Happy to see a few new faces at the meeting Saturday. For those that missed it heres a few things that went on.
The USF Van was dead, sorry to say. Jim Parish noticed the charger was missing parts, the motor controller was a mess, and the battery pack was dry and most likely dead. The batteries could take a charge but wouldnt hold much capacity. This is a crying shame that so much money and time went into the van and it had to end up this way. We have heard of more EVs at other universities that are going to go the same way. They are all sitting out in the elements destined to become scrap. Ill try to get some names and addresses of those in charge of the EVs and ask if we can help in keeping these EVs alive. Jim's Prius was there and he had some great ideas of turning battery chargers into a type of BMS and or range extender for the Prius. We decided that we will be an official sub chapter of FLEAA for the west coast. But instead of being the West Coast Chapter, we decided to be named the Suncoast EVA. I would like to thank all of you for allowing me, Michael Clark, to be the regional director. As time goes on I hope to be able to do what we did in Sarasota and meet with more city and county commissioners and get them to at least join the plug in partners, http://www.pluginpartners.org/. This is an exciting time for EVs. As we hold more meetings and get more members the word will spread that electric cars are not a dream, but a reality. The South West Coast Chapter of FLEAA will be meeting August 16th at the Fruitville Road Library in Sarasota. John Batchelder PE is putting together an agenda for the August 16th meeting at the Fruitville Road Public Library (10:00 am). John has reserved a meeting room that can seat 80 people in air conditioned comfort. This room also has a full kitchen. For those of you arriving via I-75, The Library is about 3/4ths of a mile east of the Fruitville Road Exit (# 210) on the South side of Fruitville. The entrance to the parking lot is from Cobern Road. John would like to hear from Anyone that has some EV ideas and interest for this meeting. John will contact Steve Walters (owner) of Alternative Auto of Sarasota to see about recharging any EVs at Steve's shop (which is about a mile away from the library). There is space at the East end of the parking lot to showcase our EVs.
_______________________________________________ Florida EAA mailing list listserv@floridaeaa.org http://www.floridaeaa.org
