First Place at the NEAT Rally

We competed last weekend at the NEAT Rally at NCCAR in Northampton County, NC; our Truck finished 1st place overall.  Special thanks to Tim George of Wilmington Motor Works and Greg Tarleton of Bluewater Motor Sports for transporting our vehicles; Tim was also invaluable in helping the event run smoothly.  Event results are as follows:

1st Place Jeopardy (Truck) - Ben and Justin

2nd Place Autocross (car) - Ryan

1st Place Autocross (truck) - Ben

1st Place Acceleration (car) - Logan and Katiana

2nd Place Acceleration (Truck) - Tyler and Roberto

2nd Place Troubleshooting (car) - Grant and Zac

1st Place Troubleshooting (truck) - Ryan and Justin

1st Place Range (truck) - Zac and Brandon

2nd Place Range (car) - Grant and Justin

1st Place overall - Truck (award presented by EV Challenge Executive Director, Steve Garrett)

More Pictures from the event:

A rare view inside the MR2.

Top two jeopardy teams, ready for action!

Pit Crew

Troubleshooting

Four Topsail Conversions - all together in the same place

Mr. Jeffcoat keeping an eye on things.

Troubleshooting

Ready to accelerate!

Acceleration!

This is a tight fit.

Raffle Time

It's time for the annual spring Fundraiser Raffle.  We have a lot of great things planned for next year, but none of it is possible without your financial support.

You can win one of over $2,000 in prizes:

iPad Mini
Dyson Hand Vac
Side Arm Paddleboard Lessons
Surf City Pier Season Pass
Auto Detailing at Stevenson Acura
Tree Stand
Music Loft Gift Card
Golf and Cart for 4
Beach Bowl for 6 (x2)
4 Rounds at Ten Pin Alley (x5)
Ice House Skating for 4
Shuckers Gift Card
3 Fishing Rods
Max's Pizza
Walgreens Gift Bag
Second Wind Fitness Membership
O'Leary's Car Service
Poplar Grove Gift Basket
...and more!

The drawing will be held May 29th at 5:30PM in the EV Shop.

You can purchase tickets from any EV Student.

On the road again!

The battery transplant is now complete and the MR2 is back on the road, thanks to seven long hours of work on Saturday by some dedicated students.  Re-wiring the Orion BMS took a lot of time and patience (and a call to their ever-helpful customer support line), but it is now working to equalize our new battery pack.  There are still some final details to attend to, but now our attention can shift to the Volkswagen and preparing for the EV challenge.  Check out the pictures of our progress.

Drilling out holes for the battery straps.

The front box, ready to go back in!

Moving the bug out of the way, so the MR2 can get on the lift.

Since the new cells are smaller, we need new holes for the battery cables.

The back box is almost finished...

Everything is in place up front.

Raffle Ticket sales at Advance Auto

Cold day at Advance Auto today, but a few of the THS EV Team showed up bright and early at 8:00 to display the vehicles and sell raffle tickets.  We sold a total of 32 tickets  in a short period of time.  Next week, we will be at the Hampstead Community Center at the annual Hampstead Women's Club Holiday Craft Fair from 8:00-1:00.

16th annual NEAT EV Rally Champions!



We arrived in style thanks to Larry Hall



Hunter handling the track

Davis make a first place run

Never let Shelby take a "fun run" on the autocross track.......

Competing in EV Jeopary for the Odyssey event

The guys hustling in the Pit Crew event

Another victorious event for THS EV!

Congratulations to the Topsail Electric Vehicle Team for their victories at the 16th annual NEAT EV Rally this past weekend at the NCCAR test track facility in Roanoke Rapids, NC.  An amazing weekend with an amazing group of students. We were recognized as being the best organized and most motivated group there! The team has accumulated 162 trophies in 13 years of competition.
The team won the following trophies:
1st Overall
1st Autocross: Modified Class
1st Range: Modified Class
1st Range: Truck Class
2nd Troubleshooting
2nd Pit Crew
2nd Acceleration: Modified Class
2nd Acceleration: Truck Class
2nd Autocross: Truck Class
3rd EV Jeopardy

Battery Heaters!

    We finally got around to installing battery heaters in the truck battery boxes today.  The heaters are a rubber pad that consumes .58 Amps at 120 Volts and produces 70 Watts of power.  We tested them first and found they have an internal thermistor that opens the circuit at around 115 degrees and closes it back when the temperature falls to below 100.  The pads are very flat and we were able to install eleven of them under our 16 Trojan T-145 batteries.  We monitored a pad under a 12 volt battery we have for 6 hours and found that during that time, the electrolyte rose to about 100 degrees.  We should have better results when they are in the insulated boxes and all the batteries are grouped together. The process took most of the day and also allowed the new EV 13 team the opportunity to learn how to wire a parallel circuit, crimp wires and check the specific gravity of the cell electrolyte.  The install was completed and the heaters work great.  It takes quite a while to heat the cells, but it will be a welcome addition when cold weather hits. Kudos to the new team that showed up to perform the work on a teacher workday!


   On a side note, we have not had to water the cells for over 6 months because of the Water Miser Vent Caps from Flow Systems.  The caps have done an exceptional job and we only had to top off the cell levels slightly, using only a half gallon for 16 cells.