Spotted! ZENN with a tail pipe! (Microcar MC1)
 

ZENN, as some of you may remember, used to manufacture NEV class electric vehicles for sale in North America. They ceased production a couple of years ago.

I chuckled when I got to the Azores last month (to join a boat to sail back to Canada) and spotted a ZENN!

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1311884629

I was even more startled to hear one driving by, sounding like it had an outboard engine under the hood!

I found this one parked (maybe the same one I saw driving earlier - Horta is a fairly small town)... and DUN DUN DUN!!!

A TAILPIPE!

http://ecomodder.com/forum/attachmen...1&d=1311884629

(Yes, I took this picture specifically to post about it on EcoModder.)

Of course, if you're familiar with the ZENN story, you probably also know that the cars they used to turn into EV's were made from engine-less gliders that the company bought from a French automaker called "Microcar".

This car I saw in the Azores was a "Microcar MC1", and it apparently has a gasoline powered 505cc twin-cylinder engine good for 21 hp. Good thing it only weighs 355 kg / 782 lbs!

And if you haven't seen a ZENN car, you should know it's much smaller in person than the photo suggests.