21 Firms that will convert your classic into an EV | Hacker News Reader

21 Firms that will convert your classic into an EV

driving.ca

32 pointsRickJWagner70 comments

Certain cars will benefit from this more than others. Try to find a working drivetrain for an old MG or Jaguar! A EV swap is an easy way to bring those beauties to life.

On the other hand, those poor old 911s. Renowned for their fine balance, it's not going to be the same car at all with an extra 3000lbs of batteries.

I'd be kind of "meh" about the environmental benefits. To be registered as "classic" cars, most governments have strict annual mileage limits. That is if you even put many miles on a sports car in a year to begin with. It's probably better use of time and money to electrify boring commuter cars than garage queens.

I drive an older Porsche and am considering an EV conversion. I would opt to do it myself, and keep the weight and weight location (balance) exactly identical to stock. To do this, it would require using a relatively small battery with less range to keep the weight low.

A Tesla Model Y has a 1700lb battery, and 300 mile range. So as a rough approximation, I could get 70 miles of range with a 400lb battery in place of the 400lb engine. That would be more than enough for me. Realistically, I could probably go even further than 70 miles with that size battery since the Porsche is a much smaller car, that weighs only 60% what a model Y weighs.

I'll probably wait until my Porsche engine (which runs perfect now) has some sort of expensive failure. Rebuilding a porsche engine properly is crazy expensive, more than the parts for an EV conversion.

Here's the thing... if you're going to do all of the work and expense of an EV conversion (maybe $100k for a pro job, or $10-20k in parts plus a lot of work), you want something unique and fun to drive. Nothing is really as fun to drive as a Porsche...

I can see doing this on a 914, 924/944, 928, 955, 996/997 (but people probably aren’t calling a 997 “older” yet).

For a valuable Porsche, though, I’d 10/10 do an expensive repair and keep the car gas. (There’s a pretty good chance that the EV conversion would worsen the driving dynamics and kill a lot of the current fun.)

You can get an automatic 986 Boxster for really cheap, and the space to put batteries in the center is pretty ideal... I expect once Porsche starts selling EV Boxsters they will be pretty great

You should definitely also put a bunch of batteries where the gas tank is and maybe even the front trunk (it's tiny anyway). That way you get much better balance.

> I'll probably wait until my Porsche engine (which runs perfect now) has some sort of expensive failure.

Don't get me started ;)

While you would get a nice static balance that way, hanging heavy weights far from the center of a sports car would likely destroy its charm.

That's why the fuel tank is in the front to begin with: to counterbalance the weight of the engine a bit.

The engine is about as far off-center as it is possible to go on a Porsche, it's hanging over behind the rear axle.

Porsche has been trying to transition to mid-engined sports cars ever since they started for better handling... the first 356 prototype was even mid-engined. But consumers keep wanting to buy rear-engined 911s so they keep selling them.

Porsche's factory race cars have been mostly mid-engined all along, and the 914, Boxster, Cayman, and 918 Spyder are mass produced mid-engined models.

Mid-engined Porsches IMO are ideally suited for EV conversion because they have no back seat, but instead have room for a battery right in the middle of the car, where the impact on handling is reduced.

The Cayman and Boxster are amazing to drive but even less practical than a 911. It's pretty tricky how Porsche purposefully underpowers them compared to the 911 so they keep selling their big ticket items. Also those two little jump seats make it a more or less usable family car for people with small kids.

A two seater is more practical for me with one kid… I can take the carpool lane with just the two of us! I take my son to school everyday in a Boxster… the dealer said I’m the first person in an decade to get the airbag reprogrammed for a front child seat.

Porsche had a hilarious ad campaign for the Boxster supposedly marketing it towards families with kids… pointing out that you would have to leave the kids at home.

I actually disagree that the Boxster/Cayman are underpowered just to sell 911s, I think Porsche engineers know what they are doing there. They are lighter than an 911, and have less traction with the weight further forward. They can’t really make use of as much power as a 911, and don’t need as much. Maybe with a limited slip and real race tires, but otherwise the Boxster already has as much power as it can actually transfer to the ground. It looks underpowered on paper, but I don’t think that opinion would persist past driving one hard on a winding road… they have a ton more power than other similar light roadsters like an mr2, miata, or Lotus elise.

That's a good point, they may not be able to effectively use it. But: the point that they are trying really hard not to cannibalize 911 sales has been made many times before and has more than a grain of truth in it.

Your son must be smiling on his school ride :)

Haha... He is used to it, and is mostly jealous that other cars have roofs for shade and warmth (I leave the top down year round)

It's true though that they could easily upstage the 911 with something more like a street legal version of their mid engine race cars. They arguably did this with the Carrera GT and later 918, but they didn't sell well at over $800k.

A 100kWh battery weighs 1,300 pounds. The engine in a 911 from the 1970’s weighs roughly 450 lb + 100 lb for the transaxle etc.

So you could maintain the same weight and weight distribution and with a ~50kWh battery depending on how well the conversion is done.

The best way around the weight gain is a thin battery pack underneath the body, it lowers the ground clearance slightly, but you can distribute it evenly and it will be lowest for center of gravity.

That will not work. A 911 is super close to the ground already and the first bit of debris on the highway will kill your battery (and possibly kill you in the fire that will surely develop). You want a nice barrier between your batteries and road debris, and you want to make sure there is absolutely no way that your battery box will get scraped if you cross a traffic obstacle.

Isn't the 911 notorious for breaking traction?

Yes.

The 911 retained the basic layout and rear suspension design of the VW Beetle, and consequently its major flaw - a tendency to slide its tail out if you lifted off the throttle mid-corner. My cousin bought a Beetle convertible as her first car, and wrote it off within a few weeks because of this (luckily she had no major injuries).

The difference was, of course, Porsches had increasing amounts of power and grip and the corner speeds at which inexperienced Porsche drivers discovered this about their new toys was much higher than a Beetle. The early 911 Turbos must have been very scary vehicles to drive fast.

By the early 1990s Porsche had introduced a new suspension design that greatly reduced this tendency. Modern 911s of course have a plethora of suspension and electronics tweaks that all but eliminate this tendency in street driving, The more track-oriented versions even have systems that let you configure the suspension and power delivery to control how the car behaves on the limit if you’re skilled enough to use it.

If I were doing a conversion like this I’d be tempted to have a go at a luxury sedan from the 70s or early 80s, something like a W126 Mercedes S-Class or a Series III Jag.

Firstly, these are big and heavy cars (at least for their time) and can cope with the weight of a battery pack a lot better than a Porsche 356 or 911.

Second, they are still reasonably common and you’re not going to feel guilty for chopping up an incredibly rare piece of automotive history.

Third, an EV conversion is likely to result in a car that’s better for its intended purpose (except perhaps for 100mph+ autobahn cruising, which isn’t an issue unless you’re in Germany) than the original vehicle. An electric 911 conversion is almost certainly not a more fun canyon carver or track car than a petrol one, but an electric W126 Mercedes would be a very pleasant way to cruise.

Or, if the intended purpose is cruising around Hawaii, the ideal shell is an early '80s red Ferrari 308 GTSi.

As someone that's not all that into cars, what's the connection between Hawaii and the Ferrari?

The "Magnum, P.I." TV series, set in Hawaii, featured a Ferrari.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i_XcSRWzq2s&t=1m36s

I believe it's "Magnum, P.I." reference,

Old TV show, "Magnum PI" set in Hawaii

I wouldn’t put it past a Ferrari of that era to collapse in a heap if you put any extra weight in it.

Speaking as a diesel engine mechanic, this is a pretty trivial swap and one I absolutely find exciting. However, these firms need to be able to not only convert but dispose of some of the uglier stuff connected with these old drivetrains. Lead and asbestos and pcb's are all pretty common in old big block cars all the way to the late seventies.

Old drivetrains are still worth good money to hobbyists, even as cores for rebuilding. They won't be scrapped.

old cars get disposed of all the time, that system is already in place. Might need upgrading, but if so that's already true.

I'm genuinely excited for this becoming commercialized and more frequent. I very much love my car, but I'm not excited about how much pollution it introduces to the environment. Being able to have the internals rotated over to electric would be a huge benefit to me, I think!

People are doing this for fun basically, or if the car is otherwise non-functional. There's almost no possible way the energy involved in doing this in a working car outweighs the CO2 savings you'll get.

Especially an infrequently driven classic car. Unless you're running no cats and drive it well over a thousand miles a year you'd never reach a net neutral emissions.

This immediately made me think of the commercial in Back To The Future 2 where they're advertising hover conversions for older cars. And the price was "only" $39,999.95 which is probably pretty close to what these places are charging.

8 years too late and they don't even hover!

I'd prefer them convert my truck into an EV. For a 9mpg truck with a 35gal tank, that's a $140 fill-up for 315 mile range. Not even counting the maintenance on ICE trucks, that's decent savings over time. I'm confused why "small" (1/4 to 1 ton) truck EV conversion isn't a market. Buying a used truck and converting it should be cheaper than buying an EV truck, and there's classes of trucks with no EV alternative at all.

I plan to DIY this with an old VW Beetle I have. There are cheap conversion kits available from Alibaba[0], but need to do further research.

[0] https://www.alibaba.com/product-detail/Conversion-kit-for-VW...

Make sure you really check out the batteries before mounting anything manufactured 'cheap' that contains a bunch of lithium ion batteries.

Thanks, yes I'd rather source my own batteries for this.

Does electrification generally result in regenerative braking being possible? I would think the easiest way would be to leave the legacy brakes, but that means that range wouldn't be as good (especially around town).

Surely, at best, only on the power wheels. So unless you're kitting out an AWD "classic" you still need mechanical brakes for safety.

All cars need real old fashioned mechanical brakes on all 4 wheels, EV or not, AWD or not, and all mass produced EVs have them, just like ICE cars. Regenerative braking is only for relatively light braking, only works when the battery isn't full, and isn't as reliable as a hydraulic braking system (which include independent redundant circuits). An EV cannot do an emergency rapid stop with regen alone.

On the plus side, if you have regenerative braking, the brake system wears much less.

Tesla recommends Model Y owners "frequently pressing the brake pedal to apply the mechanical brakes and dry the brake pads and rotors" to avoid rust and corrosion, because the regenerative braking is so good that the brake pads will rust if not intentionally exercised.

https://www.tesla.com/ownersmanual/modely/en_gb/GUID-3DFFB07....

That's pretty much exactly right. Once you get the feel of one pedal driving you really just never touch the brakes except in genuine evasive maneuvers, or occasionally to finesse a precision stop (pulling up to a wall in a garage, things like that). They get almost no regular use.

Yeah I wondered about this. How do they coordinate between the two types of braking? Maybe the easiest way would be to have relatively high regen by default (approaching 1-pedal driving), and then leave the actual brake pedal alone? Otherwise it would be a bit complicated, and risky.

You don't really have to. If the default state with the accelerator released is to regen at a reasonable rate, the car remains very controlable. That's the way all Teslas work by default. So the car slows down as you release the accelerator and you can use the brakes to stop faster as needed.

You could simply activate the high regen with a switch (e.g. the brake light switch that is already there) and still leave all of the factory hydraulic brakes fully intact. This will activate regen only on a light touch of the brakes, and combine them together seamlessly with heavier braking.

Loads of kits I see include regen braking.

Only if you go with an A/C motor, which usually costs more and is somewhat more complex.

If you're rebuilding the wheel hubs, it's irresponsible to not add (at least front) disc brakes, they brake so much faster and safer than drums + shoes.

Most of the desirable classic european sports cars have 4 wheel discs even back into the early 1960s.

Does anyone have list for EU?

Personally until driving an EV matches the exact same experience as a gas car ..I.e filling car at gas station takes three minutes & same amount of ev chargers as gas stations through the US (in same varied locations) then I have no interest in spending more money to be inconvenienced.

Again just my opinion / preference yet EV sales are down and maybe not just my own preference.

IF you can charge at home it’s fine. You have to change your thinking. Those 3 minutes you spend filling up are saved. You might then spend some of them on long trips.

I have spent the same amount of time waiting for my mobile phone to charge as my car - 0 minutes, it charges when I sleep. On long trips it’s normally a 15 min charge every 2 - 3 hours and I’ve normally went to the toilet or grabbed something to eat anyway so it’s not really extra time. It’s just different.

Lots of people are incapable of planning or research which is the biggest issue for the masses. They haven’t quite “idiot proofed” the whole process.

Agreed. This whole discussion is really fueled (ha!) by a lot of ignorance on the subject.

Going into my third year as an EV owner and am really happy

Auto execs are coming clean:EVs aren't working https://www.businessinsider.com/auto-executives-coming-clean...

Exactly idiot proof ..as a user experience designer that's how I design and thus how I live ... idiot proof is simplicity. Apple strives for minimalist and simple user experiences that's how I design and again how I live life. Also I drive everywhere (many long road trips as I work remotely from anywhere) and frequently including in places where there's only one gas station.

It's not for everyone and again EV sales lately have been declining and Telsa is cutting the cost of their EVs to sell them.

Overall getting downvoted for saying EVs aren't for me and why. Can't have a opinion against EVs on HN.

About 44 million people, or 36% of renters, live in apartments, according to NMHC. There is no apparent plan to provide at-home charging for these folks.

EVs will never be identical to ICE. But it's also true already EVs are more convenient and safe in some ways. These arguments have been hashed and rehashed, so I won't draw it out. But you can fill at home, never need an oil change, and can run the car without fumes.

They're different enough that they're never going to be better in every conceivable metric. Much like how cars aren't better than horses or bicycles in every conceivable way.

Most people with an EV wake up everyday with more range than they need; you're spending more "time" refueling than they are

> ..I.e filling car at gas station takes three minutes & same amount of ev chargers as gas stations through the US

Counterpoint: I'll never again buy a liquid fueled vehicle unless someone can figure out how to put a pump in my garage.

People who want to argue about EV charging experience fail to realize that for the bulk of buyers, that stuff only matters on road trips. The remaining 95% of the time, we have cars that literally never need to go to a "fueling station" at all, ever.

Objectively my Model Y spends probably less than 10% of the time "fueling" than any car I've ever owned, simply because it takes me all of 3-4 seconds to plug and unplug it vs. driving to and from gas stations.

Most people rarely drive outside the range of a modern EV. If you do frequently, you can have two cars, or buy a plug in hybrid...

I think "range extender" EVs with a very small backup generator like the BMW i3 + rex are a pretty great solution to this problem. They can run on regular gasoline as needed, but keep pretty much all of the benefits of a regular EV as well.

We are a few wars in the Middle East and a wet bulb event or two away from this type of argument falling into the “get a horse” bin.

Why are EV sales down and Ford is moving /embracing hydrogen.

Those are data market points not just my own opinion.

I drive everywhere and frequently some in remote areas where there's no chargers but there's a gas station.

Not a kool aid drinker rather someone pragmatic and usually on the money with my forward thoughts I.e. look at my comments from the past two months against Cruise robot cars ...frat bros trying to kill it and doing anything to do so ..reminded me of Ubers attempt at self driving n we all see what happened with them and now Cruise.

Might want to check who is paying for the news sources you're looking at. EV sales are up double digit percentages annually for several years.

https://www.iea.org/data-and-statistics/charts/electric-car-...

Are EV sales down? Just about everything I can find is saying they are going up. And ford has a small trial of hydrogen vans which doesn't seem to be getting anywhere near the investment of their battery EVs.

"And yet, electric vehicles are piling up at dealership lots." November 1st 2023 ... other article is from April.

https://www.cnbc.com/2023/11/01/why-dealers-say-ev-sales-hav...

A entire youtube CNBC piece on this too https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cZlsZwcIgpc&t=10s

But i can always go and check at various Telsa dealers as the media spins its own narrative ... Musk is now labeled pro-right. CNBC is more left ... not a fan of the news .. what to believe except EVs aren't for me as I drive frequently and many times in remote places.

That doesn't mean sales are down, it just means that they're being built faster than they're sold. Car manufacturers are already adjusting their build plans.

Auto execs are coming clean:EVs aren't working https://www.businessinsider.com/auto-executives-coming-clean...

Again, basically evidence that sales aren't growing as quickly as thought, they still aren't down.

just watch they are flat now and sales will decline and for the following reasons...

- Musk allienated a portion of his customer base by jumping indirectly into the horse poo that is politics

- Musk hates remote work because his customers are no longer commuters. Now a lot are remote work travelers and EV sucks for long road trips (time it takes to fill it at a charger & lack of comparably infrastructure to gas cars) especially in remote areas.

- Musk only can sell his cars to upper middle class and to the rich ... apartment complexes do not have EV chargers. Funny reading all the upper middle class and rich folks trying to beat their drum and excitement for their EV and how they charge it at home. Ok that's cool but the average person is more of the population then you and they surely arent buying Telsas.

- As you can see other car manufacturers are not having the same success with EVs that Telsa HAS HAD and now Telsa isnt anymore and for the noted reasons above.

Im pretty forward thinking in what I say here (gets downvoted a ton) but my record of my forward thinking 7 out of 10 or more (most recently pointing out Cruise is no bueno months before they came clean noting the same thing; taking their robot training wheel cars off the road unfortunately after mangling an innocent pedetersian ) is on the money (intuition). No arrogance meant just my intuition is more right then not.

[shrug]

Whatever. I live in rural Minnesota and I'm seeing more EV's on the road every day now. Around here, at least, there are far more homeowners than there are apartment dwellers (not a lot of apt buildings on farmland!) so charging's not an issue.

im not always right yet a lot of times my intuition is more right then wrong... but let's see :-)

Also i forgot to mention... another reason I say all this is ive talked to people who out of nowhere say they loathe Musk too and would never buy a Telsa. These are wealthy folks! Also pointing to the disadvantages of owning one when they are now working remotely.

Do you own one? Any buyers remorse now and or in a few years ;-) Time will tell :)

*Not seeing a ton here in rural central PA by the MD line

cheers

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