Does anyone have experience with electric CONVERSION cars?

Question

I'm looking for _personal_ experiences with cars that have been converted from internal combustion to electric engines.

Answer 1

Well first i wouldnt recomend buying a hydrogen car. You have to replace the battery every so often and it is quite expensive. You’ve probably heard about fuel cells. In 2003, President Bush announced a program called the Hydrogen Fuel Initiative (HFI) during his State of the Union Address. This initiative, supported by legislation in the Energy Policy Act of 2005 (EPACT 2005) and the Advanced Energy Initiative of 2006, aims to develop hydrogen, fuel cell and infrastructure technologies to make fuel-cell vehicles practical and cost-effective by 2020. The United States has dedicated more than one billion dollars to fuel cell research and development so far

Answer 2

I personally have not, but I've been reading information about this on http://www.GoElectricNow.com.  It has information about many different green vehicles.  In addition, you can use the search box to find out more information.   I hope this helps.

Answer 3

I had a peugeot 205 electric conversion

it was great, quiet, smooth, smell free, refuel at home; £0 road tax

30 mile range in a rural location & could do the maximum speed limit of 60mph.

simple & reliable. it was the brakes that I eventually couldn't fix.

10 deep cycle lead acid batteries still left 4 seats.

ttp://www.batteryvehiclesociety.org.uk...

Answer 4

personally, I have had the chance to drive electric, its a neat experience. I have just completed a conversion to electric on a 1987 650 motorcycle. I made one design change, it also has a small engine and alternator. dead batteries are not an option. plus it can be recharged from an outlet. for all the short trips we make daily, electric is the answer.

Answer 5

On the East coast, there used to be a guy on eBay that would do it for about 20 grand - including a junked economy car donor from the local scrapyard.  Range was about 35 miles, overnight charge.

My take:  for 30 grand (26 grand for pure electric 120 mile range, 300 mpg gas) you can get an aptera - you'll need a PMB from Mail Boxes Etc to get them to sell to you (has to sell to CA address).  As far as the environment goes, the lead acid batteries on most conversions done by hand so far make it difficult to recommend doing it yourself... BUT, if you can get a hold of a different battery technology that you can make work, that would be great!

For purposes of pulling the big oil plug, you can get a converter for most post 1990 cars to run on ethanol, E-85, or regular gas.  Flex tek is one brand name, there are others.  It's illegal to install due to EPA regs (protecting our environment, right?), but who is gonna know?  Also, especially during summer, you can blend in some e-85 into your gas tank.  Start small, 1 gal/fill up, and gradually increase until your oxygen (check engine) sensor trips - then back off a little.  Repeat as desired.

Sorry for the extra info - just for people reading anyway.