Bill, I HAVE gone through a detailed business plan. And it has been reviewed by a team of six business advisors. Apparently you misunderstand. My goal is not to CONVERT cars, it is to build my own EV sports car. My initial prototype is a conversion, simply because that cut years off of the process. To build your own EV vehicle requires:
*Attractive body style *Chassis *EV drivetrain My business model allows me to stop at any point. I started with the body because I can finish the body, leave the car ICE (with twin turbos to hit the magic 750 horsepower "Supercar" level) and sell them like that. The body is about 75% finished. I did not start with the EV conversion because,mad you pointed out, it would cost a small fortune and destroy the value of the donor car. That makes no sense from a business perspective. I originally dismissed the EV route as cost prohibitive. But I met with that group of business advisors and they recommended the EV route to fill a current gap in the market. The ICE Supercar level is simply too crowded and represents a much higher business risk. Corvette and Viper have the entry cost too low to make any money there. While I t's a toss up whether to do the EV conversion or chassis after the body is done, the EV represents the quickest time to market unless I want to sell an ICE Supercar (not COMPLETELY out of the question). But the advisors said an ICE version would dilute the value of a later (and more expensive) EV version. I have absolutely no use for a small EV motorcycle so that does not interest me in the least. I belong to a Makerspace and several people have built EV bicycles or an EV go cart. That's not difficult, doing it at scale is. BTW, the target price for the finished car is $150,000 (recommended by the business advisors). No money to be made building these and selling them for less than that. If this doesn't work I'll still have a nice and unique EV sports car for a fraction of what a comparable car would cost and I'll just keep my day job. Sent from my iPhone > On Jan 13, 2016, at 10:44 AM, Bill Dube via EV <ev@lists.evdl.org> wrote: > > I am reminded of a tired old joke: > > A fellow won the lottery. A reporter asked him what he was going to do with > all the millions he had won. > He answered, "I'm going to invest it in my EV conversion conversion business > until it is all gone!" > > If you go through the effort to develop a detailed formal business plan, it > will become painfully obvious that there is simply no money to be made in the > conversion business. You will likely be a better person when you go bankrupt, > but you will indeed go broke. There are 1000's of folks throughout the world > that want to convert cars to electric for a living, and only a handful have > managed to scratch out a meager living in the EV conversion business. Pretty > much all of those folks had other income coming in to subsidize their EV > conversion efforts. > > Have fun, convert a car if you like, but don't fool yourself into thinking it > can be a viable business model. > > I would suggest that you convert a small motorcycle to electric. The cost of > conversion scales proportionally with the size of the vehicle. However, by > converting a small motorcycle, you will learn _everything_ about EV > conversion on a small scale and with a concomitantly small price tag. > > Bill D. > > >> On 1/13/2016 6:55 AM, via EV wrote: >> I am designing and building my own sports car. My eventual goal is to >> convert it to electric and sell them. The initial plan was to follow the >> NEDRA path and use a DC motor to get high performance and publicity >> (relatively) cheaply with the prototype. Then convert to AC motors to build >> the real cars. >> >> A potential wrench got thrown in the plan when I read about used Nissan >> Leafs being so cheap. I've been building and racing ICE cars for a long time >> and know you can't build as cheaply as you can buy used. Plus all the >> 'extra' stuff I'd get from scavenging a Leaf. Problem? Performance, or more >> accurately, lack thereof. The Leaf battery and motor will be far too small >> for my goals. And my car (at least the prototype) weighs a LOT more than a >> Leaf. >> >> So, would going the Leaf route provide any value or should I stick with the >> original plan? I do not care about range at all for the prototype, just >> performance. All the prototype has to do is look good, move on electric >> power and stick people in the seat for short test rides. It's the last goal >> that the Leaf power train won't do. >> >> BTW, I would just buy a used Tesla but I read they are worse than GM about >> who "owns" their cars. I'm afraid they wouldn't reactivate the drivetrain >> after I did the swap. They did that to a guy that rebuilt a wrecked Tesla >> himself. >> >> >>> On Jan 13, 2016, at 7:16 AM, via EV <ev@lists.evdl.org> wrote: >>> >>> Good morning Bob. Well I'm going to just jump right to the point. Don't. >>> Go down to your nearest Nissan dealer and look at all the Leaf lease >>> returns and pick out a beauty. For probably 10-12K. You will have a >>> vehicle 5-10 times better than the first one you could build. Well maybe. >>> But it will still be cheaper than anything you could build. Especially if >>> you were to use Lithium. My conversion cost twice what my 2013 Leaf cost. >>> With a warranty, new, with great heat and comfort. >>> >>> ----- Original Message ----- >>> >>> From: "Bobby Keeland via EV" <ev@lists.evdl.org> >>> To: "ev" <ev@lists.evdl.org> >>> Sent: Tuesday, January 12, 2016 6:40:12 PM >>> Subject: [EVDL] Books on converting a car to ev? >>> >>> I plan to buy a new ev when the range is high enough, and they don't cost >>> as much as a Tesla S. In the near term I am considering the conversion of >>> my 1951 Chevy pickup to ev, probably with it's own solar panels. I could >>> also charge it from the solar panels that power my house. Can anyone >>> recommend fairly up-to-date books that are specific to converting an ICE >>> vehicle to EV? >>> >>> Bob Keeland >>> Forest Dynamics >>> -------------- next part -------------- >>> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... >>> URL: >>> <http://lists.evdl.org/private.cgi/ev-evdl.org/attachments/20160112/af5d4ec8/attachment.htm> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub >>> http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org >>> Read EVAngel's EV News at http://evdl.org/evln/ >>> Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA) >>> >>> >>> -------------- next part -------------- >>> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... >>> URL: >>> <http://lists.evdl.org/private.cgi/ev-evdl.org/attachments/20160113/4d0e7713/attachment.htm> >>> -------------- next part -------------- >>> A non-text attachment was scrubbed... >>> Name: 1503320_10152131533022579_134103287_n[1].jpg >>> Type: image/jpeg >>> Size: 19534 bytes >>> Desc: not available >>> URL: >>> <http://lists.evdl.org/private.cgi/ev-evdl.org/attachments/20160113/4d0e7713/attachment.jpg> >>> _______________________________________________ >>> UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub >>> http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org >>> Read EVAngel's EV News at http://evdl.org/evln/ >>> Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA) >> _______________________________________________ >> UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub >> http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org >> Read EVAngel's EV News at http://evdl.org/evln/ >> Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA) > > _______________________________________________ > UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub > http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org > Read EVAngel's EV News at http://evdl.org/evln/ > Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA) > _______________________________________________ UNSUBSCRIBE: http://www.evdl.org/help/index.html#usub http://lists.evdl.org/listinfo.cgi/ev-evdl.org Read EVAngel's EV News at http://evdl.org/evln/ Please discuss EV drag racing at NEDRA (http://groups.yahoo.com/group/NEDRA)
