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OK, I have a plan.
Not a very good plan.
But a plan none the less.
I reckon you could get pretty much everything you need to make an electric car conversion out of a fork lift truck. Battered but working trucks sell on ebay for £600-£800. You could get a bunch of that back as scrap or spare parts for the stuff you don't need off it.
I'm thinking a manual car would be the best to do, something large enough to accommodate all the stuff, say a Mercedes W124 or something.
I'm thinking manual because auto boxes need vacuum signals and all that jazz to work.
However maybe an autobox with a manual valve body would be the answer as I'm in two minds about what you do about a clutch, being as an electric motor can sit at 0 RPM you don't need a clutch unless you want to be able to change gears.
Now I notice some converted cars either don't have a gearbox or are permanently fixed in an intermediate gear.
I think this is missing a trick? Surely you want to be able to use the gears still to enable a decent cruising speed.
You'd need electric motors to power the PAS, and a vacuum pump so the brake servo would still work (or a manual brake conversion)
I reckon pretty much everything else could come off the fork truck.
Any thoughts?
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1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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Sounds interesting! Id like to do this to something small and 60's, but you are right about needing something largeish to get all the gubbins in. Would you use the batterys from the forklift? Or are they huge?
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First of all, a Mercedes is far from ideal if you want a budget conversion. Small and light is the aim of the game for electric vehicles, so anything Mercedes-based is probably less than optimal, unless you plan on carrying a frankly enormous amount of batteries. The batteries from the old fork-lift truck will probably be worn out and hence give you a range of about 5 miles. Getting any more than about 20 miles range requires ludicrous investment in batteries. Have a look around at some of the dedicated EV sites, but don't make the mistake of thinking that a decent EV conversion can be done cheaply. I doubt that you'll see any change from 3000 GBP for a usable electric car, no matter where you get your parts from.
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I only need about a ten mile range on mine, to get to my workshop and back. But I thought the batteries would be the pricey bit. To be fair I havent put loads of thought into it yet, just musing really.
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Darrel
Posted a lot
Posts: 1,167
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Unfortunately Forklift batteries are not suited to a road car. There is a very fast drag race electric car that uses 100's of Laptop battery cells, however these cost tens of thousands on their own. Looking into it a few years ago the only serious electric cars had a motor at each wheel. By the time you put a Very large single motor in it, along with all the losses in the drivetrain they are not usually very feasable. With a brushless motor at each corner its just a simple case of using a speed controller on them. Far more efficient.
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There is an electric drag beetle around Hungerford way. I'm going to see what I can find out about that, though I expect it has a small range.
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Last Edit: Jan 7, 2010 14:41:16 GMT by mrlunatic
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Unfortunately Forklift batteries are not suited to a road car. There is a very fast drag race electric car that uses 100's of Laptop battery cells, however these cost tens of thousands on their own. Looking into it a few years ago the only serious electric cars had a motor at each wheel. By the time you put a Very large single motor in it, along with all the losses in the drivetrain they are not usually very feasable. With a brushless motor at each corner its just a simple case of using a speed controller on them. Far more efficient. Jagman, having studied this in a 4th year Automotive Engineering subject recently, I can tell you that hub motors are no longer in fashion at the moment, and that larger single or twin centrally-mounted motors connected to the wheels with regular driveshafts are back in. There are many reasons for this, but at the end of the day it is too difficult to build a hub motor with sufficient power to satisfy your average car buyer. As you have suggested though, the cost of batteries is the killer. One of the final-year project teams at my uni was recently building an electric-converted Mazda MX-5, but even with basic corporate sponsorship they couldn't afford the battery pack, so were on the lookout for a battery sponsor to tip in about Au$10,000.
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I work 6 or 7 miles from home. But my theoretical project needs to be able to do more than that purely out of technical completeness I guess.
A motor at each drive wheel is possible even scavenging old fork lift stuff. Just junk the original back axle and gearbox and get fabricarting brackets. If you used a FWD base car you could make your own hybrid this way. Don't think I haven't thought about that one.
I'm not into the idea of it being expensive though....
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Last Edit: Jan 7, 2010 14:42:25 GMT by akku
1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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spiny
Club Retro Rides Member
Wiki Admin
I am abivalent towards car electrics ...
Posts: 1,331
Club RR Member Number: 167
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Electric car conversion...spiny
@spiny
Club Retro Rides Member 167
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scrapheap challenge did an electric car episode and the winners used the gubbins out of a milk float and stuck it in one of those little suzuki jeep things - as far as i can remember they mated the motor directly to the gearbox with an adapter plate so could use the gears. it certainly went like curse word round the course will try and find youtube etc
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spiny
Club Retro Rides Member
Wiki Admin
I am abivalent towards car electrics ...
Posts: 1,331
Club RR Member Number: 167
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Electric car conversion...spiny
@spiny
Club Retro Rides Member 167
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neato, the full episode is on youtube:
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Colonelk
Posted a lot
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Electric car conversion...Colonelk
@colonelk
Club Retro Rides Member 83
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forklift batteries also weigh about 2 tons on their own AFAIK. As said, think light small hatchback. This also has the advantage of a) not needing PAS, hence not needing a (battery draining) motor to power it b) if you set the brakes up right, you wouldnt need servo assist either, saving another bit of complication don't underestimate rolling resistance as well. You want this right down. don't use an auto, the motor from the forklift wont be the beefiest to start with, so sapping any of that is a bad idea really. You don't need the clutch to pull away, so it wouldnt matter in stop start traffic.
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spiny
Club Retro Rides Member
Wiki Admin
I am abivalent towards car electrics ...
Posts: 1,331
Club RR Member Number: 167
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Electric car conversion...spiny
@spiny
Club Retro Rides Member 167
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skip to 42:30 on the vid ^ to see the car based one run edit: hmm, maybe not as fast as i remember then
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Last Edit: Jan 7, 2010 15:50:22 GMT by spiny
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Steampower is the way forward (again), not electric.
Or have you tried a bicycle? 7 miles is a pittance, and there are fine mountain bikes for winter/rain/offroad use too.
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Team Blitz Ford Capri parts worldwide: Restoration, Road, or Race. Used, Repro, and NOS, ranging from scabby to perfect. Itching your Capri jones since 1979! Buy, sell, trade. www.teamblitz.com blitz@teamblitz.com
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With the 'ecomuscle hybrid' project the electric motor was a cylinder type that was mounted in the drivetrain. (cutting the propshaft and shortening both halves to locate it in the middle) This way the motor becomes a dynamo charging the batteries if needed whilst you are using the engine to propel the car. At least this way you never get caught out of range of the next battery charge. The motor.... as is the case with most DC motors..... doesn't need a gearbox cos it provides max' torque throughout the revs range. This is why electric propulsion is very efficient for drag racing.
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'71 Arrocuda.... '71 Sunbeam Rapier Turbo (The Grim Rapier).... '63 Hymek D7076..... Audi GT5S
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MWF
Posted a lot
Posts: 2,945
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Now I notice some converted cars either don't have a gearbox or are permanently fixed in an intermediate gear. I think this is missing a trick? Surely you want to be able to use the gears still to enable a decent cruising speed. Isn't this something to do with the linear power and efficiency of electric motors, i.e they give out the same power at any speed? So a gearbox would just cause more transient losses?
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Isn't this something to do with the linear power and efficiency of electric motors, I.e they give out the same power at any speed? So a gearbox would just cause more transient losses? This is so! Is a modern version of the technology used in diesel-electric locomotives and they ..... from a standing start pull trains weighing thousands of tons and don't have any mechanical gearboxes in the transmission. Only difference is that they carry a generator set around with them to power the motors rather than relying on batteries.
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'71 Arrocuda.... '71 Sunbeam Rapier Turbo (The Grim Rapier).... '63 Hymek D7076..... Audi GT5S
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Steampower is the way forward (again), not electric. Or have you tried a bicycle? 7 miles is a pittance, and there are fine mountain bikes for winter/rain/offroad use too. I am interested in a steam car, I keep going back to the 1969 Pontiac steam car project. Sillyness but cool sillyness. External combustion engines are even less efficient than internal ones but I did think of doing some real mad max style thing maybe on an old Jag with a meths powered boiler in the back with a huge chimney. "ride a bike" is about as technically innovative solution as "go on the bus" or "drive a Lexus" or something. Cycling sucks. you get tired and sweaty and cold and wet and run over and stuff.
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1941 Wolseley Not Rod - 1956 Humber Hawk - 1957 Daimler Conquest - 1966 Buick LeSabre - 1968 Plymouth Sport Fury - 1968 Ford Galaxie - 1969 Ford Country Squire - 1969 Mercury Marquis - 1970 Morris Minor - 1970 Buick Skylark - 1970 Ford Galaxie - 1971 Ford Galaxie - 1976 Continental Mark IV - 1976 Ford Capri - 1994 Ford Fiesta
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