As the name implies, this guide is for those who want to learn how to make EVs, or even for those who want to improve their EVs.

EVs in Stormworks have always been plauged with a bad range with good performance, or good range with bad performance. But guess what? You can make it have a good range and have a good performance.

By achieving this, you have to follow a few steps to understand how they work, and how each part works in the vehicle.

Firstly, you will need a basic platform, you can use this base:


Make sure all of your gearboxes are set to 3:1 and that your tyre tread is high speed. After that, save it, you have now made your very first EV base! Congratulations!

Tires are one of the most important things for an EV. With a good mix of a drivetrain and tires, you can get great performance. If you however use a bad combination, your range and performance will plummet with it as well.

To get a better range, you want to use preferebly 4 3x3 tires, all of them having their tyre tread at "High Speed". It could look like this:

So, reason why high speed tires are the best is because they require the least amount of power to roll. And with an EV, you want to preserve as much of that power as possible. This means that you do not want to waste any power on things you do not need.

In short, you want 4 3x3 wheels that are all set to "High Speed", as they will waste the least amount of power.



There are multiple different types of drivetrains that best suit your need. The best one for EVs will vary, depending on your needs. If you only care about range and efficiency, you will want to go with FWD (Front Wheel Drive). If you want a vehicle good for all round uses, you will want to go with AWD (All Wheel Drive).

Reason why FWD is so benificial for EVs is because it requires the least amount of power to drive and is still controllable. The drivetrain I would avoid at all costs is RWD (Rear Wheel Drive) as it is way less controlable than FWD or AWD.

The different drivetrains look like this:

I personally always go with AWD as I find it to be the easiest to control and still has good range. It is also the choice most people make as RWD or FWD isn't as good in Stormworks as you might think.

So, in short, you want 4 3x3 wheels with their tyre tread set to "High Speed", FWD if you are going for range and AWD if you are going for all round.

For the amount of weight you want, you will want to keep it as low as possible, preferebly under 1500 mass (you can see this when hovering over the spawn icon in the workbench). This is because weight will only make your EV harder to move forward and make it be worse.

With this, one of the hardest parts come, getting a good mix with battery capacity and weight. I will therefore be giving some research about batteries under here.

Charge
Hardpoint Battery: 300 SWatts
Small Battery: 1600 SWatts
Medium Battery: 12800 SWatts
Large Battery: 256000 SWatts

SWPB [SWatts Per Block]
Hardpoint Battery: 150 SWPB
Small Battery: 800 SWPB
Medium Battery: 1066.67 SWPB
Large Battery: 1462.86 SWPB

SWPM [SWatts Per Mass]
Hardpoint Battery: 150 SWPM
Small Battery: 160 SWPM
Medium Battery: 213.33 SWPM
Large Battery: 320 SWPM

This will give you the basic information needed to understand how batteries in this game works. If you want any more information about them, simply drop a comment down below and I will answer it.



The weight distribution in your EV will play a crucial role in how it behaves and how it will perform. You generally want a low center of mass and for it to be in the middle. This will make it tend to spin out less while also being able to drive efficiently.

The weight distrubution of this example car being indicated by the purple box:

Having your weight too far forward will make it tend to understeer. If you have it too far back, it'd do the opposite and oversteer. RWD will also make it tend to oversteer. Oversteering is usually okay for drift cars but will waste a lot of energy.

This is kind of the part that will make or break your EV, as to say. Do not worry if your weight gets over 1000, that is fully normal.

In short, you want a low weight, your center of mass to be in the center and low down.

For motor types, you generally want a few small motors. I recommend 2-4 motors as this will give you a good performance but not take too much power.

The different types of motors are small, medium and large, being displayed here:

The small electric motors are generally underestimated, as they have a lot of power in a very small area. The most important thing while choosing the type is how heavy, how much power and how much battery you have. The more you answer to these questions, the bigger the type of motor you want. For most EVs however, a few small motors are good enough.



For throttle, you generally do not want to keep it at 1, unless you are accelerating. Acceleration is the only time where a throttle of 1 is acceptable. If you need a throttle of 1 to just get moving slowly, you either have your EV too heavy, too large, too little power or something else. Please make sure you've followed all the steps so far and have made your EV along the steps of this guide.

During cruising at 100 kph (62 mph), you want a throttle of around 0.05 or lower. This is to make it have a better range and not waste power. If you cannot achieve this efficiency, check if you've followed all the steps so far.

When it comes to braking, you can use regenerative braking, which will be covered. The regen braking system I am using looks like this:

The quicker you accelerate, the more energy it will take. The most efficient is a slow acceleration as it will waste as little power as possible. Changing speeds quickly will always take more power than a slow speed change.

Motor throttle can often be controlled via something that closely resembles an ECU. This controller will be able to seamlessly adjust the throttle and make it more efficient. The most common way of this is with a PID controller. With this, you set it at a speed and then let the PID handle it, which could look like this:

So, to sum it up, you want a low throttle at most times and 2-4 small motors.

It will help you get some of the power you've given to the motors. It will slow you down slowly and without using the brakes, and will improve your efficiency.

If you cannot fit it however, you do not need to add it as it will not automatically make your EV bad.




You can make it in many ways, the best of the ways is by building it like this:

The setup I have used will make it able to slowly go into the regen braking mode while not wasting any power when not needed. The way I have done it is with an up/down counter, just like this:

This way will make it so it activates when you're coasting and braking.

So, to sum it up: you only want to use regen braking when you are either coasting or braking.

Common mistakes when making an EV are as follows:

• Focusing too much on range:
  Focusing too much on the range will only make your EV slower and not have the performance you may want. The sweetspot for the range is 100-150 km (62-93 miles), anything above this is mostly useless as you will never use it.
  
  
• Not focusing enough on range:
  Not focusing enough on range, or focusing too much on range will never be bad. As stated before, 100-150 km (62-93 miles) is the sweetspot. You want to have this much range as it will allow you to not worry about finding a charger as much.
  
  
• Using too many motors:
  Using too many motors will give you more power, sure, but it won't give you any good efficiency. If you need more than 4 motors, you have done something wrong with your vehicle.
  
  
• Using the wrong type of motor:
  Using the small motors is always the best option, they are and will always be the most efficient. They are powerful, doesn't take much battery and are small. It is the most common type of motor I use in my EVs.
  
  
• Using the wrong type of wheels:
  Using the wrong type of wheels will only hurt most people. If you want to tow, then they may not be for you, but otherwise they are.
  
  
• Using the wrong wheel size:
  Using wheels larger than 3x3 will not be smart if you aren't making a larger vehicle. Reason why is because they take so much more to spin.

Each gearbox will reduce the torque by 5%. Take this into account when making your drivetrains.

The small motor is the most efficient. It is the smallest, most powerful for the size and the best one for most people.

Larger batteries are always better, in every scenario.

3x3 wheels are always the best.

• Have your gear ratio from 1:9 to 1:81
  
• Use 2-4 small motors
  
• Keep your weight low
  
• Keep weight as little as possible
  
• Use AWD for all round, FWD for efficiency
  
• Larger batteries will always be the better option
  
• Don't focus too much on range
  
• Don't focus too little on range
  
• Keep the throttle under 0.1 while cruising
  
• You can use a throttle over 0.1 but only when accelerating
  
• Use regen braking if possible

There are the general tips to follow while making your EV! Hope you learnt a thing or two from this!

If you make an EV using this guide, I'd gladly see it. If I missed something, please let me know and I will fix it.

I own a database server, known as SDS or Stormworks Database Server. In that server, we are researching electrical systems, and more. All of the research from this guide is coming from that server. Feel free to join!
Invite link! [discord.gg]