[Doug]

Sorry I haven’t had much time to reply been finishing up a large job at work.

Larry It’s not necessary to shift through every gear actually the electric motor has so much more torque that you can start in fourth gear, it’s slow. I drive mainly starting in third then shifting to fourth, but once in a while I just want to shift through the gears. Since it doesn’t have a clutch, so you have to just let off the accelerator and shift. I have a couple of steep hills on the way to work,and third is the best gear for climbing them. first and second probably could be eliminated. Sorry about replying late.
Ed I would love to take it to Carlisle It’s just to far. When I get a chance this summer I’ll get some detailed photos and post them.
Keep having fun driving the TD’s
Doug

[Doug]

 I thought I would give everybody a update on the electric conversion. Last spring I moved the four lower batteries along side the electric motor. I installed them in the rear luggage compartment. The transfer of weight off the back of the car towards the front improved the handling considerably, the front end lowered slightly and the rear end came up. Before the front end seemed to be a little squirrelly  I drove it about 750 miles last summer with no problems. my mileage may have increased slightly, I don’t know if it is because of the battery packs breaking in or the way I drive it. The cost to drive it is dirt cheap. I don’t even notice it on the utility bill. Also it won 1st place last year at the QCBA British Auto fest Special Interest Class. http://qcbac.home.mchsi.com/autofest2010.htm
It was also featured on wired and a few other web sites.
http://www.wired.com/autopia/2010/08/electric-mg-td-replica/
It makes a great puddle jumper and with the price of fuel rising it will help slightly on the pocketbook.
When these batteries need to be replaced I plan on going with the LIPO’s which should decrease the weight and increase the distances between charges.
Doug

[Doug]

 I actually never broke it down,but all of the fabrication for the electrical  we did ourselves. including CNC machined battery boxes. I would guess about $6500.00 for the conversion we bought batteries at wholesale from a friend.

Actually EV,s technology isn’t rocket science. It’s  golf cart technology with a few more volts. It’s easier to understand than the combustion engine with fewer things to go wrong with it. Placing the batteries was the hardest part of the conversion. All battery boxes are “bolt in” so they can be removed.

I was looking at the enviromental aspect, a little bit of guilt, for running two premium vehicles and a diesel, the satisfaction of building something different, and of course cruising by the gas pump. One thing I did notice about the basic car after owning two 60 vintage Volkswagons I would have thought there would be more road noise with the vehicle that you could hear but it’s actually quiet.

   

[Doug]

The life expectancy of the batteries are about four to five years same as a golf cart. I’ve got $13,800 in it, with the cost of the car.  I paid $1800.00 with the engine leaking a small amount of oil. It needed restoration we took it down to the chassis, rebuilt the transaxle, new brakes, wheel cylinders, master cylinder,lines, removed clutch, and repainted the body. It has a on board charger. just plug it in to 110 volt. It takes about 6 1/2 hours to charge from totally dead. I’ve done that once, it’s not fun pushing it home, it has a computer that needs to be reprogramed after letting it drain completely. I usually plug it in every two days after driving back and forth to work(four miles one way).  It does have leather seats and burled wood dash that added to the overall cost. We did everything including upholstery. The dash was the only item we farmed out, most of the chrome pcs. except for bumpers, grille, headlight buckets was replaced. One thing I had to do was replace the dropped axle with a stock VW because the added weight up front lowered the front end to much.

 Yes you do miss the purr of the engine, but you should see the look on peoples faces when you go by and there is no engine noise. right now it’s been sitting in the garage since the first week of December. I charge the battery pack up last night it had dropped down to 65% in a month in a none heated garage. but the weather in northern Illinois has been in the teens.

[Doug]

  I converted a Classic Coach over to electric last year It’s running a 72 volt drive system with a 40 hp D&D EV motor and a Alltrax controller It has 12 6volt EV batteries and one lighting system 12volt. We did a complete frame off and added battery boxes to the area below on each side of the motor and seven batteries in the front. The performance is comparable to a 36hp Volkswagon. I’ve had it up to 55 on a level road. We drove it about a thousand miles last summer in fair weather back and forth to work and ironed out a few bugs. It will get about 15 to 20 miles to a charge. I have to hit the freeway when I exit my home and need to cruise at 45 for about two miles and that is a real drain on the battery pack. I think if I could keep it at about 35 it would increase the mileage up to about 25 to 30 The MG repicar was the ideal chassis for this conversion not only does it look good, it dead quiet when its running. Here’s the link to photos: http://www.diyelectriccar.com/garage/cars/142
One thing I will do this spring is move the four low riding batteries in the back up behind the rear seat, this just sits to low and does bottom out on my driveway curb. The LifePo batteries would have added $8000.00 at the time we built this. I was told the replicar weighs about 1400 lbs subtract 200 for the motor, add 12 batteries 62 lbs ea  744 lbs, motor and additional metal approx 110 lbs Total 2054 lbs. If you need any other info let me know.
Doug

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