make are parts skidder electric driven

[trooperTdiesel]

ive had this wild idea floating around in my head ever since we got are parts skidder.
and i admit its waaaaaaaaaaaaaaay out there, but every one has there dreams right....


its a Garret 15 gas model with the short frame, it does not have the reverser.
we have no working engine for it (we got it with a bad engine), so after every thing use-full is taken off. to keep the other 3 Garrett's running......
other then selling the frame to some one that needs it, its scrap.
unless i can make my grand plan work. MU HA HA HA my plan to save the world



reasons, ideas and other problems with the idea.....

are power rate is very low where we live, its about 0.06 cents per 1,000 KWH
i think the nat avrege  is near 0.10 cents or more.


ive been trying to figure out how much gearing would still be needed and how much could be taken out to make space for BATs
if you remove the trans and T-case, then your looking at using  three motors at the min.

one for each axil and......
one for the blade, steering and winch. getting those three things all plumed to one electric motor i know would be not fun, as you don't want the winch to have power at all times the motor is running.

another way would be to to away with the trans, but keep the T-case.
this would give you two speeds in forward and reverse and still leave the hole engine bay for BATs.
this still leaves the issue of the steering, push blade and winch. run it all on one motor or use two......

then there's the leave it all but the engine. doing it this way you could run it all on one motor and keep all the gearing, but where do you put the BATs

maybe along side the motor and under it, maybe also along the sides of the frame, or even in the rear part of the logger. and seal it up with steel to keep junk out???


are yarding is about 90% down hill on the place so i figure that would help matters.

on the negativite side of this idea..are place is about 130 acres and we only have power in two spots on the place.....yarding logs near a 1\4 mile or so is normal.


how far off my rocker am i with this is this in the realm of possible, or should it be put out with all the other unicorn ideas....

[SPIKER]

everything you need with this is wrong for electric drive off batteries.

skidding you need power and weight.  both of which are available fro DC system but when powering an electric vehicle both of those things are bad (weight and need for high output power to pull logs.)   takes a lot of battery power.

would require lots of re-charging and short trips and new batteries often.

mark

[zopi]

Eh...hybrid skidder eh? That is alot of torque to generate in an electric drive system...not sure you have enough room for that kind of storage batteries...

Now...diesel electric, like a locomotive...that might be the trick...run simplified hydros...electric over hyd...big electric planetary wench...err...winch....

[trooperTdiesel]

diesel electric hmmm, that could work.

one idea for BATs is, gas electric cars are getting to the salvage yards now.
they don't use lead acid bats, they use something with more energy per LBs.

if one can take a car 15\30 miles.
i figured maybe 12 of them could take a skidder "maybe" 3 miles. that's 5, 1\2 mile round trips with a 1\2 mile left over to get to and from the site, back to where it can be charged.
sadly that leaves very little wiggle room for "what if"

[Al_Smith]

Novel idea perhaps .However just price a big hi-lift 48 volt battery sometime then price the cost of the charger . Now figure in the drive motors and control system .

[trooperTdiesel]

this is on a much smaller scale.
http://www.evalbum.com/1702


a plug in diesel-electric is sounding like a better and better idea.....

[mad murdock]

Diesel electric with traction motors at each axle and an on demand
Hydropac with a pressure accumulator so the motor doesn't need to run all the time for the steering and blade. Traction motors at the axles will give
You dynamic brakin when going downhill as well.

[Ianab]

You know that would probably work pretty well.

The torque of the electric motors is pretty good, and you get away with a much smaller diesel if you have a small bank of high discharge batteries for the heavy pulls, and recharge that from the small diesel when not actually pulling, or when braking.

Electronic traction control on each wheel is then an added bonus.

 A bit of high tech electric wizardry would be needed for the drive system, but most of that stuff is pretty much "off the shelf" these days.

Probably not going to be cheap to set up though...

Ian

[bandmiller2]

Trooper,its possible but not practical,and would be a money pit.Only way would be like Al mentioned electric forklift parts,suitable motors that size are not cheap,sorry. Frank C.

[mad murdock]

I would not discount the idea out of hand bandmiller2.  I have thought similar thoughts in the past but technology has really lept forward these last few years.  There are electric airplanes now that can stay in the air for almost an hour at a whack, and carry 2 people! I say if a guy can think it it can be done. Otherwise we would all still be running up/down water powered sawmills:) and cutting our firewood with misery whips and axes

[bandmiller2]

I truely hope I'am proven wrong,it would sure be easy to start on a cold morning. Frank C.

[trooperTdiesel]

working on the bases that the fuel tank holds 10 gal.

the amount of BAT storage space needed for led acid BATs to equal 10 gals is insane

now to use BATs from a Toyota Prius there more energy per space, i think i could squeeze enuf in it to equal about 4 to 6 gal of gas.....
but i don't know how they would handle the sever service......


i purposed this idea on a ECO-modding site and the idea was quite mix there, most did'ent under stand the type of service.
and ceped coming up with ways to make the thing lighter, but they do have good info on wiring from making bat powered geos and S-10s

  though one idea that came up was steam power
i thought that was funny as can be 


any way it looks like we will need the trans, T-case, canopy from this old 15 logger.
to keep two others running, so all that leaves is the frame and axils.
i dont know if there would be enuf gearing reduction in the axils to make it work. let alone the need for more then one motor with out the trans or T-case.

[bandmiller2]

Electric forklifts are old technology and they work well,but a skidder is a much larger machine.Wood gas would work but like steam requires start up time.Would this skidder just be used around the mill or in the woods?? Frank C.

[trooperTdiesel]

originaly the idea was to use it as a daily driver, but that came to a screeching halt VERY FAST 
when i figured out how many lead acid BATs it takes to = 10 gal of GAS 

we have 220V power at two spots on the place.
one is the saw mill.
the other is the house\shop, and it would not take much to get 220V to the barn. but sadly that leaves a very large area of the place with no power at all.


the A and B on the map is are north and south line, cook RD is more or less are south and east line, and the hay fields to the west- south-west are the west line and are not ares.
there is not power at all available on the west side of the county road, makeing things very hard when a half mile or so is needed just to get to power



the more i think about this a electric front end loader at the mill would be much more practical.
seldom does it need to go very far, i mean i cant recall ever needing to take the loader more then a 1/4 mile in one DAY, other then when it goes to the shop for service\ repair. and even that's less then a mile.....

that old johnny pop 440 loader is just about shot IE under carriage is all out TOAST, and we have been looking for a replacement for years....HMMMMMMMMM
been wanting to change to a wheel loader. so there's less of a monster mud hole behind the mill.