New Owner - Ben got an iMiEV - Again!

[DonDakin]

Hey Ben great adventure,

The diesel heater would make life nicer in the winter and it is a fun project.

Don't forget DVD's... they make long charging stops pass quicker, I always have a few of my favorites in the car.

Don.....

 

[jsantala]

DVDs? Those plastic discs with moving pictures on them? Why not just watch Netflix or Youtube on a tablet. That way you can watch new stuff and not just re-runs. Or read a book or two on Kindle. I've actually come up with more stuff to do than I've actually had time to accomplish.

 

[bennelson]

My car has the fancy audio system. I believe that it DOES play DVDs!

I had my smart phone with me and was able to fool around on Facebook and some other online shenanigans while I waited. I was originally planning to bring a book, and realized 10 minutes after I left for the trip that I forgot it!

 

[bennelson]

Now that I finally got my car back, time to keep tinkering with it.

I upgraded the dome lights and rear license plate lights to LED.
http://300mpg.org/2016/01/01/led-lighting-upgrade/

I'm very happy with the look of it. The incandescent bulbs just felt so 20th Century.

 

[NeilBlanchard]

I have a small LED light on my key ring, so I just point that way if I can't see enough.
There is a topic on tire pressure. I did the 44psi, but then backed down as someone else pointed out that you need "squish" room for bumps and things.
Since I live in a Winter wonderland, my roads always look pitted and holed

Higher pressure protects your rims better. There is still compression happening at higher pressures.

 

[JoeS]

...I upgraded the dome lights and rear license plate lights to LED.
http://300mpg.org/2016/01/01/led-lighting-upgrade/...

Ben, thank you for posting your upgrades and for linking to your 300mpg.org posts. I think most of us enjoy reading your very well-written reports.

I realize you did this primarily for aesthetics and the whole concept of improving efficiency, but have you done a power-savings calculation for those license-plate lights (dome lights don't really count)?

I still haven't replaced my DRLs with LEDs and my almost-finished fiberglassed foam-sandwich fender skirts are waiting for me...

 

[bennelson]

I figured that the power savings would be SO MINIMAL that I didn't even bother to do one. Just for fun, let's do it right now!

The normal license plate bulbs are 5 watt bulbs.
The new ones are 220ma. 22ma at 12V is 2.64 watts. So, not a huge savings The LEDs are slightly less than twice as efficient as the incandescent bulbs.

5 watts - 2.64 watts is 2.36 watts. Times two, as there are two license plate lights is 4.72 watts saved.

For the sake of argument, lets say that the license plate light bulbs are on for an hour a day, five days per week.
Dividing 1000 by 4.72 gives us 211.86. In other words, using the LED bulbs saves me 4.72 watts, and when used for 211.86 hours, saves me 1,000 watt-hours or I kWh.

A common rule of thumb says that the car gets 4 miles per kilo-watt hour of electricity.

Thus, every 212 weekdays, I get four additional miles of range. We should probably also factor in a conversion loss from the traction battery, through the DC/DC converter, to the 12V system.

Looks like I would save roughly 1 kWh per year. That's 13 cents.

It cost me $9.90 for the pair of bulbs.

9.90 (cost of bulbs)/0.13 (electricity cost saved per year) = 76.15.

It would take me 76 years to earn a financial ROI (Return on Investment) on this pair of bulbs.

Like I said, I bought them for the looks, not the savings. Always fun to throw a little math in there though!

 

[JoeS]

Hi Ben. Thanks for doing the math, and sorry to put you through the exercise. In re-reading your original 300mpg.org posting I see that you were doing it for aesthetics and light distribution and, rightfully, not for any energy or economic savings benefit. In reality, it's good to show how infinitesimal all these ancillary power consumers are relative to what's needed to propel the car (except for the heater, of course).

So, looking at these LED bulbs from a range-increasing perspective, if we say you drive for an hour you save 4.7 Watt-hours. Dividing that by our (nominal) 16KWh pack capacity yields 4.7/16,000 = 0.029% potential increase in range. 0.029% * 62 miles(EPA) = 0.0182 mile = 96.1ft (29.3m). Something to think about by someone running on turtle. :roll: I was surprised the distance was that great.

A common rule of thumb says that the car gets 4 miles per kilo-watt hour of electricity.

You're actually pretty-well spot-on, as for a little over 8000 miles my carefully-measured wall-to-wheels ended up being 4.2mi/KWh.
http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?p=5744#p5744

 

[bennelson]

Some of these numbers may be good to know when dealing with the unenlightened. You know... the folks who tell you to put a wind-turbine on your roof, so you can drive forever!

"Why don't you convert all the lights to LED?" is a VERY common question that I've gotten on some of my original EV projects. I did do the math on an LED headlamp for my old [url]electric Kawasaki.http://300mpg.org/projects/evcycle/[/url]
On motorcycles, the headlight is always on, and it's typically something like a 55 or 60 watt bulb, so it potentially uses a fair amount of energy. I did the math and figured out that if I converted out to an LED headlamp, and rode really slow, and used the entire battery pack, I would be able to go 1 mile further.

Also, the only LED headlamp I could find at the time was $200 and NOT D.O.T. approved. It didn't make sense to try to stretch the range a tiny bit by spending lots of money to have an illegal headlamp. When I got my Vectrix, ALL lighting on it was LED, except for the headlamp. By that time, I could get an LED bulb for $30. I converted over, and it looked great. Again, that was more for looks than anything else.

People who DON'T know EVs often have VERY unrealistic expectations. They have heard good things about LED lighting, and know that it's more efficient in the home. Perhaps if all the bulbs in your car were LED, you could drive TWICE as far! Nope, you can't. But doing the math and knowing that you COULD go 96 extra feet, well, that's just plain interesting, isn't it!

I ordered some more LEDs, and they arrived in the mail today. The next ones I am tackling are the DRL bulbs down by the foglights.

 

[BarryP]

Man those dome lights go out quick. What a nuisance. I would not buy LED dome lights to save energy. I would do it to save time and effort of never replacing again!
But I'm on the fence of DRL or main headlights being LED. During the winter my lights get iced or snowed on a lot. But that halogen light keeps it warm enough to melt all ice so I can keep on seeing. Sometimes our LED traffic lights get snowed over and we can't see the color --- for maybe 24 hours. That gets tricky.
-Barry

 

[bennelson]

I was able to install the LED daytime running lights.
Here's a full write-up on it, including photos: http://300mpg.org/2016/01/07/led_fog/

I got some pretty inexpensive bulbs off Amazon.com ( http://amzn.com/B00TEPTQN4 )

They didn't exactly fit in place of the original DRL bulb. There's a bit of plastic on the LED bulb that's a little longer than the original bulb. I used a Dremel with cut-off disc to remove some of the excess material. After that the bulb fit fine, and it looks great!

 

[tigger19687]

The reviews on those bulbs were not very good. One person said that they blew in a week.

Keep us updated on how they work and how they last

 

[bennelson]

Yes, I saw the reviews on the bulbs. There weren't actually that MANY reviews, and one was negative because the user said "It didn't fit my XX make and YY model", so I figured that was irrelevant. As for longevity, I'll keep you updated.

On the other hand, it was $9 for a pair of bulbs. Cheap.

What I CAN'T figure out right now is how to get the headlights out!!!!

I have the three bolts out that hold in the headlight, but at the TOP bolt, there's sort of a little plastic hook that hooks in to a sheet metal tab. It prevents me from pulling the headlight out. There doesn't appear to be any easy way to pry at it or otherwise un-hook it. This is under that little removable trim piece up near the windshield.

It's hard to get a light and a camera in there at the same time.

I've searched all through this forum and haven't found a single reference to it when people have removed the headlight or replaced bulbs, although I can see the little hooked part in some photos of removed headlamps.

How do I unhook that and get the headlamp out without just plain breaking off that hook?

 

[tigger19687]

Ben, http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=2660
Headlight replacement
I knew I saw it somewhere on here
There is a website that is posted somewhere that has more pics and description. I am at work so I don't have time to look around. but google it, I know it is out there

 

[siai47]

Once the top bolt is out, you can lift up the assembly enough to get the little pin in the tab out of the hole. The first time I removed the headlamps, I took the wheel wells out along with the front bumper cover. However, as you have found out you can snap the bumper cover off and get access to the bolts without too much trouble. I like the owners manual about bulb replacement--see dealer. Not much help when one burns out on a dark night :evil:

 

[bennelson]

Ben, http://myimiev.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=14&t=2660
Headlight replacement

That thread doesn't mention the little hook thing-a-majigger either!

Looks like the right answer is that the bumper cover has to be completely removed and out of the way. Only then is there enough room to give a magical push and lift and pull (all at the same time) to get the headlight out without breaking that hook. It's just a BAD DESIGN! Again, I think my biggest frustration with it is that there's this entire disassembly procedure that you are supposed to go through, and then the service manual doesn't even mention the little hook or instructions on a particular way of lifting/pushing/pulling the light to get it out!

Well, in the end, I managed to break the hook on one light but not the other. AND the damn part doesn't even appear to do anything anyways. It's sole reason for existence is to infuriate people like me.

I'm sure there's a joke in here somewhere. "How many Mitsubishi engineers DOES it take to change a lightbulb?"...

Here's the hook on the passenger side, which I managed to NOT break.

Here's the one from the driver's side, which I did.

And here's a pretty good view of the sheet metal tab with the square hole in it that the hooked part engages.

 

[Don]

Yes, I saw the reviews on the bulbs. There weren't actually that MANY reviews, and one was negative because the user said "It didn't fit my XX make and YY model", so I figured that was irrelevant. As for longevity, I'll keep you updated.

On the other hand, it was $9 for a pair of bulbs. Cheap.

Cheap doesn't always equal good. My problem with those is they're so physically large that they 'hide' much of the reflector, which I fear will make the fog lamp bulbs much less effective. There's really nothing wrong with the DRL bulbs which would make it worth giving up lighting from the fog lamps

Don

 

[bennelson]

Cheap doesn't always equal good.

Oh no, of course not. Cheap often means poor quality. In this case, all I really meant to say is that if I broke one or it burned out, I wouldn't be out very much money at all. Cheap things ARE great for experiments. And, if they work out well in the end, then you got something that was good AND inexpensive.

I tested the foglights, and there's NO loss of light from having the corncob LED bulb in there. The LED daytime running lights are brighter than the original incandescent ones. I use the DRLs all the time, and the foglights almost never. Even if they DID block some light from the foglight (which they don't) it still might be a fair trade-off in my case.

 

[bennelson]

I got the LED headlights in.

I now have LED dome-lights, daytime running lights, parking lights, and low beams.

High beams and fog-lights are halogen. I have no urge to change those (diminishing returns and all....)

I couldn't upgrade the side marker lights to LED - the bulbs didn't fit.

I haven't looked at the rear marker lights yet. If they also use a W5w bulb, I'll try upgrading those.

I don't see any reason to change out the backup lights.

Here's the full write-up on the headlight upgrade, including lots of photos: http://300mpg.org/2016/01/08/led-headlights/

Here's a shot of the LED headlights with original halogen fog-lights.

 

[tigger19687]

Ben I did see an instruction thing on the removal of the headlamp assembly. I just couldn't find it, but it did have instructions and Pics


I wouldn't mind changing the lights as brighter/clearer is always better, but the fog or DRL are not worth it to me.

I will have to wait till Spring, I don't have a garage