ME 495P - Ford Ranger EV

Recommendations for Future Work

There is still much work that can and should be done for this project.  At this point, the plan for how to make the case, as well as the pieces that parts that should be needed in the case design.  The biggest question mark is still the controller, as no one has been able to give a definitive answer on what we need or how much it will cost.  At the end of the project, we met with some graduate electrical engineering students and discussed possible solutions.  Without schematics, any actual proposed solution is only speculation until the electrical portion of the case is analyzed.

As for the design of the case and the batteries, we are confident that what we have designed and proposed is the best possible solution given the budget and complexity of the design.  The batteries that we chose to use (Optima d31a deep-cycle batteries) are one of the most popular batteries in the custom electric vehicle field, and the performance of the batteries is adequate for powering the Ford Ranger EV.  The case design is simple, since we wanted to make this as user friendly as possible.  A process plan for the making of the case can be found by click on the following link:

 Battery Case Process Plan

 When this project is continued, we recommend the following steps be taken to best accomplish the goal of making an alternative case for the Ford Ranger EV:

 1: Contact the EE department and get a estimate for installing and wiring a new controller

 2: Determine the wiring schematic for the batteries, charger, and controller

 3: Purchase batteries and any other necessary electrical components as per electrical requirements

 4: Collect parts for the case and start manufacturing the new case in a secure area

There are only a few of steps left in the completion of this project; however, they are all major steps.  Time and money prevented us from the completion of this project within the 10 week period we worked on this.  The biggest problem still on the table is the design of the controller, and for mechanical engineering students, this is out of the scope of our abilities.  Also, because there is not a schematic, when the controller is being designed, the wiring should also be looked at so that when the new controller is going to be installed, the wiring is done at the same time.