Drive time!

I finally got the car on the road today! Maybe I should have waited until all the batteries were equalized and fully charged, but I didn't.
I've been stealing time this week charging the batteries one at a time and trying to track down an error the Zilla was giving me. I learned 2 things:
#2 Don't connect the DC/DC converter to the switched side of the contactor or the Zilla won't be able to pre-charge properly.
#1 (most importantly) don't bug Otmar with these kinds of questions unless you bought the Zilla directly from him. I thought it was something stupid I did (which it was) but it took too long to sort out and Otmar got a little peeved that I was wasting his time when technically I should have gone to Ryan at EV Source for help.

I was pretty excited to get it back on the road again, so took it for a quick run, then I had my daughter get in the car with me, then my wife wanted to drive it around the block...

I'll try to edit the videos and get them up to YouTube this week.

A couple things I noticed while driving:
- the clutch isn't working. Not a big problem as there isn't a lot of shifting at speed in an EV unless you are on the highway, which is not in my immediate plans.
- it's pretty fast. My runs were uphill at a sight grade and I could easily burn rubber
- I kept thinking i had a flat. The tires are pretty sticky and at low speed all you hear is tire sounds. That with the manual steering (with an extra 100+ pounds in the nose) makes it feel like the tires are flat. Once you step on it, though,the feeling goes away.
- it makes a nice wooshing/whirring noise like a jet but not nearly as loud. Not sure how much of this are my tires...

I don't have the gauges in it, so I won't be taking it to the Green Fair we have today. I don't want to have to tow it home.