1992 Saturn SC Electric Vehicle EV Conversion, Advanced DC motor, Zill 1K-HV

1992 Saturn S-Series Additional Info:

Selling my 1992 Saturn SC EV conversion. The car was converted in the early 2000's by myself as a project originally using lead acid golf car batteries. It was on the road and driven daily for a number of years while I was in school. It was later converted to use lithium ion batteries for longer range and lighter weight. I unfortunately do not have the time or the will to give it the attention it needs to keep in on the road any more. This may be a good parts vehicle for someone to convert another vehicle or you could get this one going again easily enough.
This is not a turn key car! It does turn on and drives; however I would not advise trying to drive it in its current state. Minimum it will need the battery pack balanced and some cells replaced, a working battery management system will need to be installed and the car will need new tires. The battery pack is from 2013 and I believe it has about a 50% state of health overall. but could not promise this. Theoretically with a new battery pack this car should be capable of over 100 miles range (new battery capacity of 26.5 kWh). I do not know what the present range of the car is.

This is a rust free car. As far as I can tell it was originally sold in Las Vegas and spent its first few years there, then moved to Phoenix and has lived here ever since. I had a clean clear Arizona title for the car. It comes with all manuals for the components added to it and any interface cables such as the Zilla serial communication connection to change parameters and view diagnostics codes.

During the conversion process I replaced just about everything that could cause excess drag such as wheel bearings, flexible brake hoses, brake caliper seals etc.. I also put light weight Kosei 15" wheels on the car to reduce un-sprung mass. All this helped efficiency significantly. The struts were replaced at that time also in addition to installing custom rear coil springs to handle the additional weight in the rear of the car.

Here is a list of the major components in the car and their present day price to purchase new as a reference:-9.1" Advanced DC series wound electric motor with tail shaft FB1-4001A ($1,750)-Custom Transmission Adapter Plate and motor shaft coupler ($700)
-Zilla 1K-HV speed controller, 1,000A 300V with hall effect pedal hairball interface ($3,079)-Manzanita Micro PFC-30 charger ($3,025)-Iota DLS 240-55 power converter being used for a DC/DC converter ($220)-Hall effect "go" pedal ($220)-Tyco 200A main contactor ($120)
So $9,000 worth of parts easily not including all the small things such as heavy 2/0 cabling and connectors, battery box materials and construction, coolant loops for the controller etc..

The battery pack consists of 80 cells of GBS-LFMP100Ah battery cells. Again, they are from 2013 so they're not new, but still have some life left in them so I won't even list a price. This is a good starter battery pack, but it is definitely going to need replaced at some point as it is nearing its end of life definition. People seem to be using junk yard production EV pulled battery packs now so this might make the most sense to go this route for a replacement and it would certainly be cheaper than buying the exact replacements. I am including a lightly used pack of four cells from the same date code so you will have some spares to use.
The battery charger does not work at present. The lights turn on dimly when powered up and there is no output current. I spoke with Rich Rudman at Manzanita Micro who built it and he indicated it would likely be a few hundred dollars to get it working again. There is an off the shelf 18V power supply in it that is not putting out voltage so my best guess is that the brain is not getting power to run the power stage. Nothing appears burned or damage in the charger. I am presently maintaining the batteries charge manually using a 12V charger. The nice thing about this particular charger is its flexibility. The output voltage can be adjusted around 450 VDC and it accepts a universal input so you can use it on 120VAC, 208VAC or 240VAC. The current output is adjusted with a knob so you can limit the charging power to work on lower power circuits. Maximum power is achieved with a 30A 240V circuit. A twist lock male plug is located behind the original fuel filler door.

The car does not have climate control, although all the duct work is still present in the dash and the blower motor is still present and works. There is no power steering or power brakes, you just spend some muscle to steer and brake the car as it sits, but these could be added.
The car has an aftermarket Kenwood CD AM/FM stereo receiver with Infinity speakers in the doors. It also has the optional Sirius radio receiver with antenna installed should you wish to activate it.

The car was re-painted from its original two tone (apparently rare for a Saturn) red and silver scheme to "Fine Sublime Green" and "Silver Nickel" two tone colors around 2009. I did all the preparation work and an employee of my families who knew what he was doing shot the paint. The colors were from a later Saturn Ion/Vue Red line series. The paint is PPG base coat clear coat paint. The Fine Sublime Green color has 80 parts pearl in it and was very expensive paint. All the body panels were removed when it was painted except for the roof, which is glued on, so there are no tape lines. All Saturn door jambs are black so the re-paint is very clean and very little evidence remains of the original color.

More money than sense was put in to this car.

This is a very light weight vehicle for a conversion. The battery pack weighs only about 560 lbs total. The cars original curb weight is less than 2,500lbs and the original engine was an iron block. I do not have an actual weight. I was able to consistently achieve 200Wh/mi with this car with nice driving and utilizing lots of coasting.
Any questions feel free to ask! The car is located in Tempe Arizona (Phoenix area). I can assist with shipping if needed. The car can be viewed by appointment also.