The converting, maintenance, and operation of a Suzuki Samurai conversion to Electric power.

Saturday, July 26, 2008

Energy consumption


The question is always, how far can you go on a charge? About 35-40 miles driving conservatively in the summer. How long does it take to charge? Depends on where you plug it in. If you have the power you could charge up to 85% in 15 minutes. I am limited to 15 amps. This translates to 1800 watts (1.8 KW) As the batteries near full, the amps go down. Near the end, 5 amps goes in. That's 600 watts.

In an effort to figure out how much energy I was really using, I bought a used KWH meter on Ebay. There are a lot of utilities updating meters, so lots of the old ones are available for about $25. The socket is a bit harder to find at reasonable cost. Anyway, I use 2 120v outlets on opposite legs of my supply, so I have 2 standard plugs attached to the meter. 2 outlets below the meter to plug in my chargers. I am using 2 maximum 150v chargers in series.

What I have found out is that I use 500 watt hours/mile. I suspect that a more efficient charger would help. So would a more aerodynamic car with less rolling resistance. But I like 4WD! It's a Jeep thing.

I find that I am using just about 500 watt hours for each mile I drive

1 comment:

Anonymous said...

Storm - you've got the wrong units. It should be 1.8 KW (not KW/hour) OR, you could say 1.8 KWH/hour.

Phil Marino