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Ulrich Schmid, New Zealand Born 10. 08. 1939. in Switzerland. Apprenticeship as chemist/metallurgist. Studied chemical engeneering. Worked in the pulp and paper industry. Emigrated to New Zealand 1967. Made handmade paper for about 18 years for artists and printers. For the last five years Ulrich has been making biodiesel out of waste oil. He also plants trees and looks after a big orchard of olive, pine nuts, macademia, cherimoya and other fruit trees on their 38 ha property. Ulrich lives at Taurikura, Whangarei Heads on the North Island, New Zealand with his wife Chrissy and four children Emil (18), Rosalie (15), Sepp (12), and Lia (6). He also has 6 adult chidren from previous marriages who live spread out in Switzerland, Australia, England and New Zealend.

Dyane for a New Millenium

Easy “2CV” Mucy, Slovenia Easy Mucy Design Studio was established in 1996, to make non-commercial publications and designs for those who want to change things for the better. Dedicated to true 2CV way of life: Against All Authority.

Electric Vehicle Discussion With

Ulrich Schmid by 2CV Mucy

Dyane for a New Millenium Electric Vehicle Discussion With

Ulrich Schmid by 2CV Mucy

Special thanks to Chrissy and my children for accepting me being a bit busy sometimes during the conversion of the Dyane! Of course without the help of Gary Baxter, my friend the electrician and Bob Smith a friend and engineer it would have taken me twice as long to finish the job! Ulrich Schmid

This book is dedicated to the memory of my great hero, Dean Špacapan Pajo. He would have liked the idea. 2CV Mucy

Foreword by Easy “2CV” Mucy

Dyane for a new millenium

O

ne of my favorite internet pages is www.evalbum. com, where I can see how more and more people make their dreams come true by transforming their vehicles into electric. Bicycles, scooters, even buses. There is also quite an impressive group of Citroëns, which, quite logically, are represented mainly by ultralight A series, followed by Berlingos and Saxos, followed by hydraulic GS and even a DS. Everything is possible. This internet site is designed to shut the mouth of opposition. Just recently an interesting car appeared which made me raise my brows: solar powered Dyane?! I immediately contacted the owner, Ulrich Schmid from New Zealand. He kindly shared his story of how his solar Dyane came to be. If not everything is explained in detail for you, it’s on purpose: go and Google away, look for answers to your questions - to the questions you should have asked yourselves long time ago.

Ulrich Schmid

Ulrich’s home on top of a hill

Ulrich: 1. The Idea Around 2002 I became aware that using oil (petrol/diesel) the way we were could not go on forever. I wanted to do something about it. As I am not a mechanical engineer or electrician I decided to hunt around to buy an electric vehicle. I then discovered that almost all car manufacturers made one or more models of electric cars. Toyota, Honda, GM, Ford, Chrysler, VW, Citroen, Renault, Fiat and Peugeot, just to name the most important ones. There were also 4


the TWIKE, Hotzenblitz, Think and other small producers of small electric vehicles. I wonder how many readers were aware of this at the time. As I did not have enough funds back then and it was impossible to import a lefthand drive vehicle into New Zealand without owning it overseas, I just had to wait. I looked at alternatives and I decided to produce biodiesel from used vegetable fat and oil as an interim solution. I started this in Sept 2004 and have been running all our cars and tractor on 100% biodiesel ever since. In 2005 I visited my mother in Switzerland which gave me the opportunity to go to London to have a look at the only right hand drive electric vehicle at the time, a Citroen Berlingo Electrique! There was a garage there which serviced these vehicles and I was very impressed by them. Unfortunately they had stopped making them a month before! In 2006 I became aware that MES-DEA in in Switzerland were converting Renault Twingos and Fiat Pandas to electric. These were brand new cars but rather expensive. I managed to locate an earlier model for a better price. However the company would only sell them in Switzerland and northern Italy. I would have to own it for 3 months before I could bring it to New Zealand. I also tried to get an exemption from this rule in New Zealand but was declined on the ground that it was more dangerous to drive a left 5

Ulrich Schmid

hand drive vehicle in New Zealand! I could have bought an converted Hyundai Getz from an Australian Convertor but the price was as high as the Renault Twingo from Switzerland. 2. Which car? Well there was now only one choice left and that was to convert one myself. The car needed to go for 80 km, have 4 seats and large wheels. We live in a rural area with dirt roads and I have to take the children to the school and school bus stop. I also want to go shopping to the nearest town Whangarei which is 35 km away.

In the beginning...

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This meant it had to be a light vehicle between 550-700 kg. To have all these requirements leaves only 2 types of cars in New Zealand. One was a Suzuki Alto previous 1991 or a Citroen 2CV. As the Suzuki has smaller wheels than the 2CV and a lower allowed maximum curb weight I focused on a 2CV. Unfortunately 2CVs and Dyanes were never sold in New Zealand. I was lucky to find a Dyane 1973 in very good condition and bought it for NZ$ 4500. 3. What system? A friend of mine had a converted Daihatsu with an aircraft starter motor and lead acid batteries.

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Ulrich Schmid

The heart of a 2CV: although the simple 602 is one of the ‘cleanest’ engines, it cannot compete with an electric motor. This one is equipped with a very rare automatic centrifugal clutch.

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It was a 2 seater and very heavy with a maximum distance of 30 km per charge. I decided on a AC system due to the higher efficiency. The weight is about the same for equivalent power. The price however is higher. I compared prices at the time and the choice was Azure Dynamics motor and controller. This was exactly the drive that BEV in Australia also use for there Hyundai Getz conversions.

The new powerful motor fits perfectly!

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Ulrich Schmid

4. Battery choice. Lead acid batteries were too heavy, Ni MH and Li Ion not readily available. That left only two other available choices. One is the Zebra battery made by MES-DEA in Stabio, Switzerland. This is a proven Ni – NaCl system that operates at 300°C. Unfortunately they would only sell a minimum of 10 batteries and they are very expensive. The other one is the Thundersky Li Fe Phosphate battery. It is also a proven battery made in China but slightly less efficient per weight. The price is better though. To match the voltage of the motor I decided to get 50 of the Thundersky 10


TS-LFP-90 AHA batteries and hoped that would give me at least 100 km range or maybe more. 5. Gear box Now the question was whether to leave the existing gear box in or get a motor with gear and differential. The Dyane does however not have enough clearance between the brake drums for such an arrangement. So the gear box had to stay. 6. Adaptor Plate for Electric Motor The next thing was to make an adaptor plate accurately. First I had to take the ICE motor out. This was great fun! Everything came out in one go! The adapter plate was made from a 50 mm piece of aluminium. 7. Weight distribution. Before I started to take the old ICE parts out of the car I went to the local refuse tip to weigh the car. The front axle 11

Ulrich Schmid

Tankers, pollution, refinery, petrol, global warming = BAD!

was 420 kg and the back 200 kg, a total of 620 kg. By weighing all the parts I took out I could figure out how much of the new batteries to put in the front and back. The motor, the controller and the DC/DC convertor and 21 batteries fit in front. The back battery box fitted neatly in the luggage compartment behind the back seat and still leaving luggage space above it. The charger fits nicely on top of the inside part of the right wheel cover. 12


Electric, clean, friendly, silent = GOOD!

8. Assembly After touching up a few rusty parts I mounted the new motor on the gear box, using the existing rubber mounting pieces of the ICE to support it. Then all the batteries were put inside with the battery manage- Fuse box ment units mounted on each battery. Batteries and BMS were all connectet and the wiring tidied up. 13

Ulrich Schmid

DC converter, charger, battery monitor

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9. Instrumentation I decided on a XpertPro battery monitor. It is rather expensive but a very nice and small instrument. It has all sorts of functions. The main ones being: Voltage V, Amperes A and Ah. Because I have a 165 V system I had to install a 10:1 prescaler since the battery monitor is built for lead acid batteries. Speed and mileage are shown by the original instruments. I also installed an inertia switch in case of a crash. Also there are built in a relay to stop me from driving off while charging, a forward/reverse switch, a switch to turn off the regenerative breaking, an emergency


stop push button between the driver and passenger seat and a secret off switch to prevent the very unlikely happening of the car being stolen. The regenerative breaking switch is necessary to change gear during driving as I have taken the clutch out to gain extra space to fit the motor without having to extend the front grille of the car. The controller has an adapter plug to plug in the computer and check and adjust the parameters or to follow real time information about motor, battery and other functions during driving if necessary. 10. Startup and Driving experiences. Apart from one set of wires not properly connected there were no problems. I then had to take the car to Auckland on a triangle to have it certified. Since then I have learned to drive more economically. I basically use 3rd gear to do all the driving up to 95 km/h with the exception of our steep 21 deg driveway for which I use the 2nd. If I have to drive fast on a highway I may switch to 4th. 11. Charging and Power consumption. So far I have charged the car up whenever I return from a trip. This will change soon as I am in the process of installing a special socket for night power which is about 55% the 15

Ulrich Schmid

• motor in • controller in • gearbox connected

• check the oil • check the petrol • smell the fumes

& & &

: : :

No need for any of that!!!

cost of normal electricity. I purposely put a 1.3 kW solar system on our shed roof to run my electric car on solar power. Hence I call my car “solar citroën” . This system produces about 1800 kWh a year and the car usage has so far been 170 kWh for just over 6 weeks or about 1500 kWh per year. I may drive a bit more in the summer time therefore 1800 kWh should be sufficient. Any electricity I produce with the solar panels gets used up 16


or the excess fed back into the grid at full price. With a bit of cheek I could say driving in my electric car charged by a grid active system with a cheap night rate actually gives me money back! I am also going to increase my solar system to about 3 kW. Enough for a second electric car maybe! Driving to town on my own uses about 235 W/mile (146W/km) or 275W/mile (170W/km) with local hilly driving and usually an extra passenger or two. This works out to NZ$ 3.84 per 100 km or NZ$ 4.47 per 100 km respectively. With night rate this will be about 40 % cheaper.

Simply plug it in ...

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Ulrich Schmid

... and we’re ready to go!

Comparable costs for an average diesel or petrol car are about NZ$ 10 – 12 per 100 km not counting the cost of oil, air and fuel filters, oil, cooling fluid and transmission oil. With the batteries having a cycle life of 3000 for 70% discharge or 2000 for 80% discharge I should not have to change the batteries for at least 10 years. Even then they will probably still be good enough for my short trips. 18


2CV Mucy: Let’s give our readers some technical data.

Ulrich: Weight: 800 kg Motor: 13 kW, 3-AC, air cooled Acceleration: far better than original motor! Max. speed: 104 km/h Range: around 100 km in the hilly area Cost: 25.000 NZ $, around 12.500 euros Time: 4-5 weeks over 6 months. Expected kilometres per year: 15.000

2CV Mucy: If I calculate all the facts about the costs compared to a petrol engined car, electric Dyane, without using solar power, would “burn” 180 euros per year, while a petrol car would burn 1050 euros. With solar power this Diane actually even produces profit.

Ulrich: A petrol car looses its value much quicker than an electric one. If you go to the Thundersky website you will see that they have increased their guaranteed charges from 3000 to 5000 at 70% discharge. That means the batteries should last for about 500 000 - 600 000 km. Also you have to 19

Ulrich Schmid Mount Manaia. Probably the only place electirc Dyane cannot go... Yet.

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consider the inevitable oil price increase while you can make your own electric power. If you want to make some predictions i think the electric car will come off quite a bit better!

2CV Mucy: I am trying to calculate how much time would it take to return the investment...

Ulrich: Why do you need that information? You have to spend about the same price for a new petrol or diesel car.

2CV Mucy: You are absolutely right. The car returns its investment simply by working and not being an environmental problem. And in 10 years a petrol driven 25.000 dollar car will be worth only a fraction of its original price and will have burnt 20.000 dollars for fuel and maintenance - which your solar Dyane WON’T. One more question. People stare at us when we drive our odd looking old cars. How about your area, what are the reactions of people when they see yout technical marvel? Appreciation, disbelief, pessimism?

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Ulrich: Most people look at my car, the main reason there are only very few in New Zealand. Some of them then realize that there is almost no sound and just stare in surprise and disbelief. The children seem to be the ones that discover that it is electric because they notice the socket at the rear. Children are much more observant. Last week a 91 year old man got brought to me by a friend of mine to have a look at my car. I then drove him home. He was literally speechless, all he could say during the drive was “ that is incredible, that’s fantastic , unbelievable etc! 22


He just was not aware that electric cars existed. He invited me to have a look at what he used to do. He converted cars in America, made them more streamlined or custom built for famous people in the 1940’s and 50’s. He also has several patents of helicopter blade drives and aircraft designs when he worked for companies like Hughes. Then he said: “Look, I have thought about this electric car business. Mostly only one person drives a car and sometimes two. So let’s design a two seater electric car.” He said: “You can be my partner and we will build a prototype and then we will produce them in New Zealand!” He then took a piece of paper and started to draw designs of his idea. This is a man that has never thought about electric cars before and is now totally converted! Most people are really interested and i am happy to show them the “inerts”! The first question is usually “how fast does it go?” and the next one “how far”. A few critics ask what I do when I run out of power. I usually tell them that I have a very long power lead and that there are many more houses along the road than petrol stations!! They do not get it however. If they carry on about this subject I say that they would have to walk a lot further with a petrol can should they run out of petrol! It does not occur to them that you do not let the situation happen, after all they do not either! 23

Ulrich Schmid

2CV Mucy: So are you going to start a business making electric twoseaters with the old designer? Or is your goal achieved and you have finished making electromobiles?

Ulrich: I think when you don’t have any more goals you will slowly wither and die! I am not sure whether the two seater project will come

A true representative of her kind: despite her old age she happily keeps going as an everyday vehicle. Wether she takes children to school, does the shopping or takes you on a trip to the beach. This Dyane makes every Dyane-fan proud.

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off the ground. Mind you if he puts his mind to it it will. I think he needs to have a good look at the existing light electric cars first and improve them. However I am considering making another electric car for my wife unless Nissan start selling their LEAF next year at a good price. Frankly I doubt it! Then I shall consider converting a Toyota Rav4. My wife wants to have a little bit more comfort! Like power steering and heater.

2CV Mucy: Let’s get back to Dyane. Can you give our readers a few tips on how to use an electric car, how to drive to use the least amount of energy, what are common errors that can shorten the life of batteries, a few constructor’s tricks, maybe? What will you do differently when you start another project?

Ulrich: When you drive an electric car you try to use as little energy as possible. Firstly you have to understand that regenerative breaking (if you have it) only gives you back a certain percentage of the power that you theoretically could. Therefore when you drive you try to drive in the zero power use whenever possible, meaning you cruise with the accelerator pedal in middle position between accelerating and 25

Ulrich Schmid

regenerative breaking. For example if you drive towards the top of a hill you don’t go full speed over it but instead you just have enough speed to roll over it and then cruise without power or reg. Breaking down the other side as far as you can go. In other words look and think ahead! In town I use the regenerative breaking almost exclusively for slowing down and mostly I do not even need the break pedal at all. The other “secret” is not to drive fast. Above about 60 km/h the air resistance really starts to cost you energy. So go as slow as you can afford. Air resistance increases by the square of the speed. Can’t think of any other ones at present. Maybe i need to go for another drive! Driving with the above points in mind is really easy, in fact nicer than with an ordinary automatic cars because you basically only use one pedal! I start to avoid driving our other cars! Of course the above mentioned points are not always possible to implement with all the traffic today and the impatient fellow drivers. However to have a car that everybody knows as being slow like the 2CV or Dyane is a great advantage. People are more forgiving! Anyway all drivers, whether in electric or petrol or diesel cars should follow the above guidelines and the fuel con26


sumption would be reduced instantly by 10-20%!

2CV Mucy: How do you know you stepped off the accelerator just enough not to switch regenerative braking? Do you have a spot, where the pedal stops or is this only the matter of having the right feel for it? I always imagined I’d make the break pedal have a longer step so that the first half of pressing the pedal would be regenerative braking and then the pedal would reach the “real” brakes. I guess after a few miles one gets the right feeling for the accelerator/brake pedal anyway, so my thinking is probably totally off...

Ulrich: The pot box is set to work the way you suggest. First half is reg braking then a small stretch at zero (rolling) then the rest acceleration. You get used to it very quickly and it is fun. I think it may work with the real break incorporated in the acceleration pedal. Of Left of the brake cylinder: mechanism course it would have to be a of the accelerator pedal. 27

Ulrich Schmid

break that is break assistant which you would have to build into the 2CV.

2CV Mucy: Oh, your system is quite fine. Your whole Dyane is an inspiration. I hope she will inspire some of our readers to try it for themselves. One more thing - regarding the empty car now being much heavier - did you have to strengthen it? How does the suspension cope with extra weight?

Ulrich: This is another advantage of converting a 2CV or Dyane as it has a maximum allowable curb weight of 930 kg. The Dyane was 620 kg before the conversion and 800 after. That means I could put another 130 kg of batteries in it if I wanted to! That would bring the range to about 175 km! But it would also cost another 6 or 7000 NZ dollars. For that weight you might have to convert the suspension to the one that the Ami has. But I am not sure. For my car all I had to do is raise the car on the tie rods to its rated height.

2CV Mucy: Having technical questions about the Dyane sorted out, tell me some more about solar power. On your photos I 28


Home of World’s environmentaly cleanest Dyane

noticed you have much more solar cells than only 1,8 kW. I guess all are not fotovoltaic, some are for water heating as well, aren’t they? So how close are you to having your home 100% self-energy-efficient? How are your neighbours influenced by that? I mean, has your “neighborhood” changed for the better because of your environmentally friendly attitude? Or are you considered more as a “strange neighbour” who doesn’t pay for petrol, heating, electricity... ?

Ulrich: I actually have a 1,38 kW system on my roof. Soon I will 29

Ulrich Schmid

A shed with solar cells

add another 2,8 kW of solar panels. Have to be ready for the next electric car! Actually the solar panels have just come down in price to about half of what I paid last year! We do have some 20 evacuated tubes on our house roof next to the tower for our hot water. We do not have self sufficiancy as one of the families living here (my nephew who is a chef ) have a little bread bakery and catering business and they use a lot of power! I just use the grid as the battery. The neighbours are very curious about my projects, specially about the electric car. They have not installed anything yet themselves but it gets them thinking anyway! Specially when I tell them that it costs me only $ 2.50 per 100 km. 30


Maybe they do something about it when the oil price goes above a $ 100 again! At the moment they still consider me as a bit of an excentric. But it is mainly the cost factor. They say the el car costs $ 25 000. they could buy a second hand car for 10 000 and use the other $ 15000 for petrol! It is like me suggesting to the people with orchards that they should also plant pine nut trees instead of olives etc becouse they woud then get a return after 10 years and no watering and looking after involved. The answer always is that there is not a quick enough return. I must be one of the old guard who thinks long term even generations down. I have planted about 300 pine nut trees and maybe get some nuts next year. But my children will get some certainly even if I don’t! They build new houses around here but when I suggest that they should put in alternative energy systems they nod but don’t do it. Instead they build complicated houses with alcoves etc. that cost a lot of extra money. Then they say they can’t afford solar power which would save them lots in the long run. Who needs a complicated house anyway!

2CV Mucy I have so many questions, but we ran out of space. So all we have left to say to our readers is to thank them for reading this book. I hope it will inspire them. 31

www.evalbum.com This is the page where those who say ‘it can’t be done’ simply lose their power of speech. Inevitably at least once in your lifetime you wondered what is the meaning of your life and maybe you answered ‘I want to save the world, but I am only a single human’. The key to the world salvation is YOU: you are the one where it all starts and it all ends.

If you are not a part of the solution, you’re a part of the problem. Visit this website, get inspired by those people who already did something about it, and become part of the solution.