Notable eco-cars (old & new) spotted in the wild: post your pics!

[freebeard]

An Arcimoto electric reverse trike on the railroad overpass in Eugene. But that's home to them.

[some_other_dave]

I also see enough Volts, Teslas, and Leafs every day (not to mention Prii!) that I hardly notice them.

However, I did see something a little more unusual today...





A green Zapcar.

-soD

[cRiPpLe_rOoStEr]

Sure it doesn't qualify as a car, but maybe as eco?


Cab-overs like this Kia Bongo require only a 4-pot Diesel under 3-litre to perform the same jobs an American truck would require some gasser above 4-litre...

[darcane]

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

Sure it doesn't qualify as a car, but maybe as eco?

We have LOTS of those Can-Am Spyders around here. I can't really figure out why though. They seem ridiculously expensive for what they are.

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

Cab-overs like this Kia Bongo require only a 4-pot Diesel under 3-litre to perform the same jobs an American truck would require some gasser above 4-litre...

Isuzu cab-overs are popular commercial vehicles and are probably comparable to that Kia. With a 3L turbo diesel, they are relatively inexpensive to operate.

[justme1969]

Isuzu cab-overs are popular commercial vehicles and are probably comparable to that Kia. With a 3L turbo diesel, they are relatively inexpensive to operate.

I worked at a heavy truck dealership and first hand can tell ya those things were not reliable. nice with good power and fuel econ though.
better bet is 345? IH turbo v6 diesel nearly all delivery vans had them.
smallish diesel with real world pulling power that runs for 700k+ before rebuilding lower end.
cant remember exact displacement????? bunk!

[doviatt]

Originally Posted by radioranger

Sorry no pics , not that smart, yet , but doing some research today found out Dodge made an eco car back in 75 called the Dodge Dart lite, it was lightened with an aluminum tranny case ,intake, special exhaust and higher gearing and epa rated at 36 mpg, I wiki searched it today the Plymouth equivalent was called the Feather duster LOL , but true.

Funny. I owned a Dart Lite for about a year. Bought it for $300 late '80s and sold it for $300 a year later. I remember nothing about it other than "3 on the tree". Linkage was so bad I had to carry a tire iron in the front seat to reach underneath and bang the linkage to get it to shift sometimes.

[euromodder]

Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr

Cab-overs like this Kia Bongo require only a 4-pot Diesel under 3-litre to perform the same jobs an American truck would require some gasser above 4-litre...

They'd get a 2L - 2.5L TDi or similar in Europe ;-)

[darcane]

Saw one of these driving around last week:

I couldn't snap a picture myself, so that will have to do.

Article about them:
A Million Carb-Light Miles Makes Frito-Lay Crave More

I haven't heard of Washington giving incentives for EV delivery trucks like California, but they must have found it worthwhile to have at least a few up here too.

[NachtRitter]

Cool! Seems like a perfect candidate for electric... filling up the cargo area to capacity with something like chips probably doesn't come even close to the GVWR, leaving a lot of headroom for batteries... and specific delivery territories means they can most efficiently tailor the routes to the range of the electric trucks (and use the ICE trucks only for routes outside the range of the electrics). Sounds like the technology & price has come to the point where the company is seeing benefits even without incentives, which is awesome! Also a great way for power companies to sell their excess power they would typically have available overnight... rather than dumping it as waste heat.

Thanks for the post!

[War_Wagon]

Wow. Still trying to figure out how much debt to go into with this one lol. At the big auction I go to, one of the best sellers is a corporately owned Mercedes Benz store in North Vancouver. North Vancouver has always been an expensive place to live, so a car traded in at a North Van Mercedes dealership has most likely been owned by 1 person all it's life, and has always been maintained by Mercedes. For example, that location is selling a 2003 E class Mercedes with 26k KMs (16k miles) next week. No, that's not a typo, it's a 10 year old car with 16000 miles on it. I have seen it, driven it, and I would bet my Insight on it that those are the real miles. But, that's not what I want to buy. This is:



1984 300SD. Traded in at the North Van Merc store with, get this, 211k KMs (131k miles). Mint blue leather interior, 9/10 body & paint. I have no idea how to value it, but holy crap it's nice!