Tesla Semi Drivetrain swap

[Gary Busy]

With the school bus world going electric drive, was looking at the Tesla semi drive train and have some questions.

Are semi truck axles the same width (track) as school buses?

Are all makes of school buses the same axle
widths?

Are the frame rails on all makes of buses/ semis the same sizes?

Would a typical bus frame hold 2 to 3 thousand pounds of batteries between the frame rails mid bus? If the interior conversion was kept at minimum weight.

Any insight would be appreciated.

Here are some decent video's of the million mile tesla drive train.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMctLIU1Eus

[EastCoastCB]

Unless you're a rich masochist I'd avoid trying to swap anything Tesla related.

You'd probably need millions of dollars just to get to sit on one, I can't imagine how much you'd have to pay for a salvaged one to swap parts from.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlvYv1SJJEY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJ8Cf0vWmxE&t=370s

The bus manufacturers are already on the EV thing. You could probably buy three or four of them for the price of the batteries for a tesla.
https://blue-bird.com/blue-bird/Pres...us-So-104.aspx

https://cleantechnica.com/2018/04/10...vered-in-2018/

https://thelionelectric.com/en/products/electric

[Gary Busy]

Have so many wrongs in those videos. Too bad fake news is so prevalent now.

Facts show that the Tesla Model 3 is closing in on 5000 units a week being produced,

Rocket business is highly successful, on and on.

The Tesla Semi will be using the mass produced model 3 motors, these things will be a dime a dozen in 3 years or so.

The batteries hitting the salvage market in the 3 year time frame will be well south of 2 grand.

The bluebird electric bus in the below video is way behind Tesla technology in my opinion, but the battery mounting between the frame rails is good.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KXOpHbXukZM

No doubt, the electric bus will rule the roost in 3 to 4 years time, the predictable route mileage is so perfect for these.

Now to figure out how to get 10,000 watts of solar on the bus to charge bus over a 3-4 day period, keep the model 3 toad charged and of course the bus interior electric supply going. The future is coming quickly.

Any thoughts on max panel mounting?

Thanks

[PNW_Steve]

I have seen a few electric buses sell at auction, for what looked to me, scrap value.

That might be a good starting point for a DIY project.

[EastCoastCB]

Originally Posted by Gary Busy

Have so many wrongs in those videos. Too bad fake news is so prevalent now.

Facts show that the Tesla Model 3 is closing in on 5000 units a week being produced,

Rocket business is highly successful, on and on.

The Tesla Semi will be using the mass produced model 3 motors, these things will be a dime a dozen in 3 years or so.

The batteries hitting the salvage market in the 3 year time frame will be well south of 2 grand.

The bluebird electric bus in the below video is way behind Tesla technology in my opinion, but the battery mounting between the frame rails is good.

No doubt, the electric bus will rule the roost in 3 to 4 years time, the predictable route mileage is so perfect for these.

Now to figure out how to get 10,000 watts of solar on the bus to charge bus over a 3-4 day period, keep the model 3 toad charged and of course the bus interior electric supply going. The future is coming quickly.

Any thoughts on max panel mounting?

Thanks

After a few years of tesla sales their used batteries out of salvage cars are worth about $16,000. Many salvage cars are even being sold with the battery pack removed or stripped out and reinstalled without the modules.
The batteries for the Tesla trucks will cost 3x what a new truck currently costs.

[o1marc]

No longer hear the roar of the motor, now all you hear is the rattles of the rest of the bus. I assume most of what I hear is the door?

[Gary Busy]

The two post above Tell the Tape perfectly.

I have seen the poor tech hybrid electric transit buses sell for scrap prices and I have seen the Tesla batteries going for 16 G's.

Tesla is going from 300 units a week to over 5000 a week, economies of scale will bring those 100 kwh batteries down to $3000 or so.

The million mile warranty on the Tesla electric drivetrain will no doubt cause the unit to cost 50 to 60 G's when they first appear in the salvage market, Tesla is predicting 100 thousand semi units per year, that should get the much coveted drive unit down to 10 grand or so in the salvage market.

How wide are your frame rails on your buses? Web dimensions?

[Gary Busy]

Lol on those rattles, I see a few used buses show up with FRONT air suspension, anybody ever drove one of these? Quieter, smooth?

Do school buses run the same air pressure as semis on their braking system?

[Gary Busy]

Would like to hear from different makes of buses as to their frame dimensions.
To see if they match up with the below post. Thanks

I'm converting a '95 International 3800 series school bus chassis to rv. The outside frame rail diemension is 34 1/4". 10" c channel. Looks like 3 1/4" wide. Here recently I've been thinking my next project may be finding another similar bus and drivetrain, and putting some early iron on the frame. Reason being, the bus chassis was pretty cheap. Mine has a DT466 with a spicer 7spd, 4.44 rear gears. It Drives an easy 65mph and tops out somewhere just above 75. The best part was I paid $2200 for the bus with 140,000mi.

Truck frame dimensions? - Pirate4x4.Com : 4x4 and Off-Road Forum

[magnakansas]

From what little I think I know. Frame rails are 34 inches apart. Seems to be convention started in the 1930's became somewhat standard in the 40's and 50's. The 34 inch thing is how I am going to be able to put my 1954 bus on a 2005 chassis.

Tesla is not build it your self friendly. Several instances where gearheads have rebuilt/salvaged a tesla. Tesla will not support the vehicle, even go as far as to shut down features on the car, while the car is in use.

I wondered about leaving four wheel drive front suspension under my bus and connect up electric motor to the front wheels. For times when a couple of hundred horsepower could help get up hills. allowing a smaller motor for use all the other times. After reading/watching some of the tesla horror stories that some of the car guy gear heads have posted....I would not want to send the money towards Tesla until they change attitude towards do it yourselfers.

I have to wonder how much of the issue is legal system driven (pun not intended)

william

[Gary Busy]

Always the bad stuff gets promoted by the fake news. There are a lot more Tesla motor swaps that are highly successful than the fails.

I have found where the semi trucks are also 34" frame rails so it appears (lol) that the Tesla semi drivetrain would be a near bolt in affair.

Frame rail repair or replace

You have to work with aftermarket like in the below link

EVTV Motor Verks Store:

With you having thought about an electric drive do you see other hurdles to bolting in a Tesla semi drivetrain into a bus?

I know the battery mounting will require a little engineering. I am currently looking at 300kw worth of batteries mounted mid frame. I would like to get 250-350 miles per charge. That would suit my travels well.

Any negatives anybody else see here other than approx 30 grand cost, Insurance bud of mine is looking into policies, says it can be done just trying to get upper office to confirm.


Here are some current Tesla model S motor prices, remember no transmission needed, when over 5000 a day Teslas are coming of the line the price will drop significantly.
https://www.ebay.com/i/292541559684?chn=ps

[Booyah45828]

So you drive on the 300kw batteries for 250-350 miles per day, now where do you charge? How do you charge? Will you have to hook up to 220 for 8 straight hours to do it? Electric is alright for inner city stuff or short trip stuff. But for class 8 semi's running coast to coast I don't think battery will work. At least not the current batteries. Especially the way some outfits run 24hrs straight with 3 drivers onboard.

I'm on the fence about all of this electric push, especially with li-ion batteries. The mining and processing that it takes is amazing.


Ideally, the US would regulate freight shipping into using connex containers. Making it easy to swap freight loads from truck to train to ship. Then move to have all shipping that's done within 250 miles by truck, outside of that would be done by train, Therefore you'd utilize the fuel efficiency of rail and could then utilize electric trucks.

But, now I'm off topic discussing random thoughts I have throughout the day

[EastCoastCB]

Originally Posted by Gary Busy

Always the bad stuff gets promoted by the fake news. There are a lot more Tesla motor swaps that are highly successful than the fails.

I have found where the semi trucks are also 34" frame rails so it appears (lol) that the Tesla semi drivetrain would be a near bolt in affair.

Frame rail repair or replace

You have to work with aftermarket like in the below link

EVTV Motor Verks Store:

With you having thought about an electric drive do you see other hurdles to bolting in a Tesla semi drivetrain into a bus?

I know the battery mounting will require a little engineering. I am currently looking at 300kw worth of batteries mounted mid frame. I would like to get 250-350 miles per charge. That would suit my travels well.

Any negatives anybody else see here other than approx 30 grand cost, Insurance bud of mine is looking into policies, says it can be done just trying to get upper office to confirm.


Here are some current Tesla model S motor prices, remember no transmission needed, when over 5000 a day Teslas are coming of the line the price will drop significantly.
https://www.ebay.com/i/292541559684?chn=ps

30 grand? The batteries alone will cost many times that amount.

[magnakansas]

From a vehicle dynamics stand point, other wise know as "How a vehicle handles". getting the center of gravity as low as you can. Reduce weight as much as you can. As you see in Tesla cars, battery pack is low and in one tray. Um you need controller and workable software. What I do not know about is how well you can feed braking forces back into the battery pack. What is needed for temperature control for the system. Will onboard power unit be needed to charge system? is you bus small enough to make it in to a tesla supercharger station? could you even use one? electric pumps for hydraulics for powersteering. electric air conditioning systems? At some point with tandem rear drive you could be able to use one motor for each rear wheel set. so four motors one each for two rims. You could then even alter turning radius by driving one side forward and the other locked or rearward... packaging of parts would also be way diiferent if you wanted..... total freedom to alter design parameters.

[Gary Busy]

Looks like the Cummins fans can go electric and keep their Cummins tatoos.
This is great news, these batteries look to be bolt in ready sealed. Prices will probably remain higher than Tesla units due to lower unit production. Not too long until a complete bolt in conversion for bus owners shows up.

Check out the pictures lower right hand corner.

https://www.cummins.com/news/release...ry-show-europe

[ennonne]

A little related reading:

https://electrek.co/2017/10/25/tesla...-supercharger/

[Mark_In_MA]

I'd look at it thusly :

Pretend diesel is $4/gallon.
Lets say the bus averages 8MPG.

Every $10,000 towards an electric conversion will buy you 20,000 miles of travel (in diesel.)

(24,992 miles at the current average price of 3.24/gallon.)


I'd say it depends on how far 20,000 miles feels. That could be a few years of travel for some people, a year for others.