Future Nuclear Engineer here.

[Izzyp]

Hey I'm in my junior year of High School, and I am interested in Nuclear Engineering. It's eco friendly and a lot of times people forget about it, or refuse to change their preconceived notions that nuclear is bad. Since it will probably be a while before anybody is driving an atom car, I have become interested in electric vehicles. I think it would be really cool to make a three wheeled electric car this summer. However I have no idea if this is feasible. Any advice or personal experiences?

I've looked at this forum and lurked awhile, but finally got an account today.

[Izzyp]

About the three wheeler, I was just thinking something that had enough room for one person and a little gear. Home built, something to go to school and back, or a quick trip to the store I live in a town so small it is called a village. Short range is fine, and I Don't need the speed of a real car. (as long as It would still be street legal)

[Harpo]

http://www.surlybikes.com/new/bigdummy_pop.html

Much more efficient.

If it's a village, it needs a bike not another car even if electric.

[SVOboy]

Welcome to the site. If I were looking for a putt putt vehicle I would definitely get a Van Dessel (I'm not saying it just because they're a sponsor and I'm about to buy one),

[Izzyp]

Bicycles that's no fun. Maybe a bike with an electric motor. I enjoy driving too much to bike everywhere.

[Daox]

Welcome to the site Izzyp. I don't think anyone here has done an electric trike, but I know there are a bunch of links to them here in threads.

[landspeed]

A nuclear powered electric car would be good - although it would be interesting whenever there was a car crash!. I for one would support nuclear power over fossil fuels. If we had used nuclear power from the start, we would have a huge pile of extremely dangerous spent nuclear fuel, which will be toxic for 10s / 100s of thousands of years, but at least we wouldn't be melting all the ice caps, increasing global temperatures, and maybe even starting a runaway greenhouse effect. Even if you took all that nuclear waste and had a bad accident, there is no way you could damage as much land as will vanish once the ice sheets in Antarctica melt!

I like the idea of an electric trike - I'm thinking seriously about one of these too. I would plan to make it with a metal welded frame, and coroplast for a lot of the 'bodywork', and would make it sort of teardrop shaped for efficiency, and would make it covered so you can drive it in the rain. One issue would be to make it quite tough underneath, and have a seatbelt (which you can remove after a crash)... so that if some mad car driver tries to hit you (e.g. doesn't notice you), you can make an emergency detour off the road into the bush!

[MetroMPG]

Originally Posted by Daox

I don't think anyone here has done an electric trike

Don't let counterStrike hear you say that!

As for the bike/village thing, I'm an avid biker, but in fair weather only.

Put 1,100+ km on my bicycle last year (city is 10 km wide). But when it's cold or rainy, I'd like some shelter with my wheels, thanks! Thus the ForkenSwift.