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Location: East of Seattle since 1992, 615' Elevation, Zone 8b - originally from SF Bay Area
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Originally Posted by Airborneguy
I wish I had the money to convert a Pre-2000 Mazda Miata. I daily drove a '94 in 2012-2013. It's my second favorite of my many cars to my Model 3. I will most likely own one again some day.
For me it would be a Morris Minor, that would be a huge performance improvement on a cool little car that's underpowered. It would be far more capable of managing in today's traffic.
For hub motors, it'd have to be for at least two wheels as you can't (or at least shouldn't) have it be lopsided where driver side has one motor, but the passenger side does not or vice versa. So the options would be two motors on each of the front wheels, two motors on each of the back wheels, or four motors on each wheel. You can potentially do hub motors for one set of wheels (back wheels for instance) and then a single conventionally mounted wheels driving the axle (on the front wheels for instance). That'd be interesting as then you can preserve a lot of the mechanicals of the original vehicle, but still bump it to AWD with torque vectoring.
You do want to make use of regenerative braking if possible and in-wheel hub motors can do that, so that's nice.
The batteries are tricky for now. You sort of want to assess how much range you want and where you want to put the batteries. I've seen EV restomods where they opt for smaller battery packs and mounted in a way so that the weight distribution and total weight after conversion are about the same, but given where energy density is now, that generally means lower range EVs. About one more doubling of energy density though would likely fix that though.
Interesting. I would consider malaise era RWD compacts like the Mustang II and one of GM’s Monza clones. An AMC Gremlin would be another option. Probably would make them faster than their performance
version was when new.
Be interesting to see a full VW Beatle conversion with regenerative braking, disc brakes, and upgraded suspension.a Chevrolet Corvair could also be a good EV conversion.
While not a Beatle, Jonathan Ward did an EV conversion on a "Thing" which I thought was pretty cool.
Be interesting to see a full VW Beatle conversion with regenerative braking, disc brakes, and upgraded suspension.a Chevrolet Corvair could also be a good EV conversion.
I think one interesting direction to go on this is with in-wheel hub motors.
Electric motors have really high power density and for a very cheap price and that's why we're seeing so many EVs with incredibly high power output. Motors are also very efficient without much room left for further efficiency within the motor itself. Where they do have more room to improve is lower costs and even greater power density by volume and by weight. I think with that, it would be interesting to see how hub motors get factored in as they're very efficient in terms of mechanical loss since they'd deliver power straight to where it's needed and can yield interesting new options for converting FWD vehicles to RWD or AWD or RWD to FWD or AWD as well as some interesting torque vectoring possibilities that would otherwise be much more difficult in a restomod. The Achille's Heel would be the unsprung weight and that's where the possibility of even greater power density by weight can come in. Fix that up and get them even cheaper alongside battery improvements, and we're maybe looking at opening things up for some very interesting conversions accessible to more people.
It's an interesting idea, OyCrumbler - you don't need to worry about where to put the electric motor(s), or how to rig the new drivetrain either - the power is being generated at the point of application. As you say, unsprung weight does become a concern, but especially in a retrofit, I think one can argue that the advantages outweigh the disadvantages. As you know, Aptera is using this kind of hub-mounted motors in their maiden offering.
I wouldn’t do this for the same reason I never got onboard the restrooms/pro-touring fad. If I wanted the performance and amenities of a modern car, I’d rather just get the modern car. I like classic cars spicifically because they AREN’T modern and have a distinct feel to them.
That said, this may be the inevitable necessity to keep fresh original drivetrains on the market for those of us who do want to retain that more pure, original feel. I’d be the last person to stop someone from doing whatever it is they want to their cars.
Honestly, if i had the budget, I would do an EV restomod on a classic just for the challenge of doing it. I'm an engineer by trade (mechanical, although i do a lot of electrical related work) and this sort of thing is right up my wheelhouse. I've done things like retrofit ABS, or automatic climate control systems onto older vehicles. I enjoy the challenge of integrating modern tech with older chassis.
Do I think i'd actually enjoy the finished product? Probably not. I'd rather do something like a Coyote swap and manual trans. Would I enjoy the challenge of an EV retrofit? Absolutely.
But i'm not dropping that sort of coin on a project like that. Well, not unless I knew i had a buyer when done and would make a profit.
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