Efficient, cheap beaters! Used car ads: 35 mpg highway or more for $1500 or less

[Isaac Zachary]

Originally Posted by freebeard

How much for a Leaf with a new battery pack, and the old one for a 'powerwall' for the house?

$2,000 Leaf + $5,500 battery (minimum) = (at least) $7,500, and pretty sure the landlord wouldn't want a DIY "powerwall" installed on the property, as well as the family not wanting anything taking up any more space in our tiny home.

[Piotrsko]

Leaf batteries are relatively flat and boxy. Could fit under a bed, not that you'd want to. Power wall is a tesla name, probably trademarked and wall mounted (duh). Unsure how much floor space a system actually consumes, but suspect not much more than a 50 gallon water heater, so it fits in a coat closet. Reasonably certain landlord would have a proper hissy fit.

[freebeard]

Put it in an outhouse. Make that out of brick.

A containment vessel.

[Isaac Zachary]

Originally Posted by freebeard

Put it in an outhouse. Make that out of brick.

A containment vessel.

Hehe! And the landlord wouldn't throw a fit at that? She won't let me install a satellite dish, much less an outhouse.

Furthermore, my electric bill is only around $50 per month on average. If I cut it into half I'd only be saving around $300 per year. It would take over 18 years to justify the cost. Not to mention the rest of the stuff I'd need for the installation.

And then what would I power it with? My electricity is the same cost, day or night, so no use in storing off-hours electricity for day time use. I could sneak a solar panel on the roof if I laid it down flat. But that wouldn't be optimal.

[freebeard]

My electric bill is similar. And I buy about ten gallons of gas a quarter.

So, if I get an electric vehicle my gas expense becomes an electric expense. It may be a wash, unless I start going places.

[Isaac Zachary]

Originally Posted by freebeard

My electric bill is similar. And I buy about ten gallons of gas a quarter.

So, if I get an electric vehicle my gas expense becomes an electric expense. It may be a wash, unless I start going places.

When we had a Nissan Leaf, which was basically our only car at the time, what we spent on electricity was about $20 or $30 per month on top of what we typically spent.

[freebeard]

And the landlord wouldn't throw a fit at that?

So store it in a broken-down rusty pickup truck. Or a bass boat.

I could cut $20 or $30 off my bill if I tried. BRING has 4x8 sheets of half-inch insulation for $13. Four sheets would do the ceiling. I'm thinking about one or two gallons of Snow Seal on the roof to cut down heat gain this summer.

And I'll need a little mini-carport to store an FUV.