My Elec-Trak E-20
E-20 Tractor
(The ultimate snow-moving machine.)
My Elec-Trak E-20
In January of 2002, I started thinking of what else I could run off the Solar shed. My first thought was to buy a battery powered lawn mower and hook it into the grid. Then I heard about the Elec-Trak, and I knew I had to have one.
Elec-Trak was a line of lawn tractors that GE built in the early 70's. They had 8-20hp electric motors, and were powered by six golf cart batteries for a 36 volt power source. One could attach lawn mowers, tillers, even snowblowers (the weight of the batteries and the large tires makes the Elec-Trak a stunning snow device). Being built by GE, they were made to industrial specs, and are just about indestructible. I knew I had to have one.
As luck would have it, one came up on Ebay in January of 2002. As luck would further have it, none of the ET'ers spotted it, and I won it with a bid. Wow. Now of course I had to pick it up, but thanks to an extreme help from a fellow ET list member (thanks Ed!) I got it home.
Spent a few weeks cleaning it up, and spent $150 on a set of batteries. The tractor fired right up, and I have been spending the past week driving it around my yard. Wheeeee!!!!!
Next thing I need to do is repair the charger's timer and the brakes. With that operational (and the cruise control) this Elec-Trak will easily replace my 16hp Craftsman tractor. It's *much* better already; the Craftsman has little tiny tires and not much weight on the rear wheels. Thus it gets stuck a lot. This Elec-Trak seems to be able to climb up trees....
At about the same time, I also won a Solarex SC-18 charge controller on Ebay. This was an Australian unit, and it can be set for voltage points of 12, 24, *36* and 48 volts. 36 volts is just what the tractor ordered. Now I have a solar charge controller for the ET. More details on the solar project can be found here.
The plan is to add another MSX-120 panel to the shed and wire it into a DPDT switch. When toggled one way, the panel will be configured for 24 volts, and will run in parallel with the current shed panels (giving a total of 15amps of charge current). When flipped the other way, the panel will run in series with the two existing panels, and will output 36 volts at 10amps of current to the tractor. This will then pipe into a disconnect and the SC-18 controller. Then it's a simple hop with wire into the tractor's 36 volt battery port.
When done, this system will be able to charge the tractor. I'm guessing that the sun will put an average of 30amps a day into the pack, or 200 amps a week. This should be enough to fill up the tractor on the weekdays to allow me to mow the lawn on weekends.
In a way, the Elec-Trak is perfect for solar power. You always want to keep the batteries peaked (which means plugging it in even if you drive around the block), and the tractor spends a large amount of time just sitting there doing nothing during the week. And in the winter the tractor would sit for long periods just waiting to use the snowblower...
A perfect match. I'll write more about the status on this project as I work on it. I expect to have the panels ready to go for March.
A shot of the mower.