Posted this on Retro Rides but there are a few of us on here with old modified motors. Whether you're into green issues or not, like it or not, fuel prices are going up. I've been interested in eco conversions on retro vehicles for some time and have been looking into home electric conversions and even ways to bodge on my own hybrid system so I can roll around town on the electric motor and fire up the engine when I need to get a move on.
Going all electric is dead easy. If you've got space to hide the batteries then there are numerous electric conversions out there and have been since the mid 90's. The advantage of converting an older car is you get the light weight, you use deep draw lead-acid technology which is cheap and plentiful and, even though you have to change the batteries once a year, the running costs are still quite a bit lower than petrol.
The main problem I've had up to now is how to do a hybrid. Most hybrids are FWD and a lot bigger than older cars. To rob all the gubbins from a wrecked Prius, CRZ or gen 2 Insight would be easy enough, but stuffing it all under something like a Nova would just be impossible. And on top of that, a lot of our cars are RWD which pretty much rules out our options.
Until now. BMW are doing a hybrid system in the next generation 1-Series. This is the funny looking little hatch type car, which happens to be RWD. According to these links it'll be hitting the market late 2011 to early 2012:
http://www.worldcarfans.com/109111923143/bmw-1-series-hybrid-spied-for-first-time
http://www.autoblog.com/2009/11/19/spy-shots-bmw-1-series-hybrid-spotted-in-munich/
This is good news for us who want to drop economical motors into our cars. I'm sure it won't be too long before the first wreckers come up for sale, so by 2013 we'll probably have quite a few powerplants in circulation. Those Bimmers aren't the lightest of cars, so if they can do 55mpg combined, when stuffed in a light retro shell they should be able to stretch their legs a lot further.
Here's a bit of Bradley GT electric action:
http://blog.sierratradingpost.com/in-the-news/teenager-builds-electric-car-for-10000/
Going all electric is dead easy. If you've got space to hide the batteries then there are numerous electric conversions out there and have been since the mid 90's. The advantage of converting an older car is you get the light weight, you use deep draw lead-acid technology which is cheap and plentiful and, even though you have to change the batteries once a year, the running costs are still quite a bit lower than petrol.
The main problem I've had up to now is how to do a hybrid. Most hybrids are FWD and a lot bigger than older cars. To rob all the gubbins from a wrecked Prius, CRZ or gen 2 Insight would be easy enough, but stuffing it all under something like a Nova would just be impossible. And on top of that, a lot of our cars are RWD which pretty much rules out our options.
Until now. BMW are doing a hybrid system in the next generation 1-Series. This is the funny looking little hatch type car, which happens to be RWD. According to these links it'll be hitting the market late 2011 to early 2012:
http://www.worldcarfans.com/109111923143/bmw-1-series-hybrid-spied-for-first-time
http://www.autoblog.com/2009/11/19/spy-shots-bmw-1-series-hybrid-spotted-in-munich/
This is good news for us who want to drop economical motors into our cars. I'm sure it won't be too long before the first wreckers come up for sale, so by 2013 we'll probably have quite a few powerplants in circulation. Those Bimmers aren't the lightest of cars, so if they can do 55mpg combined, when stuffed in a light retro shell they should be able to stretch their legs a lot further.
Here's a bit of Bradley GT electric action:
http://blog.sierratradingpost.com/in-the-news/teenager-builds-electric-car-for-10000/
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