Video: electric Saturn SL1 - Fuel Economy, Hypermiling, EcoModding News and Forum

MetroMPG · 02-06-2008, 10:37 AM

This is a good video. A pretty thorough look at a well done conversion, including commentary on the key issues & a nice on-road demo.

But holy smoke, there's a lot of lead in the trunk!

[YOUTUBE]http://www.youtube.com/v/wPYhsfshciw[/YOUTUBE]

Daox · 02-06-2008, 11:23 AM

Nice video. Too bad he didn't mention the cost of the conversion. That is a LOT of batteries haha.

NoCO2 · 02-06-2008, 11:39 AM

Wow, that's awesome! He is actually doing a decent, road worthy speed! As soon as I live somewhere that has a garage so I can plug it in at night, I would love to build one myself. Until then, however, I'm left to building my E-bike and taking it easy on the petrol burner.

MetroMPG · 02-06-2008, 11:43 AM

And you can bet he didn't include the replacement cost of those batteries in his "2 cents per mile" claims either!

(Neither did I when talking about the ForkenSwift's 3 cents/km, but I've got three packs worth of used batteries to swap around.)

NoCO2 · 02-06-2008, 11:53 AM

How much does each of those battery packs cost roughly?

bennelson · 02-06-2008, 01:59 PM

Talk about a "lead-sled"!

He needs to ditch that roof rack!

Great looking conversion overall. Cockpit looks really nice - didn't go too crazy with instrumentation.

GenKreton · 02-06-2008, 05:41 PM

This is the sort of conversion I was interested in trying eventually. Big batteries at a high voltage for some real distance and highway speeds. This place has forced me away from these and looking more into supplementing bicycling with hypermiling and ecomodding a gasser instead (or a scooter/motorcycle with a gasser if the area I land in after this May doesn't permit daily bicycle riding). This big conversions don't do anyone a favor for the wallet right now and are quite the time sink in comparison.

Still, this car is wicked cool

igo · 02-06-2008, 07:12 PM

This may be a beginner question: Why does his tachometer work? Does the electric motor spin at the same rpm as a conventional engine or is the tachometer read off of the transmission?

MetroMPG · 02-06-2008, 07:34 PM

He probably rigged the tach to read off the motor shaft.

One revolution of the electric motor will turn the transmission's input shaft once, just like the gas engine that used to be there.

WaxyChicken · 02-06-2008, 09:36 PM

I'd be more than happy driving that.

It looks like he did some good work on it.