Internet was one of the most challenging technical implementations I had to solve on the bus. For me, it was more difficult than building the battery and energy systems, or the roof raise. Here is a brief tale of my journey. While building the bus, I placed a spare wireless router in it that just […]
Bus
Wheel/hub inspection
I wanted to pull the wheel off to take a look at the springs closer, and practice with the torque multiplier. While off I cleaned up the crust on the wheel and gave it a spray of enamel paint to freshen it up. Reminded me a lot of working on Unimog wheels – about the […]
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Leaf pack modules and thoughts

So at this point, I have a bunch of potentially dangerous sardine cans that I’ve extracted from a Nissan leaf “battery”. Sometimes all this disassembly reminds me how everything in the world can be considered objects and classes of objects. Car Battery enclosure Battery group Battery module Parallel cell group Pouch cell Lithium plate stack […]
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Nissan Leaf battery pack disassembly

A week or two ago, the time was finally right to try and purchase a lithium battery pack for our bus. I’ve been planning on this for several years now, and in fact our whole project revolves around the energy density afforded by lithium power storage. I don’t think I’m doing anything particularly novel here […]
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Big lithium bus battery design criteria

I’ve been thinking over various design ideas on the big battery pack. This might sound sort of obsessive but really this conceptualizes the core of the ability to live off-grid, and it presents so many positive opportunities it would be a disservice to not consider them. Some of them major concerns I had, and perhaps […]
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Water tank assembly
So the water tanks that need to go into the luggage bay are huge – I suppose my eyes were larger than my appetite, because after I got the tanks I realized that they were about an inch higher than the gap between the deck of the bay and the frame rails. After a little […]
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Gluing surfaces together
My asbstract shapes. Lots of gluing plastic to ply backing going on. This stuff never ends it seems. The finished panels seem to take the temperature swing and durability test when done though.
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Panel finishing and struggle.
Feels like every panel and finish piece is a struggle. It looks good enough so I’m happy with the result. Carpet/ply panels in riding cabin area keep noise down. I have picked the hardest panels to complete first, naturally. Stairwell entrance gets the same sorta thing. Preview of the other areas. Birch with teak oil […]
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Door latch assembly
Got the final design for the pneumatic door latch actuator. Tomorrow I’ll add the inside handle. Its neat having a latching, locking pneumatic swing door.
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Entry/starwell wall
Got the stairwell wall and handrail thing built. I’ll cover with an upholstery panel soon. This frame was difficult, because of all the little connectors and features it needed.