Auto & Car Blog

Filed under: EV/Plug-in, Green Culture, Green Daily

Following in the footsteps of our friend Andrew Angellotti, another teenager has taken it upon himself to convert a vehicle to fun on electric power on his own time. This time, the story revolves around 17-year-old Lucas Laborde, who took an old Bradley GT II kit car and put in about 150 hours to swap the engine for an electric motor and a set of batteries providing 96 volts. Luke’s father bought him the $5,000 vehicle on eBay and then spent another $5,700 on the parts needed to make it run on electricity, according to the AP. One problem he had was that the 640 pounds worth of lead-acid batteries caused the frame to warp and the doors to not close. The windshield wipers don’t work yet and the car has a top speed of just 45 miles per hour, but it’s clear from the article that none of these shortcomings make Luke any less proud of his work. Congrats, and if anyone’s got pictures, send ‘em in.

[Source: AP via Green Daily]

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Filed under: EV/Plug-in, Chrysler, USA

If you want an electric car with some serious style, you could either fork over a ton of dough for an electrically-converted DeLorean or you could convert an older muscle car of some sort. We advise the latter. Take the early ’70s Chrysler A-Body, like the Plymouth Duster, for example. It’s relatively lightweight, has lots of room for batteries and has the easy-to-convert front engine, rear-wheel drive architecture with a full frame. Perfecto! And, you can even see an example of the work done rather nicely in a blog format.

Electricity storage comes by way of 26 six-volt Trojan T-125 batteries wired up to deliver 156 volts to the Netgain Warp 9 DC motor. A Logisysystems controller is capable of sending 550 Amps to the motor, which should make this machine move pretty smartly. The original three-speed manual transmission has had its clutch and flywheel removed and the motor is mated up. Batteries are now being installed. Check out all the progress here.

[Source: Electric Mopar via CarDomain]

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Chrysler makes a big jump into electric-hybrid technology with the announcement of three new production-intent vehicles that feature advanced electric-hybrid technology – one each for its brands Chrysler, Dodge and Jeep. The automaker also launched a new enclosed GEM low-speed neighborhood car. The new vehicles are the Dodge EV, an all-electric performance sports car; the […]

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Filed under: EV/Plug-in, Zap

Zap’s been having a pretty good last few weeks. There was the groundbreaking at the Kentucky plant and now we hear that August electric vehicle sales set a new record. According to a new release from Zap (pasted after the jump), the company sold $737,000 worth (unaudited) of vehicles in August, compared to $392,000 in August 2007. Back in April 2007, Zap announced a “sale” of $79 million, but we had questions about that.

Considering the earlier questions, I asked Zap for some clarification of the most recent sale numbers, including how many of each EVs were sold. I wondered if this was another “sale” to a partner, but Zap’s response indicates that this is not the case this time: “Sales are mostly to individual consumers. Don’t have a breakdown but most of the sales were for trucks,” they wrote to AutoblogGreen. That’s what we know.

[Source: ZAP]

Continue reading Zap sells $737,000 worth of electric vehicles in August

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Filed under: Hybrids/Alternative, Sedans/Saloons, Green, Videos, Chevrolet, GM

General Motors’ goal for the exterior of the 2011 Chevy Volt is to create as much pizazz as possible with superior aerodynamics to ensure the least amount of parasitic loss for the electric drivetrain. The interior, however, is all about how the driver interacts with the vehicle. And with the Volt, GM designers attempted to pull off a Buck Rodgers meets Apple iPod theme.

A quick glance at the futuristic Volt interior shows a very unique approach to integrating design and technology. The first thing we noticed was that GM decided to use two seven-inch LCD screens, with one working as the main driver instrument panel (no gauge cluster here) and the other for everything from navigation to tracking battery charges. Both screens are user configurable, and two different configurations can be saved for two different drivers.

Follow the jump for more including a video demonstration of the Chevy Volt’s interior by one of its designers.

Continue reading VIDEO: Walkthrough of 2011 Chevy Volt interior

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Filed under: Convertibles, Hybrids/Alternative, Green

The Tesla Roadster launch has been anything but silky-smooth, but the upstart EV automaker hopes its problems are in the rear view mirror with the completion of Drivetrain 1.5, which includes an upgraded electric motor and swapping the original two-speed automatic transmission for a Borg Warner-sourced one speed. The changes will improve the Tesla Roadster’s instant torque from 211 to 280 lb-ft while also improving its range by 10% to a shockingly impressive 244 miles.

Drivetrain 1.5 also means Tesla can finally ramp up production of its well-publicized roadster. Within the next few weeks, Tesla will begin producing 10 Roadsters per week. By next March, that number will increase to 40 samples per week, which will go a long way toward satisfying demand for the sexy EV. The new, upgraded Drivetrain 1.5 is so much better than the mechanicals it replaces, Tesla will keeps its promise and retrofit the 38 models already produced and delivered with the new equipment. Hit the jump to view Tesla’s official press release.

[Source: Autoblog Green]

Continue reading Tesla ends development of Drivetrain 1.5, ready to ramp up production

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