Almost Finished...

It's been a while since I've photographed or documented anything - stuff has been done, the big items being re-doing the control panel to include a volt meter and joystick for the hydraulic lift, neatening up the wiring and mechanically, getting the bushes on the lift arms machined and/or replaced as the arm and operator basket was quite wobbly due to the un-lubricated and badly worn bushes. A visit to the neighbour and his machine shop soon had that sorted out.

So here's the machine, in the middle of doing work:

Note the housings over the motor (3mm steel sheet no less) and the cover over the batteries, which is also 3mm, but made of alupanel (aluminium polyethylene composite panel) which is much lighter, and after what the sheetmetal shop charged for the motor covers, I was a little put off that option.

This is the latest version of the control panel. Notable additions are the voltmeter and key and the joystick for the hydraulic lift. The little button next to the hydraulic joystick is an emergency drop switch which is separately wired back to the batteries and drop valves, so if the joystick, switching FETs or main breaker trip, the arm can still be lowered.

All the components are IP67except for the meter and little toggle switch - those two shouldn't be too hard to waterproof (I think you can get a little rubber boot for the switch) - then it should be safe to leave out in the rain.

One of the key safety features I added was a foot switch. This activates the main contactor, meaning the machine is essentially dead otherwise. The only niggle is that you have to wait 1/2 a second before operating the controls - I might add a beeper to indicate when the machine is "live".

The hydraulics are still exposed - it's a bit of an awkward thing to cover. The 48v charge port is just to the left of it:

The gaggle of electrics. Somehow I ended up with less room than I expected to have.

This is the common point for pretty much all the wiring. The bit of perfboard below the fuses is a couple of MOSFETs - they take the switching signal from the special hydraulics joystick (which is rather fancy - it has about 7 or 8 connections on it) and switch the hydraulic valves, either to open just the lift valve when the pump runs to lift the boom, or to open both the lift and drain valves to allow the boom to drop.

As mentioned, this drop switching is replicated by a switch on the control panel as an emergency backup.

The main 48v 400A contactor with precharge resistors sitting on top.

And the main breaker.

So what's left to do?

• Add some safety bars to the operator basket.
• Make it fully rain-proof.
• Add a 240v inverter to allow the use of electric tools such as chainsaws, hedge trimmers etc.
• Improve the braking system.
• Add a picking bag for harvest season.