POSEIDON SPEAKS TO ME: Part Three

I called David at Annapolis Hybrid Marine the U.S. distributors for the Thoosa 9000 systems.  Since the Key switch did not seem to be the issue I began thinking of other things that might easily resolve the problem. One was to disconnect the B+ of the battery to hopefully reset the controller. David said that was not necessary. I then mentioned that the power contactor relay might be bad. David ask if I had a multimeter on board. Of course I did. He suggested I remove the cover to the controller box and he could guide me on making some voltage measurements. This of course means emptying out the starboard locker and squeezing my way to large frame down below in the summer heat to access the controller box. I had not had to do this in eight years of electric propulsion operation because the system was so reliable. But, now it had to be done. I then asked a question that saved me some aggravation. In preparation of my journey down below I asked how many screws hold the cover of the controller box and are they Phillips? David replied no they are Torx (star) type screws. I did not have any Tork screwdrivers on board so I would need to buy them. But, at least I had not found this out after contorting my body down below after emptying out the locker. So it was a row back to land to get a Torx screw driver set to continue trouble shooting.


At the store I had several choices of Tork tools. The first one I picked up was a compact set that folding into the handle. It looked like it would do the trick. Though something told me that maybe I had better have a backup.


So I also bought another Torx set that had a screwdriver type handle with interchangeable bits. 
 Good thing I did this because I found that with the compact folding set it was difficult to access and turn the screws at the rear of the case. Where as the set with the screw driver handle was much more secure and made it easy to turn the screw. But, even then I found the controller box was just a little too close to the battery charger case to use the handle.  I was however able to use just the Torx  bit and a pair of small vice grips to turn the screw enough to remove it.



With the controller case finally removed I gave David another call and armed with a digital multimeter I was able to start trouble shooting.  There is not much to a Thoosa 9000 system. There is of course the battery bank, motor, key switch and a box holding the controller and a few other components.

But, even inside the controller box there are many components that one finds with a diesel engine system. There is a relay, fuses, connectors. The one main different component is the motor controller. In my case it is a Navitas 400 unit. Under Davids guidance I carefully connected the multimeter ground to the B- battery connection in the box. I then checked the voltage at the power relay connections. Which was the component I thought was the next culprit after elimination the key switch. I measured 55 volts which was full battery voltage on both terminals.  David explained that it looked like the the relay was good because 55 volts on both terminals means the coil of the relay is not open. What happens on turn on is after the Controller does it's self check it grounds one side of the relay which then allows full battery power to the controller. This was not happening. So it was time to look at the controller. There were two status/fault lights on one side of the controller neither one was on. David then instructed me to probe two pins on the multipin connector  to the controller module.  There was 55 volts across those pins. This meant the controller module was getting power. So the diagnosis is the controller is bad. David mention this had happened to other units and as a result they were no longer using the Navitas controllers because of these mysterious sudden failures. Stil I had gotten eight trouble free years out of this one and could easily replace it but, I was thinking it might be best to upgrade to the new controller David mentioned. Trouble is the new controller is larger and won't fit in to the current box. He said I also needed to check if the new slightly larger box dimensions would fit in the current space. I'm pretty sure they would but, I want to make sure and while I'm at it I want to mount it so I will be able to have enough roof to use the Torx screwdriver handle to remove the cover in the future.

 So a quick ten minutes of probing and the problem was quickly diagnosed. Compared to the hours I and some diesel mechanics I had hired in the past spent scratching our heads working on the diesel it was a breeze. Unfortunately, it is getting late in the season and I would be away for several weeks. So I had a few things to think about before I decide to move ahead with a new controller box which I'll share in an upcoming post.

POSEIDON SPEAKS TO ME: Part Two

It was already mid July BIANKA was late in getting launched because of the previously mentioned 48 volt Battery bank issues. The new batteries were now in place and I was anxious to bring the boat out to the mooring and get away from the dock. Being at the dock was certainly convenient especially when loading over 500 pounds on new 8A4D batteries on board. But, in summer the breeze is not always coming from the most favorable direction for working on the boat. It was also one of the reasons I had not attached BIANKA's sail to the mast. As it turns out this was a good move. I had bought it on board in it's sail bag and laid it at the bottom of the mast. My thinking was it would be much easier to install it on the mooring with the boats bow pointing into the wind.

I was finally ready to untie the lines after a months delay. I had four brand new batteries on board. I had reloaded the cockpit lockers with all the "stuff" I had removed to load in the new batteries. I was ready to shove off. All I had to do was hit the main power switch on the controller box then turn the Key Switch in the cockpit.  This tells the controller to engage the contactor relay which provides battery power to the controller  which then provides power to the motor.  The main power switch lit up as normal. I then turned the Key Switch expecting to hear the loud click from the controller box that tells me the contactor relay had closed. But, instead I heard nothing. I turned the Key Switch again still nothing. I tried a few more times making no progress. It was mid morning and looking to be another hot humid summer day.  I was sure that after eight years the Key Switch had finally succumbed to the elements. I'd easily fix this at the mooring I thought. So I told the boatyard folks to tow BIANKA out to the mooring and they could have work dock where BIANKA had taken up space for the week.

I then went to the dingy dock where I kept my eight foot Porta Bote dingy and rowed out to the mooring. I was so confident the the corroded Key switch was the problem that I  spent a day or two doing other things on board before I looked at the switch. When I finally removed the switch things did not look that bad. I removed the spade lug connectors from the back of the switch and tried to short them together for a quick check but, it was still not working. Perhaps there was a lot of internal corrosion inside the connectors I thought. So I cut the connectors off and stripped the wires and twisted them together. Still not action from contactor relay. Uh oh I thought this is still a little more serious. My thoughts now turned to the contactor relay. Another simple fix if it was bad. But, I would have to open the controller box which meant I would have to remove everything again from the cockpit locker and squeeze my large frame down below in the mid summers heat. I was not looking forward to this but, it would need to be done. But, first I thought I'd give a call to David DiQuinzio Chief Technical officer at Annapolis Hybrid Marine U.S. distributors for the Thoosa systems and get his thoughts. 

TO BE CONTINUED

POSEIDON SPEAKS TO ME: Part One

Well, this ninth season with electric propulsion has certainly been one of two steps forward and one step back. Looking back at how things have gone it certainly seems as if the Gods are conspiring against BIANKA venturing too far off the mooring after eight years of pretty trouble free operation. To recap:

Spring outfitting was going well as usual until a few days before I was planning to launch. I plugged into grid power to do one final charge in the boatyard before launch when I noticed one of the batteries was not reaching full charge. Some further testing showed it was going bad and would need be replaced.

Since all the batteries in the bank were eight years old replacing only the bad battery created my first dilemma. By only replacing the bad battery in older 48 volt battery bank results in the older batteries degrading the new battery. So in a few years I might have to replace all of the batteries again. So I decided since the battery bank was eight years old I'd replace all of them now. So that's what I did.

Unfortunately,  shipping damage made two of the new batteries unusable and required replacements to be ordered further delaying installation of the new batteries. Poseidon must have had Thor or whoever the God of shipping is throw the batteries around in the truck to damage them.

Since I would be removing the old batteries. I decided now would also be a good time to reconfigure the position of the batteries so they will be easier to access and service in the future. But, I needed to extend the the battery platform to do this. This was the time to do this but, it meant an additional delay while I worked on how to extend the platform.

Once that was done it was time to install the new batteries which went well. With the new batteries installed and rewired it was time to head out to the mooring. I turned the systems main power and then the key switch to engage the contractor relay. Nothing! For some reason the relay was not energizing and providing battery battery power to the controller and motor for operation. Poseidon is laughing at this no doubt.  I'd been at the boatyards work dock for a week and the boatyard was getting antsy for me to move out of the way.

I thought it would be a simple problem with the Key switch that tells the controller to engaged the contactor. Certainly eight years with the switch exposed to the elements had caused the switch contacts to fail. Something I could easily fix while at the mooring.  It was now already well past July 4th I was also anxious to get out to the mooring where I would also be able to jump off the boat for a swim in the summer heat. So I told the boatyard to tow BIANKA out to the mooring where I thought I would be able to quickly fix the switch issue and finally start the sailing season. Unfortunately this was not to be the case...

TO BE CONTINUED

THE COST OF RECYCLING

With the brand new 8A4D batteries on board BIANKA I was faced with what to do with the old batteries I still had in my possession. These included the four old batteries that made up the propulsion bank along with the two new 8A4D batteries that were damaged in shipping.  I knew the two damaged batteries and the one bad battery from the propulsion bank should be recycled ASAP if only to make some room in my garage. I called the local place I usually recycle metals to and asked what they paid for the large 8A4D batteries. They said six dollars. Hmmm, only six bucks for over one hundred plus pounds of lead batteries?  I decided to call another scrapyard nearby and there I was told they pay twenty eight cents a pound. So my 8A4D would make me thirty six dollars each. It really pays to shop around even if you are just recycling.

BATTERY INSTALL 2016

The sailing season has been delayed while I deat with the damaged battery SNAFU. Two new 8A4D batteries arrived to replace the two that were damaged in the original shipment. The only difference is that the batteries probably have different manufacturing dates. When I ordered the original batteries the battery company said it could provide batteries manufactured the same day. But, now that probably is not the case. Whether or not it will make that much of a difference only time will tell.
So I loaded up all five hundred and twenty pounds of batteries into the car and took them to the boatyard.

I had BIANKA launched because it would be easier to load the batteries into BIANKA while floating at the dock.
I did make some major changes in the placement of the new batteries. I reversed the location of the the terminals of batteries one to three. I just turned them around so all terminals are located along the port side. Battery four was off by it's self next to the other batteries facing aft on the starboard side. The was because the engine stringer which held up the original battery platform did not extend far enough aft to allow for the fourth battery so I installed it next to the other three. Unfortunately this also meant I had to empty out two cockpit lockers to do any maintenance on the pack instead of one. It was a real pain.
By building a metal extension battery holder out of slotted angle iron and extending it off of the existing platform:

I was able to line up all the battery terminals on the same side and make them easy to reach after only emptying one of the cockpit lockers. This will make for much easier access and maintenance in the future.

 Other than doing the install on the hottest day of the year the install went pretty good. There might be some tweaks I might want to do but, they could wait until the off season. The next step is to get the batteries wired up. I did have some concern that since I changed the layout of the batteries that one or both of the main battery cables would not reach the proper terminals. We'll see how that works out once I start wiring thing up.