with drilling a 32mm hole in the bottom of the cup holder

Looks like this

Well I put the whole thing together and placed back in the car to find the contractor mechanism fouled on the gear selector cables so I needed to gain about 10mm so I cut away a further section of the holder. Next I found the diameter of the cup holder to be 75mm just the same size as an end block for a 75mm storm water pipe

So centre and bore a 26mm hole in the end cap and mount the BRB

Looks like this on the side

Back in the console view from under side

Used fibre glass resin to glue end cap in place 

Stuck tight 

And back together 

No no nope not going to talk about this!!!

Follow good advice

Hi again have been communicating with a chap in the UK, Greg, who has not only converted the same model (and color) car but has 10000 miles on it from electric only drive, see his quick run around on youtube http://youtu.be/7ekUZVTmINM . This means he knows what he’s talking about so when he recommended I put an engine/gearbox mount/support to cope with the huge torque, that was my next step. Greg did mention his motor has broken the support already and required repairs. So here we go and without metal rollers to roll the 6 x 40mm flat I need something about 9 inches in diameter Ha! The fly wheel. Rip off the ring gear and make a small bracket from angle to hold the flat bar. 

I had to put 2 bolts through the centre of the fly wheel and hold it in the vice. The clamp just couldn't hold it to the table

Now off to tend my sheep...

And after much groaning and whinging we end up with 2 brackets

Have to weld feet to each bracket so I can drill and bolt 2 halves together 

Just another look at the fly wheel with the 2 bolts in the middle. These protrude 40mm out the other side and give the vice something to grip on. I must mention the flat bar wouldn't stay in a nice round shape without some heat. For this I used my stick welder to weld 5 cent piece size welds 50mm apart along the length of the arc. This produced enough heat to take the tension out of the metal and left a true shape. Then I just ground the weld tags off. Who's a clever boy?

You can see where I have ground the welds off

Ready to go around the motor

Looking up from the bottom

 Looking down at the front. I'm using part of the original engine mount which I will weld to the support ring.

Also using the rear mount to attach to the support ring

Cheers

Just update on front engine mount completed

rear engine mount