Electric Magayon II – Deployment

Part 2: Integrating all components into Magayon II

After successful designing, constructing and testing of the prototype electric motor for Magayon II, the next step was to integrate all electric drive components into Magayon II. Specs for this were as follows:

• Motor easily detachable
• Batteries protected from seawater
• Joystick should be storable so that it is not in the way when sailing
• Emmergency cut off switch in the cockpit
• Each battery has it’s own ON/OFF switch
• Charger built into the boat and connected to land connection. On/OFF switch.
• For charging can select individual batteries or both together. Protection with Schottky diodes.

The Batteries

Initially I planned to make two boxes for the batteries to be located in the cockpit where the gasoline tanks are right now. I spent some time to think about how to make the boxes waterproof and prevent sea and rainwater entering them. One of the boxes would also accommodate the joystick and the emergency cut of switch. The downside of this idea was that it would have required intensive construction work of the two boxes, and it was not clear whether a solution for a heavy tropical downpour could be found for the protection of the batteries. So then I decided to place the batteries in the cabins, under the center bed area, in a space that was underutilized in the past. This would also move some weight forward, balancing he boat a bit better.

Made two battery floor boards, sealed them with epoxy and protected the upper side on which the battery would sit with a fiberglass layers. Glued the two battery floor boards in place with marine epoxy.

The Throttle / Shift Control (Joystick Box)

The throttle / shift control needs to be retraceable so that it would be out of the way when sailing. I constructed a box which also contained the battery main switches, the emergency cut-off switch and the display unit for the electric outboard motor.

It is mounted where where the gasoline motor one of the fuel tanks was located.

The Motor

The electrical bits of the motor are already done. I just disassembled and cleaned the bracket that connects the motor to the boat. I had to order some spare parts for it since heavy corrosion happened at some of the parts.

The Charger and Charge Control

For convenience and easy use by the various potential captains, without having to connect the batteries individually all the time. I plan to develop a fully automated charger using an Arduino, but that is not so high priority, so a simple panel using three switches, two LEDs and three voltmeters will be used to start with, also until the electric motor is fully tested.

Wiring

To make place for the wires a lot of cutouts needed to be done in the hulls, inclduding sealing the wood afterwards with epoxy resin and fitting waterproof grommets leading the cables from inside to outside the hulls. Since space in some of the interior sections are very limited some of the holes needed to be drilled manually, a quite time consuming task.

Testing

The electric motor has already been tested on the Bangkal river and on Lake Taal. We also used it successfully to transfer Magayon II out of the Bangkal River to the beach at Sundowners. So the next step of testing was to test the whole system under real world conditions.